Hindustan Times
Eat, read, love
I am not sure how well AA Gill is known as a food writer in India, but if you have not read him, you could do worse than to make his acquaintance. He is an erudite and immensely funny companion, and the best way to get to know him is to read Table Talk: Sweet and Sour Salt and Bitter, his collection of food columns.
From the mid-1990s, Gill started writing a food column for the Sunday Times (London). Before that, before, as he says, he “cut his critical mil teeth”, he wrote for Tatler magazine. This book – opinionated, full of comic brio and sharp observation – brings together some of those columns, and showcases food writing at its wittiest.
Gill does not so much review restaurants. He largely writes on themes, and the book is arranged around themes (Appetite, Ingredients…) which are then broken into sub themes (Nouvelle cuisine, Cabbage…). Each essay focuses on one sub theme.
When his back is up, Gill can be as acerbic as few other food writers can. He savages vegetarians (“Vegetarians are people who get pleasure from not eating things”) and organic food (“What I mind most about it is that it has reinvigorated the old class distinction in food”). No wonder I loved Table Talk.
Here is a longish interview with Gill.
And here are a couple of his fatherhood columns in GQ magazine.
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