"With a lively tone that makes you feel as though you're chatting with her at the kitchen table, Severson keeps the reader engaged."

[Photograph: kimseverson.com]

My mother is a great cook. Opening the door to my house after 6 p.m. nearly always means a deep breath of sizzling garlic, or roasting beets, or bubbling ratatouille. Even after a full day of work and organizing the lives of the rest of our haphazard family, she somehow gets a delicious meal on the table. I know that when it comes time for me to get cooking in my own kitchen, it will be her staple dishes that I attempt to recreate first. Despite years of watching cooking shows and reading about food science, my mother is my primary culinary influence.

We all have those figures in our lives who shape our own behavior—and our tastes. For those who care about food, these figures are often linked somehow to the nourishment we've received throughout our lives. For journalist and food writer Kim Severson, her life-changing influences were all women who somehow helped her develop as a food lover. In her memoir, Spoon Fed: How Eight Cooks Saved My Life, she details her experiences with these women.

Severson brings us into her life with a jolt, beginning her story by dropping us into her longtime struggle with alcoholism. Living as a reporter in Alaska, she fell into cycles of binge-drinking to combat long winters and emotional turmoil. When she finally kicked the near-fatal habit, she knew it was time for a new life. A job in northern California pulled her away from the past and towards a terrifying but promising future.

It was in California that she began her romance with food. She began to fall in with the food-loving crowd, and interviewed high-profile chefs and food writers. And then she began meeting the women she talks about in this book. Severson was constantly collecting advice, reflecting on her own attitudes and actions, and changing for the better. Each woman cooked her way into Severson's life, continuing her trend of self-improvement and growing confidence.

Marion Cunningham was a motherly influence; Ruth Reichl was the all-star older sister. Rachael Ray was relatable and so warm; Alice Waters was dreamy and inspiring. Edna Lewis was a down-home cook with Southern hospitality; Leah Chase believed in New Orleans despite devastating floodwaters. And Severson always wanted to please her mother, an Italian woman slightly perplexed by her daughter's homosexuality—but learned from Marcella Hazan that we can love our families without completely understanding them.

At times, the story wears a bit thin. It becomes hard to track what specific contributions each of these women made to Severson's life, making one feel as if they're tossed in for the sake of the narrative. But with a lively tone that made me feel as though I was chatting with her at the kitchen table, Severson kept me engaged. And it's entertaining to hear first-hand accounts of what it's like to have lunch with some of the most influential women in the world of food, especially from someone as modest and humorous as Severson.

Severson's story has a wonderful ending—at the close of the book, she is a successful food writer for the New York Times, living with her wife and child in Brooklyn, NY. But it is clear from the details she generously shares with readers that her path was not easy. Her reflections on the eight women who shaped her life are not always favorable, and sometimes their contributions are more teachable moments than heartwarming gestures. But Severson does a lovely job relating her story to the reader, and showing how we can all take the advice bestowed on us by others to heart, while still maintaining our own voices. And it helps if these guides can also teach you how to make a seriously delicious meal.

About the Author: A student in Providence, Rhode Island, Leah Douglas loves consuming and learning about as much food as possible. She blogs at Feasting on Providence.