As a foodie, New Yorker fan, and lover of good writing (I'm a professional journalist/writer), this turned out to be one of my favorite books of ALL TIME. This book represented so many different eras in food and culture. A masterful collection of the best food essays and articles ever written.

I've only just started to work my way through the book, but it has been a delight. It is especially pleasurable to read the pieces written long before I began reading the New Yorker, but re-reading old favorites is a joy as well.

I got this book from the library and I was very disappointed. Over the years I have read many New Yorkers, and the essays and stories selected were not the best ones. Even the Woody Allen piece was uninteresting and I could not finish it. Woody Allen written another piece called The Diet based on The Trail, which they should have selected. There was not one single piece I liked. The only mildly entertaining story was one about a man who goes to China to review restaurants that serve rats, and it was very unsettle because they also served cats. The piece about a couple who visits a Japanese restaurant was the best of the lot, but the same author had written another I liked better which was over looked for inclusion. I have been reading the New Yorker and have been subscribed since my birth, as mother subscribed. I should also mention there the essays about wine and spirits better then the ones about food. I am not a foodie. There was one humorous poem about women and weight, but overall this book does not deserve a space in your collection.

This book is overall pretty good. However, some of the articles (especially the older ones) are pretentious and not all that great. There are a wide variety of writing styles, and I feel that most readers will be happier if they just skip some of the articles.

I gave this book as a gift to my husband. I was happy to find he loves it. He commented about how he enjoyed being able to skip around from one essay to another. He enjoys the variety of the essays from so many diverse authors. And of course, the fact that this book was edited by David Remnick is always a plus.

Witty, insightful and you can pick it up anytime for a good read. A must for the beside or a carry-on for that long flight. The best of the New Yorker is simply the best you can get.

Vic W

I am a lifelong New Yorker reader and have many foodie friends for whom this will be a delightful gift.

My sister is a fan of New Yorker magazines and books and she didn't even realize this one was out and so excited that I had gotten it for her for her birthday! She was thrilled

In praising Secret Ingredients, I'm torn between praising the writing style or the content more highly. Both are superb.

As a reading experience, you'll find your mouth watering, your mind remembering tastes and aromas you haven't experienced in years, your eyes alight with remembered scenes you've enjoyed, your mouth smiling as you enjoy great turns of phrase, and your hand writing down things from the book you want to try. At the same time, you'll be learning more about food, beverages, cooking, gathering food, catching fish, preparing food, and dining than you had ever thought you would know.

I normally plow through a book like this in an evening, but I was having so much fun I stretched the pleasure out over several days. I recommend you do the same.

The opening section on dining out was a revelation as I learned about huge feasts that all-male groups would eat unbelievable quantities of food in New York without benefit of tables or utensils. The theme of that section is how overeating has slowly disappeared from eating out as diners more often included women and weight concerns and health consciousness rose.

The book's title is an allusion to how those who are proud of their recipes often pretend to share their recipes while secretly sabotaging the results by leaving out an ingredient or an instruction. That reference appears throughout the book, not just in M.F.K. Fisher's essay by that name.

For those who love haute cuisine in France and New York, there are many articles that show how that estimable pastime has been changing over many decades. For me, there was a lot of nostalgia in reading about restaurants in France and New York where I've had memorable meals. There's a nice lengthy section on Julia Child that will stir happy memories for many about learning French cooking.

To me, the most fascinating articles were about finding food such as A Mess of Clams, A Forager, The Fruit Detective, Gone Fishing, and On the Bay. The most unexpected section was on local delicacies (including Peter Hessler on eating rats).

I was intrigued to find an article where I was an unacknowledged source, Malcolm Gladwell's article about ketchup, for which I had supplied a lot of information about Grey Poupon mustard's great success.

The fiction section is most enjoyable and allows more room for the writing to blossom.

Now, there's a special treat you might not have expected: Many of The New Yorker's best food and beverage cartoons are included. These humorous contributions add a light touch for those sections that become almost too serious.

I was very impressed by the editing done for this book. The articles were well chosen for themselves and for fitting into major themes in the book, themes that both matched the contents' categories and over arched those categories.

Bravo and bon appetit!

Like a lengthy, varied meal, this book offers frothy appetizers, serious main courses and sweet, cloying desserts.

Highly recommend to any lover of good food and wine and good writing.

The droll cartoons add a hint of spice to the mix.

Love this book as I do all New Yorker things. Got it for my daughter for Christmas but I'm reading it first! It will have to be for her birthday next November. Don't look Danielle!

I like books of short stories and essays to read while exercising on my non-impact climbing machine. This one fits the bill of fare, as it were, perfectly. The pieces are just about long enough to meet my three mile goals, and I work my mind and my body at the same time. And, the hard cover version lays nice and flat on the reading ledge.

What a great lineup:

Woody Allen on dieting the Dostoevsky way.
John Cheever on the sorrows of gin.
Don DeLillo on Jell-O.
Steve Martin on menu mores.
Alice McDermott on sex and ice cream.
Joseph Mitchell on beefsteak clubs of New York.
Dorothy Parker on dinner conversation.
Calvin Trillin on the "magic" bagel.
Nora Ephron on a hot pastrami sandwich.
Calvin Tomkins on Julia Child.
Malcolm Gladwell on ketchup.
M.F.K. Fisher on tripe.

Roald Dahl's "Taste" is here, with its story of a keen eyed maid and a wine lover with doubtful ethics, able to toss off some excellent tasting notes:

"A prudent wine, rather diffident and evasive, but quite prudent.

"A good humoured wine, benevolent and cheerful - slightly obscene, perhaps, but nonetheless good humoured.

"A very interesting little wine - gentle and gracious, almost feminine in the after taste."

Interspersed are delightful, funny, sometimes baffling cartoons, typical of "The New Yorker's" taste.

It's amazing to the casual foodie like myself how intense some people can get about food, how deeply Mrs. Fisher has thought about the casserole for example.

Trillin has a fascinating piece about the history of chicken wings; here's a short extract, a nibble of the delights on offer:

"About two years ago, a Buffalo stockbroker named Robert M. Budin wrote a piece for the Courier-Express Sunday magazine suggesting, in a light-hearted way, that the city adopt the chicken wing as its symbol. Budin's piece begins with two Buffalonians discussing what had happened when one of them was at a party in Memphis and was asked by a local where he was from. Deciding to "take him face on," the visiting Buffalonian had said, "I'm from Buffalo." Instead of asking if the snow had melted yet, the local had said, "Where those dynamite chicken wings come from?"

"You mean positive recognition?" the friend who is hearing the story asks. It becomes obvious to the two of them that Buffalonians should "mount a campaign to associate Buffalo with chicken wings and rid ourselves of the negatives of snow and cold and the misunderstood beef-on-weck." Budin suggested that the basketball team be called the Buffalo Wings, that the mayor begin wearing a button that says "Do Your Thing with Wings," and that a huge statue of a chicken wing (medium hot) be placed in the convention Center."

An absolutely delightful banquet for anyone with the least interest in food.

I like books of short stories and essays to read while exercising on my non-impact climbing machine. This one fits the bill of fare, as it were, perfectly. The pieces are just about long enough to meet my three mile goals, and I work my mind and my body at the same time. And, the hard cover version lays nice and flat on the reading ledge.

What a great lineup:

Woody Allen on dieting the Dostoevsky way.
John Cheever on the sorrows of gin.
Don DeLillo on Jell-O.
Steve Martin on menu mores.
Alice McDermott on sex and ice cream.
Joseph Mitchell on beefsteak clubs of New York.
Dorothy Parker on dinner conversation.
Calvin Trillin on the "magic" bagel.
Nora Ephron on a hot pastrami sandwich.
Calvin Tomkins on Julia Child.
Malcolm Gladwell on ketchup.
M.F.K. Fisher on tripe.

Roald Dahl's "Taste" is here, with its story of a keen eyed maid and a wine lover with doubtful ethics, able to toss off some excellent tasting notes:

"A prudent wine, rather diffident and evasive, but quite prudent.

"A good humoured wine, benevolent and cheerful - slightly obscene, perhaps, but nonetheless good humoured.

"A very interesting little wine - gentle and gracious, almost feminine in the after taste."

Interspersed are delightful, funny, sometimes baffling cartoons, typical of "The New Yorker's" taste.

It's amazing to the casual foodie like myself how intense some people can get about food, how deeply Mrs. Fisher has thought about the casserole for example.

Trillin has a fascinating piece about the history of chicken wings; here's a short extract, a nibble of the delights on offer:

"About two years ago, a Buffalo stockbroker named Robert M. Budin wrote a piece for the Courier-Express Sunday magazine suggesting, in a light-hearted way, that the city adopt the chicken wing as its symbol. Budin's piece begins with two Buffalonians discussing what had happened when one of them was at a party in Memphis and was asked by a local where he was from. Deciding to "take him face on," the visiting Buffalonian had said, "I'm from Buffalo." Instead of asking if the snow had melted yet, the local had said, "Where those dynamite chicken wings come from?"

"You mean positive recognition?" the friend who is hearing the story asks. It becomes obvious to the two of them that Buffalonians should "mount a campaign to associate Buffalo with chicken wings and rid ourselves of the negatives of snow and cold and the misunderstood beef-on-weck." Budin suggested that the basketball team be called the Buffalo Wings, that the mayor begin wearing a button that says "Do Your Thing with Wings," and that a huge statue of a chicken wing (medium hot) be placed in the convention Center."

An absolutely delightful banquet for anyone with the least interest in food. Very highly recommended.

I notice that this hasn't been reviewed yet so I had to come on here and say something...I've had this book for a few weeks now, right after it was released. I've been slowly savoring each piece and because it is over 600 pages, it will fill you for months to come.

This is the best food writing and cartoons from the past 70 years or so from the magazine, what can be better? There are several different sections to enjoy with pieces by favorites such as MFK Fisher and Calvin Trillin, including a section of short stories that involve food, and the cartoons make it especially amusing. I am particularly enjoying the food history I may otherwise have been unaware of - a favorite piece of mine is on the tradition of "Beefsteaks", which came before the NY steakhouses. Fascinating stuff! John Seabrook's delicious profile of the Fruit Detective makes you ponder AND miss what you've never had. Another is by John McPhee about an incredible forager named Euell Gibbons with whom he spends a few days living off the land. WOW. To think that the piece, which is almost 40 years old, is way older than me and I wouldn't have read it otherwise or anywhere else just amazes me and brings to mind the quote about writers reaching out to readers across time. It is outstanding.

The sections are entitled Dining Out, Eating In, Fishing and Foraging, Local Delicacies, The Pour, Tastes Funny, Small Plates and Fiction and each has up to ten articles, profiles etc that you will thoroughly enjoy, just like that magazine's food issues!

Highly recommended for a gift, or for yourself. As with any anthology, it is nice to be turned on to other writers' works because you like what you read here. I'm going to check out AJ Liebling's collection of writings along with the other anthologies The New Yorker has to offer.

Excellent reading!!!

I notice that this hasn't been reviewed yet so I had to come on here and say something...I've had this book for a few weeks now, right after it was released. I've been slowly savoring each piece and because it is over 600 pages, it will fill you for months to come.

This is the best food writing and cartoons from the past 70 years or so from the magazine, what can be better? There are several different sections to enjoy with pieces by favorites such as MFK Fisher and Calvin Trillin, including a section of short stories that involve food, and the cartoons make it especially amusing. I am particularly enjoying the food history I may otherwise have been unaware of - a favorite piece of mine is on the tradition of "Beefsteaks", which came before the NY steakhouses. Fascinating stuff!

Highly recommended for a gift, or for yourself. As with any anthology, it is nice to be turned on to other writers' works because you like what you read here. I'm going to check out AJ Liebling's collection of writings along with the other anthologies The New Yorker has to offer.

Excellent reading!!!

I notice that this hasn't been reviewed yet so I had to come on here and say something...I've had this book for a few weeks now, right after it was released. I've been slowly savoring each piece and because it is over 600 pages, it will fill you for months to come.

This is the best food writing and cartoons from the past 70 years or so from the magazine, what can be better? There are several different sections to enjoy, including short stories that involve food, and the cartoons make it especially enjoyable.

Highly recommended for a gift, or for yourself. As with any anthology, it is nice to be turned on to other writers' works because you like what you read here. I'm going to check out AJ Liebling's collection of writings along with the other anthology The New Yorker has to offer.

Excellent reading!!!