MANILA, Philippines - Who is the American restaurant critic and food writer who introduced a generation of Americans to a variety of ethnic cultures — particularly Asian and Mexican at a time when the average American had fairly conservative tastes in food?
He is the first one to supervise a food page at a major American newspaper and is credited with the New York Times’ coverage of new restaurants and innovative chefs.
He was born in Sunflower, Mississippi on September 4, 1920, and was raised on the region’s storied cuisine in the kitchen of his mother’s boarding house.
After serving in the Navy during World War II and the Korean War, he used his GI Bill scholarship to attend the prestigious Ecole Hoteliere in Lausanne, Switzerland.
Returning from Europe, he worked his way up in New York’s food publishing business as a contributor to Gourmet magazine, a food products publicist, and finally as food editor of the New York Times in 1957. In the 1950s, a typical food section of a newspaper was largely targeted to female readership and limited to columns on entertaining and cooking for the upscale homemaker. But with his expert knowledge in cuisine and passion for food, he transformed it into an important cultural and social bellwether for New York and the nation at large.
His voice was authoritative and friendly, and in his weekly Food News column, he explored everything from caviar and couscous to down-home dishes like his mother’s famous chicken spaghetti. He also invented the restaurant review as we know it — part of a four-star rating system based on multiple visits to an establishment.
Known as an exacting, honest critic, he was just as likely to praise new talent as he was to reveal the shortcomings of old-guard restaurants. Though he introduced Americans to then largely unknown cooks like Madhur Jaffrey and Marcela Hazan, he also collaborated with established food world figures like French chef Pierre Franey, with whom he shared a byline on several cookbooks, New York Times columns, and recipes.
He wrote several books including his autobiography A Feast Mad for Laughter; and cookbooks that contributed much to gastronomy in the United States. These include The New York Times Cookbook, The New York Times International Cookbook, Kitchen Primer, The New York Times Food Encyclopedia.
He also explored new ways of cooking in Cooking with Herbs and Spices, Veal Cookery, Classic French Cuisine, and books written with Pierre Franey, such as Gourmet Diet and Master Cooking Course.
With books like Elements of Etiquette: a Guide to Table Manners in an Imperfect World; Memorable Meals, Menus, Memories, and Recipes from Over Twenty Years of Entertaining; and American Food Writing: An Anthology with Classic Recipes, he brought American cooking and eating to a whole new level.
A fixture on the New York social scene for decades, his lavish celebrity-studded birthday parties at his East Hampton Estate were regular events on the Manhattan social calendar. Known for his wit, he has many enduring quotes like “Cooking is at once a child’s play and adult joy,” “Cooking done with care is an act of love,” and his famous advice “Know more than everybody, say something funny, and leave some questions unanswered.”
He died on January 22, 2000, and in his will be bequeathed his estate to the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, New York.
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Last week’s question: Who is the 20th-century American architect best known for his collaboration with Nelson Rockefeller and designing New York landmarks like the United Nations headquarters, the Metropolitan Opera House in Lincoln Center, and La Guardia airport?
Answer: Wallace K. Harrison
Winner: Myla Kamias of Caloocan City
Text your answer to 0926-3508061 with your name and address. One winner will be chosen through a raffle of texts with the correct answer. The winner will receive P2,000 worth of SM gift certificates for use at Our Home, SM Department Store, or SM Supermarket. They can claim their prize at Our Home in SM Megamall. Bring photocopies of two valid IDs and a clipping of the Design Quiz issue in which you appear as winner.