Mincemeat: The Education of an Italian Chef by Leonardo Lucarelli

Just in time for the holidays!!  A new book all about an Italian chef and his life in the kitchen. 

(Thank you to Other Press for providing me with a copy of this book!)

Yep, this exciting new memoir provides insight into what made Leonardo Lucarelli grow up and become a professional chef.  You also get a behind-the-scenes look at what it takes to be a chef in and around Italy.  Talk about a fun, fascinating, and interesting read. I just loved getting to know Lucarelli through this book - his love of food, cooking, and Italy is evident in this culinary delight titled, Mincemeat: The Education of an Italian Chef. 

Here's a summary of the book:

"With the wit and pace of Anthony Bourdain, Italian chef and anthropologist Leonardo Lucarelli sketches the exhilarating life behind the closed doors of restaurants, and the unlikely work ethics of the kitchen.

Even in Italy, star restaurants and celebrity chefs have become parts of the landscape. In reality, though, the restaurant industry is as tough, cutthroat, and unforgiving as anywhere else in the world—sometimes colluding with the shady world of organized crime. From the deep underbelly of Italian cuisine comes the powerful voice of Leonardo Lucarelli, a professional chef who for almost two decades has been roaming Italy opening restaurants, training underpaid or just hopelessly incompetent sous-chefs, courting waitresses, riding high on drugs to work long hours, and cursing a culinary passion he inherited as a teenager from his hippie father. In his debut Mincemeat: The Education of an Italian Chef, Lucarelli teaches us that even among rogues and misfits, there is a moral code in the kitchen that must always be upheld above all else."

How great does that sound?  I know I enjoyed it.  And I just know that Mincemeat will make a great read/gift for anyone interested in books about food and their chefs.  Check it out!

Thank you to Other Press for providing me with a copy of this book!