CHEF ALICE WATERS HAS ALWAYS
BEEN FRIENDS WITH FOOD.
T he
search for good food led Alice Waters to France, and then
back home to Berkeley, California, where she started Chez Panisse
restaurant and the Edible Schoolyard. For Alice, a delicious meal does
not start in the kitchen but in the fields with good soil and caring farmers.
JACQUELINE BRIGGS MARTIN
, author of the Caldecott winner,
Snowflake Bentley, and Farmer Will Allen and the Growing Table, tells how
one childs search for delicious led to a dream for all children to share the joy
of tasty food the same joy we get from a beautiful song or a starry sky.
Printed in U.S.A.
Contents
ALICE WATERS
and the
Trip
to
Delicious
WRITTEN BY
JACQUELINE BRIGGS MARTIN
ILLUSTRATED BY
HAYELIN CHOI
AFTERWORD BY ALICE WATERS
BELLEVUE, WASHINGTON
Text copyright 2014 by Jacqueline Briggs Martin
Illustrations copyright 2014 by Hayelin Choi
READERS to EATERS
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All rights reserved. No part of the book may be reproduced, transmitted, or stored in
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photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the written permission of the publisher.
Printed in the U.S.A. by Worzalla, Stevens Point, Wisconsin (4/14)
Book Design by Red Herring Design
Book production by The Kids at Our House
Photograph of Alice Waters on page by David Liittschwager.
The art is done in brush and black ink, scanned digitally, then colored
and each element combined using Adobe Photoshop.
The text is set in Cochin and Neutraface. Cochin is a transitional serif font based
on the copperplate engravings of French artist Nicholas Cochin, and was originally
produced in 1912 by Georges Peignot for the Parisian foundry Deberny & Peignot.
Neutraface is a sans-serif typeface designed by Christian Schwartz for the American
type foundry, House Industries. Its geometric forms reference modernist architect
Richard Neutras design principles and signage used on his buildings.
First Edition
Library of Congress Control Number:
ISBN 8- 0983661566
DEDICATION
To my mother, Alice Briggs.
Like Alice Waters, she knows that delicious food and good times go together.
J.B.M.
To my mom and dad, who taught me there are so many delicious foods
around the world. H.C.
Some people want new red shoes.
Some want to sing on stage
or play basketball.
Chef Alice Waters wants every kid in the country
to come with her on the trip to Delicious.
She wants
the hungry kids, the happy kids,
the tall kids, the short kids
to have a delicious lunch every day.
She wants them to know the taste of good food,
know the story of food.
Every kid millions of kids!
Where did Alice Waters
get such an idea?
Well, Alice Waters has always
been friends with food.
When she was three years old,
she wore food
a lettuce- leaf skirt, radish bracelets,
a necklace of strawberries, a crown of asparagus
and won first prize in a costume contest.
Little Alice was also looking for Delicious.
And she found it in
fresh green beans, sweet corn,
and just- picked blueberries.
A LICE WAS
ALWAYS VERY AWARE OF
SMELLS AND FLAVORS.
As a child, she loved
applesauce, grilled steak,
and strawberries, but
not bananas or dry
brown bread.
When she was in college, Alice went to France
and studied food (not books).
She walked the markets,
tasting savory onion soup,
buying sweet carrots, warm bread, sausages.
She and her French friends
spent hours cooking,
eating, talking, and laughing.
In her travels, Alice learned
wonderful food was like a symphony
that woke people up, made them happier.
Sharing good food
could start a party, make memories.
O NCE IN
TURKEY, A BOY HAD
SHARED TEA AND HIS
LAST BITS OF CHEESE
WITH ALICE AND HER
FRIENDS. She said that
kindness changed
her life.
Back home, Alice wanted to take her American friends
on the trip to Delicious.
She wanted them to have the meals and the good times
she had loved in France.
She searched long hours for fresh vegetables,
fish, meat, and herbs.
She simmered stews, roasted chickens, baked tarts.
Her friends filled Alices place
and stayed for hours enjoying the amazing dinners.
People who ate Alices meals called her a genius with food,
but her home wasnt big enough for all her friends.
Alice started to dream of a new kind of restaurant
with wonderful food and helpful waiters,
a small restaurant that welcomed people
to eat, sit, and visit.
Alice found a place,
fixed it up with her friends,
and named it after Panisse,
a kindly character from a French movie.
Chez Panisse (Panisses House)
was like a house, a home
where the staff chefs to dishwashers worked together,
laughed together, and ate together.
That first night they had such a crowd
they ran out of food.
And that was a problem
finding enough fresh, tasty food.
Frozen food was handy.
Food that had been on the shelves for days
was cheap.
But those were not right for the trip to Delicious.
Alice worked day and night finding just the right food.
She drove to the fish and poultry markets
in Chinatown so often that her car began to smell
like a fish wagon and no one wanted to ride with her.
A LICE COULD
NEVER RESIST SHARING
DELICIOUS FOOD.
Once she was carrying fresh
strawberries on an airplane.
Everyone on the plane could smell
them. One by one they asked to
taste a berry. By the time the
plane landed, Alice was
out of berries.
Alice and her friends picked wild fennel
beside railroad tracks;
knocked on strangers doors and asked to pick
mulberries from their trees.
She planted lettuce in her own yard.
As news of Chez Panisse spread,
growers brought baskets
of their best vegetables to the back door.
Alice noticed that these plump, fresh vegetables
had the richest flavor.
She began to pay foragers to go out into the country
to find others who took good care of the earth,
their crops, and their animals.
The delicious meals she wanted to serve
to her customers
began not in the kitchen but in the field,
with good soil and thoughtful farmers.
A LICE ALSO
VISITED FARMS.
She walked the fields
