What Happened at the Wisconsin Restaurant Show Yesterday, Plus What Happens Today, Plus a Foodie Narrative Roundup.

Set up is from 7 to 10:45 AM. I got there at about 8. First of all, I brought too many books! Second of all, it's hard to sort them all out. Third of all, we had that panicky moment when we think we're going to run out of the author's books at the event. Eh, I have that moment a lot, even though we usually have enough.

Featured author Andrew Zimmern headlined Monday's show. His book The Bizarre Truth: Culinary Misadventures Around the Globe* is now in paperback. Remember, Zimmern's show "Bizarre Foods" airs on the Travel Channel, so it's more of a narrative than a cookbook. And I'm not sure that you'd want these recipes of the exotica tackled in the show--cow vein stew from Bolivia, giant flying ants in Uganda, raw camel kidneys of Ethiopia, and putrefied shark in blood pudding from Iceland.

That said, his demo was for mouth-watering Chinese Street Food. He offered recipes for wok tossed, twice cooked, crispy salt and pepper shrimp, as well as back ribs with black beans and green onions, a popular dish of central and northern China.

Today's demo is for Wine Bar Food, from Kenosha's Mangia Trattoria and Chicago's acclaimed Italian restaurant Spiaggia. The book travels the world to ten iconic cities, offering about ten dishes per market, along with wine pairings and sections on cured meats, cheeses, and pantry items for each (I'm paraphrasing here). The focus is on Italy, home of half the cities covered, with the rest being Mediterranean-esue (Athens, Barcelona). An interesting aside--Spiaggia is at least part-owned by Levy Restaurants, who also does the food service for the Frontier Center, home of this convention.

Our non-event bestseller so far is no surprise; signed copies of Life, on the Line, from Grant Achatz and Nick Kokonas. I talked to one culinary student (the convention was heavy with students, as there was a competition going on) who dreamed of moving to Chicago to work at Alinea. I'm sure that's not an uncommon dream!

Some other foodie* books that we took to the event:

Blood, Bones & Butter: The Inadvertent Education of a Reluctant Chef, by Gabrielle Burton. The making of a chef/owner, in this case, of Prune in the East Village of New York. I guess Burton's trajectory was a bit unorthodox; instead of culinary school, she started out by waiting tables. This book came out of nowhere for me--now that I'm not buying, I don't always know what kind of marketing money is thrown at which books, but an attendee came up to me at the show and said, "That book is a pick on Amazon." Thanks!

Scars of a Chef: The Searing Story of a Top Chef Marked Forever by the Grit and Grace of Life in the Kitchen, by Rick Tramonto, with Lisa Jackson (yes, the romance writer). I remember him from Tru, which was his restaurant with Gale Gand, his first wife, but his restaurants now include Traamonto Steak and Seafood, and Osteria di Tramonto. You wouldn't think I would have much in common an acclaimed chef, but we both started our culinary careers at Wendy's. I detoured. SaltRiver, his publisher, is an imprint of Tyndale, so the book is squarely Christian in focus, with Tramonto counting T. D. Jakes as one of his inspirations.

Knives at Dawn: America's Quest for Culinary Glory at the Bocuse D'Or, the World's Most Prestigious Cooking Competition. Now out in paperback, Andrew Friedman's chronicle of one year of the Bocuse D'Or competition, focusing on Timothy Hollingsworth, the American entrant from the French Laundry. It's foodie manna, though like many of these narratives--read more in my blog on the hardcover, back from November 2009.

Plus lots and lots of pretty cookbooks.

*The publisher changed the subtitle for the paperback. I do think it's an improvement over the hardcover, which was "How I Walked Out the Door Mouth First... and Came Back Shaking My Head."

**Appropriate, as the show is co-sponsored by Wisconsin Foodie.

Bocuse d'Or Competition on "Top Chef" is the Perfect Opportunity to Discuss the New Book Knives at Dawn.

Do you watch "Top Chef" regularly? I've been a bit bored this season because it seemed obvious by the 2nd episode who the top four would be. And only one tie-in challenge to the new Top Chef Quickfire Cookbook? Don't they want to sell books? I certainly heard more about the Glad family of products.

But I'd been holding out for last week's episode. It was the competition where they held a mini Bocuse d'Or. I've been waiting for the episode all season, as it was mentioned in the new book, Knives at Dawn: America's Quest for Culinary Glory at the Legendary Bocuse D'Or Competion, by Andrew Friedman.

The Bocuse d'Or is an international culinary competition where chefs representing countries battle it out to see who can do the best job creating two specialized platters, one of meat and the other of fish. The terms of the competition are very French, which may be the reason why the French do well every year. On the other hand, the French don't compete in the International Culinary Olympics, because one year they did very poorly. Or so I'm told. Seems like sour crepes to me.

So last year, the Americans made a concerted attempt to do better, recruiting Thomas Keller and Daniel Boulud to the board. This is the story of that year of training, filled with insider stories, gossip, strategies. It's foodie porn to the max. Of course, if you heard about the competition (or perhaps saw it on cable), you already know how it turned out, but half the fun is getting there.

I won't spoil last week's "Top Chef" episode, where the prize included a place at the 2010 competition tryouts. (Reading this book, I learned that season 3 winner Hong tried out in 2009.) But I will say that the results were far from the elaborate platters described in the Knives at Dawn.

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Speaking of Keller, to my knowledge, there are still tickets available to the hors d'oeuvres reception at Lake Park Bistro on Wednesday, December 2nd, at 4:30. Tickets are $85 and include a copy of the book. Call (414) 962-6300. The dinner at Bacchus is sold out, alas. It's also not too late to get a copy of the $50 Ad Hoc at Home signed by the chef/author--for that you contact us at (414) 332-1181. I don't think Keller will sign Knives at Dawn, though fans of his will certainly enjoy reading it. On second thought, who knows?

Official but Extremely Short Visit to GLIBA (that's a Regional Book Convention) in Cleveland

What's the best way to visit your regional book convention? I'd suggest taking off as few days as possible and jamming it in with a trip to a wedding in Ann Arbor.

There are about seven regional booksellers associations in the United States. We're sort of on the border between two. Wisconsin is more officially in the Midwest Booksellers Association, but Chicago (where I know more booksellers) gravitates towards the Great Lakes Independent Booksellers Assocation. Contining the Schwartz tradition of indecision about these things, I decided that Boswell would continue to belong to both (because it's not that expensive).

Lanora at Next Chapter spoke on a panel at MBA the previous week, and wrote up a nice trip to Twin Cities bookstores on her blog. My only true bookstore visit was a stop in Nicola's for a gift card for the wedding party. I heard Nicola explain to a customer why Peony in Love was more enjoyable to Snow Flower and the Secret Fan (I never read the former, but just assumed it didn't measure up--mea culpa) and then she gave me a primer in slash fiction, a subgenre of fan fiction where the author brings together characters in same-sex relationships. Harper is publishing Pride/Prejudice next winter.

Alas, some travel delays and a bad time through Chicago forced us to miss the author cocktail party and Friday night dinner featuring Dan Chaon (Await Your Reply). We're selling Chaon's novel pretty well and should be able to do better. I hoped to pick up another selling handle after listening to his speech (but also wondered how much he'd repeat from his pre-pub dinner in Chicago. I woudn't blame him--that's a lot of speeching). But I can only imagine what it was like, or at least cruise the internet for other bookseller blogs.

So we arrived in Cleveland about four hours late. We stayed at the Radisson down the block --this seems to be a habit with me of late. I had a little confusion with the official Renaissance Hotel and they were sold out of rooms at the good rate. Of course Joan at GLIBA fixed it but momentum was not on her side at that point. Kirk and I arrived for drinks at the bar, where we chatted with booksellers and publishing folk. It was nice to see Miles from Nowhere's Nami Mun (we hosted her last week) and I introduced her to some booksellers she hadn't met. Then I spoke to Wendy from Simon and Schuster (an ex-bookseller turned publishing type who just let me read an early advance of an uber-foodie book, Knives at Dawn--more on that closer to pub date) and Bill, the buyer at said Nicola's. They were speaking about blurbs. Bill is down on those write-ups where booksellers simply say "I loved this book" but also warned against too much plot revelation.

I thought back to my experiences at Schwartz, where several booksellers would say little more than "Buy this book" and with the right book, it worked like crazy. I remember revealing just a plot about Katrina Kittle's The Kindness of Strangers and one of the Brookfield booksellers who was selling it like crazy told me I was guilty of TMI. Robert, who recently moved from a more urban store to one with a more suburban setting, noticed these directed recs seemed to work better at his new venue than previously. I don't know the answer to this.

More chatting, a drink, a revelation of my own--I like red wine better than white wine because white wine seems salty to me, and half my GLIBA was over.