Between meals

While on a year of study in Paris in 1927, Liebling acquired the friendship and tutelage of Yves Mirande, ‘one of the last great gastronomes of France’, beginning a joyous apprenticeship in the fine art of eating. Told with gluttonous joie de vivre, Between Meals expounds on the delights and pitfalls of a life dedicated to food, from bad ros (‘a pinkish cross between No-Cal and vinegar’) to lobster a l’Amricaine (‘I have never personally inquired into the mysteries of its fabrication; I am content to love a masterpiece of painting without asking how the artist mixed his colours’), to a memorable stay at a Swiss slimming clinic with a masseur named Sprudli. Witty, grouchy and full of gusto, ‘Between Meals’ has the exquisite sensuality of a Michelin-starred meal and the delicious, catty wit of the perfect dinner guest. It is a love song to food, wine, and Paris.