Margins
What She Ate book cover
What She Ate
Six Remarkable Women and the Food That Tells Their Stories
2017
First Published
3.27
Average Rating
320
Number of Pages

A culinary historian’s short takes on six famous women through the lens of food and cooking—what they ate and how their attitudes toward food offer surprising new insights into their lives. It’s a lively and unpredictable array of women; what they have in common with one another (and us) is a powerful relationship with food. They include Dorothy Wordsworth, whose food story transforms our picture of the life she shared with her famous poet brother; Rosa Lewis, the Edwardian-era Cockney caterer who cooked her way up the social ladder; Eleanor Roosevelt, First Lady and rigorous protector of the worst cook in White House history; Eva Braun, Hitler’s mistress, who challenges our warm associations of food, family, and table; Barbara Pym, whose witty books upend a host of stereotypes about postwar British cuisine; and Helen Gurley Brown, the editor of Cosmopolitan, whose commitment to “having it all” meant having almost nothing on the plate except a supersized portion of diet gelatin.

Avg Rating
3.27
Number of Ratings
4,728
5 STARS
13%
4 STARS
28%
3 STARS
39%
2 STARS
15%
1 STARS
5%
goodreads

Author

Laura Shapiro
Author · 4 books
Laura Shapiro is an award winning author who worked at Newsweek for over 15 years.
548 Market St PMB 65688, San Francisco California 94104-5401 USA
© 2025 Paratext Inc. All rights reserved