Join Bold Fork Books, award-winning author John Birdsall, and The Washington Post's Aaron Hutcherson for a conversation about John's new book WHAT IS QUEER FOOD? : HOW WE SERVED A REVOLUTION.
ABOUT THE BOOK
A celebrated food writer’s expansive, audacious excavation of the development of modern queer identity and food culture
Food in America and Europe has long been shaped, twisted and upended by queer creatives. Beloved food writer John Birdsall fills the gap between the past and present, channelling the twin forces of criticism and cultural history to propel readers into the kitchens, restaurants, swirling party-houses and humming interior lives of James Baldwin, Alice B. Toklas, Truman Capote, Esther Eng and others who left an indelible mark on the culinary world from the margins. Queer food is brunch quiche à la Craig Claiborne, Richard Olney’s ecstatic salade composée and Rainbow Ice-Box Cake from Ernest Matthew Mickler’s White Trash Cooking. It’s the intention surrounding a meal, the circumstances behind it, the people gathered around the table.
With cinematic verve and prose that dazzles, What Is Queer Food? is a monumental work: a testament to food’s essential link to a modern queerness that reveals how, like fashion or tastes in music, food has become a language of LGBTQ+ identity.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
John Birdsall is the author of The Man Who Ate Too Much: The Life of James Beard and the recipient of two James Beard Awards for food and culture writing. He lives in Tucson, Arizona.
ABOUT THE MODERATOR
Aaron Hutcherson is a writer and recipe developer for Food at The Washington Post. Before joining The Post, Hutcherson was a freelance writer, recipe developer, photographer and food stylist whose work has appeared in the New York Times, Food & Wine, Eater, among other publications.
