Melissa Clark's Apple of Truth

The Amateur Gourmet Podcast

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Melissa Clark's Apple of Truth

Adam Roberts

Oct 28, 2019

Melissa Clark is one of the most prolific food writers working today: she's the author of 43 cookbooks, as well as a weekly columnist for The New York Times AND a new podcast host ("Weeknight Kitchen with Melissa Clark"). She also turns out to be the perfect Lunch Therapy guest because both of her parents are psychiatrists. During today's session, we talk about how she comes up with a recipe, how she empowers people to have "personal responsibility in cooking," how she deals with criticism online (including for the famous pea-guacamole, denounced by TWO presidents, that wasn't even her recipe). We also go deep on how she used cooking to get her parents' attention, how she cultivated her voice as a writer, what she gets out of reading Proust, and whether or not baking brownies made her popular in high school.

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The Amateur Gourmet Podcast

Are you a person who loves to cook but every now and then you screw up? You've come to the right place! Since 2004, Adam Roberts (aka The Amateur Gourmet) has been writing about his adventures and misadventures in the kitchen. He's the author of three books (including the upcoming Broadway cookbook, Give My Swiss Chards to Broadway) and the author of a biweekly newsletter for Substack. Each week on The Amateur Gourmet podcast, there's a theme, interviews with famous chefs, writers, actors, and cookbook authors connected to that theme, plus visits from friends and family, and lots of yodeling. If you like what you hear, be sure to become a paid subscriber and you'll have access to twice weekly recipes, essays, bonus podcast material (including Ten Feisty Food Questions with that week's guest), plus threads where you can engage with other Amateur Gourmet fans about food topics that you care about. Just know there's no judgment here: we all screw up in the kitchen!

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