The Man Who Ate Everything
Jeffrey Steingarten
384 pages
published in 1998

This is a linked collection of articles about all aspects of food, cooking and eating, originally published in the US edition of Vogue. Steingarten is originally a lawyer but has always been a food fanatic. In the preface he writed how he decided to rigoriously deal with his various food fads; how he'd learn to eat literally everything that's edible. He then describes how he dealt with his own food phobias, which is remarkably funny.

The subjects of the other articles are wideranging: from sampling the best food Venetia and Sicily have to offer to experiments in determining the best way to make chips to cooking with Olestra, with a fair few recipes strewn through the book. Despite the rich variety in subjects, one common theme keeps turning up again and again: his crusade against food fads and health food.

He starts by asking himself the question that how it's possible for france to have one of the lowest rates of heart attacks in the world, yet they do everything wrong according to accepted wisdom in eating and cooking food. From there on he rants against the anti-fat craze, the anti-sugar freaks and others, always in an entertaining and inquisitive fashion.

For everybody who likes food, this is an recommended book.