I loved this little book and read it in one sitting on a rainy Sunday afternoon. It made me wish that Colette would invite me to dinner! The writing swept me along throughout the journeys in her life. The recipes were a surprise bonus for me as I had never read her other books and had no idea she was known for cuisine. It was the beautiful cover that sold me! Highly recommend this book. I can barely cook, but am going to try the Agvolemono soup, a favorite from my 20's when I worked upstairs from a Greek Deli in downtown Boston.

.
Reading _Return to Paris_ (and preparing its recipes) is like listening to a Piaf song, at once strikingly beautiful and hauntingly sad, something that commands your attention to the very end.

So, dear reader, beware! For should you open the first page of this book, you may find yourself swept away to a Paris you never knew of, to return to a present made a little sadder by finding there are no more pages left to turn.

I also recommend these other books by Rossant which I have read:
- Memories of a Lost Egypt (the first of her food memoirs)
- Bocuse a la Carte (translator)
- Colette Rossant's After Five Gourmet
- Colette's Slim Cuisine
- New Kosher Cooking
- Vegetable

I don't usually read food-related books. I generally stick with novels or straightforward history/biography. Yet I could not resist Colette Rossant's earlier memoir, Memories of a Lost Egypt, for its poignant, delectable interweaving of memories, recipes, and passionate observations about the tastes and foods she discovered as a child growing up in remarkable circumstances. (Her recipes are fabulous, by the way--easy to recreate.)

Rossant's new book, Return to Paris, continues the story of her extraordinary upbringing. I really recommend reading both books, which are delightfully different but ideal companions. In fact, I so loved Rossant's evocation of Cairo in both writing and recipes, and her candid portrait of her family there, that I wasn't sure at first how I would react to her new memoir's focus on Paris, where she returned as a teenager. As it turns out, I enjoyed the dramatic turn this book reflects, in both her life and her culinary education, as she describes her difficult adjustment to postwar life in a country so different from her beloved Egypt. I was touched by young Colette's largeness of spirit as she accepts her losses and isolation, and opens up to the delights of Paris and its food.

Rossant is a wonderful writer with an explorer's personality, which makes her books transcend their genre. Lovers of good stories and good writing, as well as marvelous food, will enjoy Return to Paris. I'd like to add that given the events of our time, in particular the appalling anti-French and anti-Arab behavior some folks exhibit, it is compelling to read how one young person bridged two strikingly different cultures with grace, open eyes, and receptive tastebuds.

France seems to produce more than its share of wonderful stylists who don't have much to say (Georges Simenon also comes to mind). This is a lovely, cozy read, but I'd sure like to know what the other reviewer found that is especially about women or directed toward women. I find what Janet Flanner said about Colette much more to the point, something to the effect that there was hardly a tree in French literature until Colette came along. What she does--and does supremely well--is describe flowers, insects, trees, whole gardens beautifully and precisely. For this reader that's quite enough.

I first read this book back when the earth was cooling. When I wanted to reread it, I couldn't find it, so I bought another copy. I've loaned it out, never had it returned, bought it again, ditto, ditto, ditto.
I've probably bought this book 10 times over the past 20 years, and that's no doubt a record for me.
People associate Colette with Cheri and her other erotic and somewhat scandalous writing and life-style.
Sido (her mother) and My Mother's House are written in an altogether different tone: lyrical, idyllic, dreamy, funny (of course; she's a very funny writer), nostalgic.
Read these two companion books, usually sold in a single volume, to get a real taste of what it was like to spend your childhood in rural France before the turn of the last century, in an eccentric household run by an unusually permissive mother and a much older, loving but distant father.
To read these books is to be sucked into another era by a writer uniquely skilled at her craft - and most of all, it gives you a fresh appreciation for the child who became Colette.

There are many Colettes, and I cherish them all. But the one dearest to me is the Colette who wrote so lovingly and voluptuously of her early years. In "My Mother's House" and "Sido" Colette writes about her family, her childhood in the country, and the creatures - human and otherwise - which informed those years.

In her writing about these years, Colette describes the inner life of children, country life, and her parents and their odd, affectionate and often difficult relationship with each other and with their children. We have the sense of lives tied to the earth and the turn of seasons, particularly through loving descriptions of her mother, Sido.

These two memoirs are not about "not much" as one reviewer puts it, they're about the sensuality of life, about enduring bonds of love and of blood, and about the education of a writer. Perfectly gorgeous work, and highly recommended.

I found this book a joy to read I couldn't put it down.The life that this author had as a child the smells of the cooking the lush gardens of her grandparents yards and the Maket place must have been a fun place to go as a young child, it was truly like being there.Her ability to keep a good head as a kid being moved around and as always the kitchen was a big part of her life a place were she felt secure. I have tryed some of the recipes they are easy to follow and taste great.

This book is not only charming but is beautifully written. I had tears in my eye as I read it. The recipes are mouth watering and I ran to buy some Egyptian ingredients to try the recipes. Colette Rossant gives an evocative picture of the life of a Jewish family during second world war.

I think that Rossant has a great gift for evocating her past. I felt that she really gave us an idea of what Egypt was like in the 40's. The recipes are excellent, I have already cooked from it.