Whether the subject of her fancy is the lowly, unassuming potato or the love life of that aphrodisiac mollusk the oyster, Mary Frances Kennedy Fisher writes with a simplicity that belies the complexities of the life she often muses on. She is hailed as one of America’s preeminent writers about gastronomy, but limiting her to that genre would be a disservice. A passionate and well-traveled woman, her narratives fill over two dozen highly acclaimed books. In this collection of some of her finest works, Fisher demonstrates a palette well-trained not only in gastronomical masterpieces, but in life’s best pleasures as well.

Love in a Dish . . . and Other Culinary Delights is an instructional manual on how to live, eat, and love brought together by prolific researcher and culinary enthusiast Anne Zimmerman. With great care she has selected essays that forgive, and celebrate, our lustful appetites, as in “Once a Tramp, Always . . . ” and “Love in a Dish.”

It is through these selections, including two essays never before collected in book form, that we encounter Fisher’s bold passion for cuisine and an introduction to her idea of what constitutes the delicious life.