Paula Wolfert to discuss food, writing and dementia this month at Readers’ Books

‘Bold Flavors,’ bold life of Paula Wolfert|

After a week of Food Section front page stories in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post and San Francisco Chronicle, Sonoma cookbook author Paula Wolfert and her biographer, Emily Kaiser Thelin, will be at Readers' Books on Saturday, April 22 at 2 p.m. The afternoon will be co-sponsored by Readers' and the Last Wednesday Food Group. (As part of the LWFG, I'll be interviewing them at the event.)

Readers' Books will be the first stop on the duo's short book tour for 'Unforgettable: The Bold Flavors of Paula Wolfert's Renegade Life.' After Thelin left Food & Wine magazine where she served partly as Wolfert's editor for four years and Wolfert confessed to Thelin that she had dementia – spurring Thelin to ask Wolfert to allow her to write a book about her adventurous life.

Beginning in Flatbush, New York, where her mother fed her such bland foods as iceberg lettuce and cottage cheese, Wolfert decided she wasn't made for college or that food. So Wolfert embarked upon a new path that led to learning from Dione Lucas, James Beard and many others. She also traveled and wrote extensively (nine cookbooks) while living in France and Morocco with some of the most successful ex-pats this country has spawned.

Wolfert didn't just sit in New York and research Mediterranean cuisine at the library. She moved to France and Morocco for several years, stayed in homes and learned at the stove from home cooks. Then she tells us their stories throughout her cookbooks.

Now Thelin has helped Wolfert tell her story, from New York to Morocco to Sonoma – and through Alzheimer's. Wolfert and Thelin will be at Readers' at 2 p.m. on Saturday, April 22. All author and publisher income from sales of this book will be donated to the International Dementia Alliance. 130 E. Napa St. 939-1779.

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