"Cooking for the Culture: Recipes and Stories from the Streets of New Orleans to the Table" is not your average cookbook. A big part of my life is reading cookbooks, for both work and pleasure, and very rarely do they leave me feeling like that I've read a memoir packed with vibrant, revealing prose — all in addition to learning to how to make smothered okra and shrimp and the perfect cinnamon-tinged cup of coffee.
That's because the book's author, Toya Boudy, is so gloriously present in "Cooking for the Culture" and makes a point to show readers the way in which her lived experiences are intertwined with the meals she makes, like Christmas chicken, red beans and "expensive ass deviled eggs."
