Life from Scratch

Life from Scratch
Written by Melissa Ford

ISBN-10: 1935661981
ISBN-13: 9781935661986
Publisher: Bell Bridge Books
e-book: 208 pages

This is another title I found from NetGalley (my second e-book!), I requested it because the description piqued my interest. It's about a newly divorced woman, Rachel Goldman, who starts a blog (aptly titled Life from Scratch, tagline: blogging about life one scrambled egg at a time) about teaching herself to cook. Something she never bothered to learn when she was married. Rachel worked at the New York City Library as a graphic designer and has taken the year off to "find herself" if you will. I know, not the most original idea. Her husband, too busying trying to make partner at his law firm was never around and so their relationship lacked everything Rachel wanted.

Here's an excerpt of the first page of the book had me laughing with guilt already, it starts off with this blog post:

June Cleaver beat the crap out of me with her rolling pin.

In my dream, Martha Stewart, June Cleaver, Bree Van De Kamp, and Marion Cunningham (who they were all affectionately calling “Mrs. C”) were baking a pie together in my kitchen and arguing about the best way to pit cherries. They hadn’t really noticed me lounging around by the sink until I pointed out what a waste of time it would be to pit your own cherries when there were perfectly decent ones that you could get in a can when June Cleaver turned with a maniacal gleam in her eye and started beating me on the face and shoulders with her flour-dusted rolling pin.

Just imagine what she would have done to me if I had suggested frozen pie crust....

Yes, we've all had that thought when we pit our own cherries and make our own pie dough. Sometimes working with store-bought things are easier. Plus, I love the group of women that are in her kitchen dreams!

The book doesn't include recipes, but I like it for capturing a blogger's experience. She learns about sitestalker and finds out that she does have a lot of readers. She frets and compares herself to Smitten Kitchen and Pioneer Women Cooks when her blog is nominated for Bloscars. Really, who can compete?

In the end, this book read like a mash-up of Emily Giffin's Baby Proof and Sophie Kinsella's The Undomestic Goddess. It's a light, even a little sexy, and easy-to-read novel that makes it a good beach or summer read. The voice of Rachel is candid and humourous, so while she's still pining over her ex-husband, you can see that her year alone has really helped her grown.