There must have been threads on this before, but I can’t find any. When I read a novel that contains descriptions of foods, I start craving them. It started way before I read Proust and developed the requisite craving for madeleines, which I’d never had. (I have since, and they were…OK.)
When I was little and read The Boxcar Children, I craved beef stew, brown bread, and blueberries. Pickwick Papers had me craving milk punch. An Agatha Christie character (Miss Oliver?) had me wanting apples. Heck, when I read Dharma Bums, I craved canned macaroni and cheese and canned chili, and I can’t stand either.
Surely I can’t be alone in this. What books had you drooling discreetly for what foods?
The Sten series by Chris Bunch and Alan Cole. The Eternal Emperor is a great cook, and he shares recipes. Angelo Stew makes my mouth water.
Cookbook.
It’s not exactly what you’re asking about but almost any mention of coffee or tea in my reading will make me think “I could use a cup.”
I read James Michener’s Chesapeake years and years ago, and it got me yearning for crab cakes. I like crab but had never had crab cakes. And now I love them. Whenever I’m back east near DC I have to go to Clyde’s in Georgetown for them!
I’ve read CS threads and ended up cooking dishes being discussed. A Cuban Black Beans recipe (from a @Broomstick thread) is now something I’ve made three or four times. I get ideas from the Dinner thread all the time. Years ago @Guinastasia posted a recipe for a Slovak xmas mushroom soup that I made for a special occasion and it was a huge hit with my Slovak in-laws.
I can’t think of any specific books, but going back to when I was young, any time I read the word “piazza” I would crave pizza. These days, I can have pizza any time I want and so never get deprived enough to “crave” it but I still think of pizza when I read it.
You might not think Moby Dick is a sensual book, but when the narrator eats clam chowder in one of the early chapters, it always makes me want some (even though mine is never quite as good as the book’s; I guess I need to wander frozen seaside streets first).
Boeuf en daube in Mrs.Dalloway. I don’t even like beef, but the way Woolf describes it makes it seem infinitely desirable.
Roasted potatoes and clotted cream (not at the same time), from reading The Secret Garden. Chocolate, from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. And of course, Turkish Delight, from The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe. I don’t mean actual Turkish Delight…that stuff’s nasty. But what I imagined it to be when I was a child reading the book.
Not from reading ( that I can recall ) but whenever I see the movie ‘Tampopo’ I’m driven mad with cravings for a fresh bowl of authentic Japanese ramen.
Nora Ephron was thoughtful enough in Heartburn to actually include the recipes for the dishes described. I still make her Swiss potatoes.
If it’s cold, any mention of hot chocolate find me wandering in the kitchen.
If it’s hot, mentions of ice tea will do the same.
And I have a book about Islay whisky. The reader’s supposed to have a dram while reading.
Reading Carolyn Hart’s mysteries make me want to travel to South Carolina to sample the local cuisine.