Foodie Books Wish List

I finally ordered a handful of books that had been growing on my (foodie/restaurateur) book wish list:

history's most famed
maître d'hôtel

When I first began working at my current post, our general manager told me a handful of stories plus few tricks she'd learned from her days working at Le Cirque alongside famed restaurateur, Sirio Maccioni. At the end of each story she'd always finish with, He wrote a book about it! 

perhaps rival to Capote's 
La Côte Basque?

Last month, in Edible Manhattan, I read a darling little article about the sadly out of print book, La Bonne Table by Ludwig Bemelmans. I was instantly tantalized by the (thinly-veiled non-fiction) book's premise of 'keenly observed... grandly-bad behavior by the prewar A-list.' Bemelmas spent the majority of his career catering to the very wealthy at Manhattan's great hotels such as the Ritz-Carlton, which he aptly refers to in  his book as "Hotel Splendide."

'inimitable gusto and
disarming honesty'

And last, but not least, the memoir of Julia Child's early days in France, recounting her first "perfectly soigné meal," enrolling in the Cordon Bleu and co-writing her first cookbook with "fellow gourmettes," Simone Beck and Louisette Bertholle. I'd remembered when the book first appeared in 2007, but it wasn't until this past holiday season, at a Christmas carolling party, that I was finally reminded of reading it.


What's on your foodie book wish list?