title: As Always, Julia: The Letters of Julia Child and Avis DeVoto
author:  Joan Reardon 
description: <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/feature.html?docId=1000637301"><strong>Amazon Best Books of the Month, December 2010</strong></a>: Though this collection of letters between Julia Child and her savvy friend, cook, and confidante, Avis DeVoto, may be voluminous, its narrative force is immediate. Julia and Avis shared a voracious curiosity about ingredients, gadgets, recipes, and methods that any home cook worth her salt will find wonderful to read. Their testing and tasting in large part fueled <em>Mastering the Art of French Cooking</em>, the now-legendary and game-changing cookbook that Avis, upon reading an early chapter, said "could be a classic and make your fortune and go on selling forever." Avis was an instant and unwavering champion of the book and shepherded its long journey towards publication stateside, as Julia and her co-authors in France worked doggedly on the manuscript, and there couldn't have been a better or brighter for advocate for the book's target audience. As a mid-century American housewife, Avis participated both eagerly and critically in the renaissance age of culinary convenience: she details her experiments with the frozen, freeze-dried, canned, and casseroled with a wonderful sense of humor and taste. These pieces are particularly fascinating to read now, as we resurrect the slow, local approach to home cooking, and her perspective on what was available to American cooks at that time is a seamless counterpart to her commentary on the cookbook itself, which she praises time and again for its classical richness and modern practicality. Julia writes to Avis early on that "people who love to eat are always the best people," and certainly nothing could be truer of these two formidable and gracious <em>gourmandes</em>. --<em>Anne Bartholomew<br /><br /></em>
zlib_text: ![](Images/image00145.jpeg)
  
    
  
  **_DEDICATION_**
  
    
  
  ![](Images/image00144.jpeg)
  
    
  
  For Julia
  
   **CONTENTS**
  
    
  
  [ _Cover_]($00004)
  
   _Title Page_
  
   _Dedication_
  
   _One_
  
   _Two_
  
   _Three_
  
   _Four_
  
   _Five_
  
   _Six_
  
   _Seven_
  
   _Eight_
  
   _Nine_
  
   _Ten_
  
   _Eleven_
  
   _Twelve_
  
   _Thirteen_
  
   _Fourteen_
  
   _Fifteen_
  
   _Sixteen_
  
   _Seventeen_
  
   _Eighteen_
  
   _Nineteen_
  
   _Twenty_
  
   _Twenty-One_
  
   _Twenty-Two_
  
   _Twenty-Three_
  
   _Twenty-Four_
  
   _Twenty-Five_
  
   _Twenty-Six_
  
   _Twenty-Seven_
  
   _Twenty-Eight_
  
   _Twenty-Nine_
  
   _Thirty_
  
   _Thirty-One_
  
   _Thirty-Two_
  
   _Thirty-Three_
  
   _Thirty-Four_
  
   _About the Author_
  
   _Other Works_
  
   _Credits_
  
   _Copyright_
  
   _Back Ads_
  
   _About the Publisher_
  
   ** _ONE_**
  
    
  
  ![](Images/image00146.jpeg)
  
    
  
   **I** DON’T KNOW WHO was more anxious—Daniel or Kenjii—but they weren’t
  making this emergency helicopter evacuation any easier. I patted Kenjii and
  she shifted until her full hundred pounds of German shepherd rested squarely
  on my feet. When I tried t