Food-o-file
A conversation with Julie Powell; plus, the Kitchen Sisters at BookPeople
By Virginia B. Wood, Fri., Nov. 11, 2005
The Julie Conversation
Somehow, I completely managed to miss Julie Powell's 2003 blog documentation of her yearlong commitment to prepare all 524 recipes in Julia Child's classic Mastering the Art of French Cooking. The Julie/Julia Project blog attracted a legion of loyal daily "bleaders" across the country, eventually garnering Powell national media attention and a lucrative book contract. When Powell came through her native Austin on a triumphal book tour, I heard about her witty and profane appearance at BookPeople and snapped the book right up. Once I'd devoured Julie & Julia: 365 Days, 524 Recipes, 1 Tiny Apartment Kitchen (Little, Brown, $23.95) and thoroughly enjoyed it, I made it my business to snag an interview with the author when she came back to speak at the Texas Book Festival.
Austin Chronicle: Where have you been eating while you're here visiting your folks?
Julie Powell: We had Mexican food at El Chile, and my parents love Vin Bistro on Kerbey Lane – they treat them like royalty in there.
AC: Have you met many of your blog readers on the book tour?
JP: That's really been the best part of the tour, getting a chance to put faces to the names ... although there is something a little strange about meeting people who feel as though they know you so personally because they've followed the blog every day.
AC: In the book, you talk about going to New York to fulfill your ambitions to be an actress. Had you ever really considered being a food writer?
JP: This whole thing was a bit of a fluke – I'm really not a food writer, I'm really just an eater. But I discovered I enjoyed writing about the daily intimacy with food, so I'm pursuing that. I have a contract for one more "food" book with Little, Brown and then I'm also working on a novel.
AC: Who else's cookbooks have you cooked out of recently?
JP: It's hard to go wrong with any of the recipes in The Border Cookbook by that couple, uh, the Jamisons [Bill and Cheryl Jamison], and my husband and I really love Anya von Bremzen's new book, The New Spanish Table.
AC: Now that the project is finished, can you imagine any of Julia's recipes like Eggs in Aspic or Brains Poached in Red Wine making it into your regular cooking repertoire?
JP: Nobody cooks like that anymore – but I do still make the Baked Cucumbers sometimes, they're so good.
AC: I read somewhere there is interest in making a movie from your book?
JP: Someone has optioned it for a movie, but that's a long way from it actually happening. We'll see if anything comes of it. It would be cool.
AC: Any news on the baby front?
JP: Yeah, I need to get right on that ... but we definitely need a better apartment before we can have a baby. A baby would freeze in there.
