10 Great Novels for Food Lovers

There are no shortage of thought-provoking food books on the shelves (or in your Kindle library) these days, what with best-sellers like Mary Roach's pop-science triumph Gulp and Michael Pollan's latest. But there's a time and a place for food-politics treatises and highminded cooking manuals, and summertime ain't it—when you're swinging in a hammock or lounging on the beach, only a novel will do. Thankfully, there are some fine works of fiction that offer plenty of fodder for the food obsessive. Some revolve entirely around life in the kitchen, while others use dining culture as critical scene-setting, or illuminate characters through what and how they eat. In all cases, these novels hit the sweet spot for a great summer read, side-stepping the 'required reading' feel of certain non-fiction tomes while still saying something interesting about food and—in many cases—coming through with some serious literary food porn (fooderotica?!) to heat things up. Here are 10 of our favorite novels in which food plays a critical role, with excerpt from each author to help you choose your next summer read.

Author: Emile Zola Year of publication: 2009 Buy it here Why it's great for food obsessives: There are few better ways to understand a culture than by investigating its markets, where commerce and appetites collide, and where all social classes intermingle in one seething mass of scents, tastes, and sounds. And there are few food markets as famous as the historic Les Halles in Paris, which is setting for this classic 19th-century novel by Emile Zola, one of the all-time great food writers in fiction. The tale follows Florent, who becomes a fish inspector at Les Halles after escaping from prison, where he ended up after the French coup of 1851. The novel offers a fascinating look at the French working class and political unrest in the capital, but it's perhaps most notable for its sensory descriptions of the charcutiers, cheesemongers, and other food merchants who create the backdrop for the plot. One fromage-driven scene is so beautifully wrought, it's become widely known as the "Cheese Symphony" (see below).

Tasty excerpt

Beneath the stall show-table, formed of a slab of red marble veined with grey, baskets of eggs gleamed with a chalky whiteness; while on layers of straw in boxes were Bondons, placed end to end, and Gournays, arranged like medals, forming darker patches tinted with green. But it was upon the table that the cheeses appeared in greatest profusion. Here, by the side of the pound-rolls of butter lying on white-beet leaves, spread a gigantic Cantal cheese, cloven here and there as by an axe; then came a golden-hued Cheshire, and next a Gruyere, resembling a wheel fallen from some barbarian chariot; whilst farther on were some Dutch cheeses, suggesting decapitated heads suffused with dry blood, and having all that hardness of skulls which in France has gained them the name of “death’s heads.” Amidst the heavy exhalations of these, a Parmesan set a spicy aroma. Then there came three Brie cheeses displayed on round platters, and looking like melancholy extinct moons. Two of them, very dry, were at the full; the third, in its second quarter, was melting away in a white cream, which had spread into a pool and flowed over the little wooden barriers with which an attempt had been made to arrest its course….The Roqueforts under their glass covers also had a princely air, their fat faces marbled with blue and yellow, as though they were suffering from some unpleasant malady such as attacks the wealthy gluttons who eat too many truffles. And on a dish by the side of these, the hard grey goats’ milk cheeses, about the size of a child’s fist, resembled the pebbles which the billy-goats send rolling down the stony paths as they clamber along ahead of their flocks. Next came the strong smelling cheeses: the Mont d’Ors, of a bright yellow hue, and exhaling a comparatively mild odor; the Troyes, very thick, and bruised at the edges, and of a far more pungent smell, recalling the dampness of a cellar; the Camemberts, suggestive of high game; the square Neufchatels, Limbourgs, Marolles, and Pont l’Eveques, each adding its own particular sharp scent to the malodorous bouquet, till it became perfectly pestilential; the Livarots, ruddy in hue, and as irritating to the throat as sulphur fumes; and, lastly, stronger than all the others, the Olivets, wrapped in walnut leaves, like the carrion which peasants cover with branches as it lies rotting in the hedgerow under the blazing sun.

Author: Bret Easton Ellis Year of publication: 1991 Buy it here Why it's great for food obsessives: Anyone vaguely familiar with this controversial book—or the cultish film it spawned starring Christian Bale as the blood-lusty Patrick Bateman—will know that it is brimming with gruesome scenes of rape and torture that will put you off your food completely. But brilliant food writing doesn't have to stimulate the appetite, and as a piece of satire about the excess of the New York dining scene, Ellis' set pieces (the recurring cackle of the maitre d' denying Patrick a reservation at Dorsia) and hilarious send-ups of nouvelle cuisine are pitch-perfect. And what's most brilliant about his depiction of New York restaurants isn't just how funny they are, but also how intricately these scenes are woven into the story of Patrick's psychosis. Throughout the novel, restaurant scenes become a stock precursor to Patrick's violent outbursts: Patrick finds himself back at these hot spots night after night, in the same mindless company, picking at the same unappetizing food. His loss of appetite consistently precedes acts of rape and murder, and the conflation of experiences reaches its culmination with his active manipulation of food, including his “finding” a bone in his Dove Bar; covering a urinal cake in Godiva chocolate and feeding it to Evelyn; and trying to eat a victim’s brains. If you've only seen the movie and heard people quote lines like, "I'm on the verge of tears by the time we arrive at Espace, since I'm positive we won't have a decent table. But we do, and relief washes over me in an awesome wave," please read the book to understand a darker, more sinister side to Ellis' masterpiece.

Tasty excerpt

"Christ, twenty dollars for a fucking egg roll?" I mutter, studying the menu. "It's a moo shu custard, lightly grilled," [Evelyn] says. "It's a fucking egg roll," I protest. To which Evelyn replies, "You're so cultivated, Patrick." "No," I shrug. "Just reasonable." "I'm desperate for some Beluga," she says. "Honey?" "No," I say. 'Why not?' she asks, pouting. "Because I don't want anything out of a can or that's Iranian," I sigh. She sniffs haughtily and looks back at the menu. "The moo foo jambalaya os really first-rate," I hear her say. The minutes ticked by. We order. The meal arrives. Typically, the plate is massive, white porcelain; two pieces of blackened yellowtail sashimi with ginger lie in the middle, surrounded by tiny dots of wasabi, which is circled by a minuscule amount of hijiki, and on top of the plate lies one lone baby prawn; another one, even smaller, lies curled on the bottom, which confuses me me since I thought this was primarily a Chinese restaurant.

Author: Richard Morais Year of publication: 2010 Buy it here Why it's great for food obsessives: This debut novel from Forbes correspondent Richard Morais is a charming bildungsroman tracing the path of a young Indian boy—a culinary savant named Hassan Haji—from his picaresque life in Bombay to the French alps, and finally Paris. He goes from watching his dysfunctional but loving family run an Indian restaurant to apprenticing for a disgruntled French chef working desperately toward her third Michelin star, and eventually scaling the heights of haute cuisine on his own. While Hassan is a bit wooden as a narrator (more of an idea than a deeply felt character) he ends up being merely a cipher for the book's more colorful characters—his larger-than-life father, and the sinister Madame Mallory—as well as wonderfully vivid descriptions of meals, cooking techniques, and kitchen life. Make sure there is a good restaurant near whatever beach you're lounging on, because 100-Foot Journey will make you hungrier with each flip of the page.

Tasty excerpt

During slow moments Grandmother wandered out in the long shirt and trousers we call salwar kameez, threading her way between the sagging hammocks and chatting with the soldiers missing the dishes of their own countries. "What you like to eat?" she'd ask. "What you eat at home?" And the British soldiers told her about steak-and-kidney pies, of the steam that arose when the knife first plunged into the crust and revealed the pie's lumpy viscera. Each soldier tried to outdo the other, and soon the tend filled with oohing and "cors" and excited palaver. And the Americans, not wishing to be outdone by the British, joined in, earnestly searching fro the words that could describe a grilled steak coming from cattle fed on Florida swamp grass. And so, armed with this intelligence she picked up in her walkabouts, Ammi retreated to the kitchen, re-creating in her tandoori oven interpretations of what she had heard. There was, for example, a kind of Indian bread-and-butter pudding, dusted with nutmeg, that became a hit with the British soldiers; the Americans, she found, they were partial to peanut sauce and mango chutney folded in between a piece of naan. And so it wasn't long before news of our kitchen spread from Gurkha to British solider, from barrack to warship, and all day long jeeps stopped outside our Napean Sea Road tent.

Author: Caleb Carr Year of publication: 1994 Buy it here Why it's great for food obsessives: Set in late nineteenth century New York, The Alienist is a history nerd's dream, with fascinating descriptions of early developments in psychology, criminal investigation, New York City, and of course, its food and restaurants. The two protagonists, a crime reporter and an "alienist" (read: psychologist), spend plenty of time at old New York spots like Delmonico's, complete with lavish meal descriptions and guests like a young Teddy Roosevelt. The Alienist is both a riveting historical mystery and an ode to New York (and its dining scene) at a particular moment in history.

Tasty excerpt

It is often difficult, I find, for people today to grasp the notion that one family, working through several restaurants could change the eating habit of an entire country. But such was the achievement of the Delmonicos in the United States of the last century. Before they opened their first small cafe on William Street in 1823, catering to the business and financial communities of Lower Manhattan, American food could generally be described as things boiled or fried whose purpose was to sustain hard work and hold down alcohol—usually bad alcohol. The Delmonicos, though Swiss, had brought the French method to America, and each generation of their family refined an expanded the experience ... The craving for first-rate dining became a kind of national fever in the latter decades of the century—and Delmonico's was responsible.

Author: Muriel Barbery Year of publication: 2009 Buy it here Why it's great for food obsessives: Written by the author of the best-selling The Elegance of the Hedgehog, this book has a fascinating setup for anyone who waits with bated breath for the New York Times restaurant review to drop each Tuesday. Pierre Athens, widely considered the world's finest food critic (and a real piece of work), is on his deathbed, and his one mission before passing is to experience and savor one last, perfect taste. He's spent his career ruining restaurants' fortunes and analyzing the work of Paris' top chefs, but in his final moments he grows more introspective, embarking on an examination of all of his culinary experiences. In terms of florid food prose, it doesn't get much juicier than this.

Tasty excerpt

True sashimi is not so much bitten into as allowed to melt on the tongue. It calls for slow, supple chewing, not to bring about a change in the nature of the food but merely to allow one to savor its airy, satiny texture. Yes, it is like a fabric: sashimi is velvet dust, verging on silk, or a bit of both, an the extraordinary alchemy of its gossamer essence allows it to preserve a milky density unknown even by clouds.

Author: Amy Tan Year of publication: 1989 Buy it here Why it's great for food obsessives: The members of the Joy Luck Club are four aging Chinese women who gather regularly to play mah-jongg, gossip about their children, and feast on Chinese food that would make both Cecilia Chang and Danny Bowien proud. Eating plays a vital role in the book; Tan uses tangible food, occasions centered around food, food as symbol, and food as metaphor to drive her story about the Chinese-American experience across multiple generations.

Tasty excerpt

I was not too fond of crab, ever since I saw my birthday crab boiled alive, but I knew I could not refuse. That's the way Chinese mothers show they love their children, not through hugs and kisses but with stern offerings of steamed dumplings, duck's gizzards, and crab.

Author: Nicole Mones Year of publication: 2008 Buy it here Why it's great for food obsessives: There are plenty of great books you could read about Chinese food, including KC Chang's Food in Chinese Culture and any of Fuchsia Dunlop's work. But if you want a bit of drama that you can dig into alongside the fascinating foodways of such an ancient culture, The Last Chinese Chef is the beach read for you. At its heart, it's a tale of how the best way to understand a culture is through the gut: Maggie McElroy, a recently widowed American food writer, finds herself in China writing a profile a man who is the last in a line of legendary chefs tracing back to the imperial palace. He's in training for the country's biggest culinary competition, and as he plans a banquet to end all banquets, McElroy delves deeper and deeper into the roots of Chinese cooking, learning that—as always—it's about far more than just what's on the plate (though that stuff is pretty damn delicious).

Tasty excerpt

She plucked a morsel from the right side of the bird, low on the breast where the moistness of the thigh came in, and tasted it. It was soft as velvet, chicken times three, shot through with the ginger and the note of onion. Small sticks of bone, their essence exhausted, crumbled in her mouth. She passed them into her hand and dropped them on the plate. “But it’s perfect,” she said. “All chicken should be cooked that way, all the time. I may never have tasted anything so good.” “Thank you.” “I mean it.” She bit into another piece, succulent, soft, perfected. It made her melt with comfort. It put a roof over her head and a patterned warmth around her so that even though all her anguish was still with her it became, for a moment, something she could bear. She closed her eyes in the bliss of relief. She finished and passed out the bones. “Are you going to make this for the banquet?” “No,” he said. “This I made for you.” She looked up quickly. “These are flavors for you, right now,” he explained, “to benefit you. Ginger and cilantro and chives; they’re very powerful. Very healing.” “Healing of what?” she said, and put her chopsticks down. She felt his human force suddenly, as if he were standing quite close to her instead of sitting across the counter, and she sat up in apprehension. “Grief,” he said. Grief? The unpleasant nest of everything she felt pressed up against the surface: sadness, shame, anger at Matt. Anger at Sam for presuming, for intruding; gratitude to Sam for those same things. Her voice, when it came out, sounded bewildered. “You’re treating me for grief?” “No,” he insisted. “I’m cooking for you. There’s a difference.”

Author: Ernest Hemingway Year of publication: 1964 Buy it here Why it's great for food obsessives: Earnest Hemingway may be the best food writer in the history of food writing. His posthumous memoir of Paris in the '20s overflows with fantastic food imagery and crystal-clear descriptions of cafes, bars, and brasseries. Hemingway is a writer perpetually aware of the contents of his belly and his glass—he coins the term “hunger-thinking,” noting that “hunger is good discipline and you learn from it."

Tasty excerpt

As I ate the oysters with their strong taste of the sea and their faint metallic taste that the cold white wine washed away, leaving only the sea taste and the succulent texture, and as I drank their cold liquid from each shell and washed it down with the crisp taste of the wine, I lost the empty feeling and began to be happy and to make plans.

Author: Charles Bukowski Year of publication: 1982 Buy it here Why it's great for food obsessives: Bukowski's semi-autobiographical coming-of-age tale treats food with a brutal directness, offering a stark counterpoint to the blustery, fawning odes to pork fat and sous-vide technique that dominate contemporary food writing. Meals preoccupy but also irk the narrator, Hank Chinaski. His father slurps spaghetti. He denies Chinese cuisine. Food is also a barrier to pleasure—at one point, cans are offered instead of cash, lest money be spent on booze. Food serves to mark financial status throughout the book, and it is also employed as a device for projecting familial and societal angst. Thus, while meals don't come frequently in Ham on Rye, there is palpable and fascinating friction whenever tables are set. The power of Bukowski's description is its un-celebratory nature—food, when treated solely as sustenance, is wrought with annoyance rather than romance.

Tasty excerpt

We went for Sunday rides in the Model-T when my grandmother didn't visit. My parents liked the orange groves, miles and miles of orange trees always either in blossom or full of oranges. My parents had a picnic basket and a metal chest. In the metal chest were frozen cans of fruit on dry ice, and in the picnic basket were weenie and liverwurst and salami sandwiches, potato chips, bananas and soda-pop. The soda-pop was shifted continually back and forth between the metal box and the picnic basket. It froze quickly, and then had to be thawed.

Author: Mark Kurlansky Year of publication: 2010 Buy it here Why it's great for food obsessives: Mark Kurlansky is best known for his excellent non-fiction food writing, including Salt, Cod, and a biography of Clarence Birdseye, the inventor of frozen food. So it's perhaps not surprising that this novel, split into 16 vaguely connected vignettes, is rife with some wonderful descriptive writing about food, and anchored by portraits of how what we eat occupies the center of everything we do. There is a very loose idea of a plot here, about a guy named Robert Eggle who has lost his memory, along with his sense of smell, and is trying to get by without letting anyone in on the secret. But while the narrative thread is a bit gossamer, the real reason to read this book is for the top-shelf literary food porn, as well as the erudite insights into American foodways, covering everything from Alaskan fish soup to vegan Thanksgiving, baseball-stadium eats, and the way Cajun folks make boudin. Ultimately, these foodstuffs are the most thrilling characters in this "novel."

Tasty excerpt

She didn't really want all this food. She wanted beer, not wine, and she wanted a hot dog. She had always head that Yankee Stadium had better hot dogs than Fenway Park and she wanted to find out if it was true or just more Yankees propaganda. Clearly New York had better hot dogs than Boston. They had taken to serving clam chowder at Fenway Park but Emma felt certain that you should eat hot dogs at the ballpark. But she didn't want to hurt Howard, seated happily in his outfit, so she sipped her Venetian wine and nibbled on her spicy shrimp and smelled with longing the steam from the metal box of the nearby hot dog vendor. As she are, she could see things coming unattractively out of the mouths of Red Sox players, sometimes linger on the lips. What were they spitting? Were they some kind of seeds? She wondered if these seats were too close. Maybe baseball players were better seen from a distance.