Introduction

Cassoulet Confessions is an enthralling memoir by award-winning food and travel writer Sylvie Bigar that reveals how a simple journalistic assignment sparked a culinary obsession and transcended into a quest for identity. Set in the stunning southern French countryside, this honest and poignant memoir conveys hunger for authentic food and a universal hunger for home.

In Cassoulet Confessions, Sylvie travels across the Atlantic from her home in New York to the origin of cassoulet – the Occitanie region of Southern France. There she immerses herself in all things cassoulet: the quintessential historic meat and bean stew. From her first spoonful, she is transported back to her childhood in Geneva, Switzerland, and finds herself journeying through an unexpected rabbit hole of memories. Not only does she discover the deeper meanings of her ancestral French cuisine, but she is ultimately transformed by having to face her unsettling, complex family history.

Sylvie’s simple but poetic prose immerses us in her story: we smell the simmering aromas of French kitchens, empathize with her family dilemmas, and experience her internal struggle to understand and ultimately accept herself.

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Excerpt

Prologue
Wobbly from almost 20 hours of travel, I swung open the metallic doors of the restaurant kitchen, put my bag down and stopped short. On the counter, next to the neatly folded apron and the heavy knife, a pig’s head stared me down with sad eyes filled with eternity. ... view entire excerpt...

Discussion Questions

1. What food best represents you as a person?
2. If you could immerse yourself in a region and study the cuisine, where would you choose?
3. What is your first food memory?
4. What more would you like to know about Sylvie Bigar?
5. What food writers would you most like to dine with?
6. If you had to choose between cooking and baking, which would you pick?
7. What's your favorite novel about food?
8. Favorite foodie memoir?

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