Julie & Julia: 365 days, 524 recipes, 1 tiny apartment kitchen

I’m a foodie. As my friends who have known me for years can attest, my loves are baseball, the beach, and two celebrity crushes. But above all, I love to cook. On those rare Thursdays and/or Fridays when I’m off work, I’m known to spend most of my day in the kitchen. Sometimes, I even stay up late on Thursday nights, devising new ways to prepare chicken and vegetable side dishes.

Ten years ago, my parents must have watched the movie based on this book. My mom grew up with the likes of Julia Child because her generation ate natural food that was “accessible” to every cook, including my grandma, who savored a good leg of lamb (a food that is a no-no in my house, more on that later). Me, not so much. Ten years ago, my oldest kid was under ten. If I got quality reading time, it would only be those books that I selected for myself, without any need for recommendations from friends.

Fast forward ten years, and now I only have teenagers. I can afford to be less picky in my reading selections. Not every book I read has to have an award attached to it. In between the Pulitzers and biographies, I needed a fluff book. I found it in an ode to Julia Child that ten years ago I wouldn’t have even touched.

Julie Powell faced a ticking biological clock. Turning thirty stared her in the face, and three doctors diagnosed her with PCOS. This was twenty years ago, and at the time, doctors didn’t know as much about the inability of women with PCOS to conceive. Julie and her husband Eric lived in a loft apartment in Long Island City, and she worked in a government agency in midtown Manhattan that assisted the families of 9-11 victims. In 2002-03, Julie was definitely busy at work but unfulfilled as a secretary.

On a visit home to her parents in Texas, Julie noticed her mother’s copy of Mastering the Art of French Cooking (MtAoFC) on the kitchen counter. Her mother knew she needed an infusion of Texas cooking, but what Julie really needed was a project to help ease the pain of turning thirty in a dead-end job and not having any children. Julie decided right there in her parents’ kitchen that she would cook her way through Julia Child’s iconic cookbook over the course of the year. The two shared a name, and Julia Child would be Julie Powell’s polestar. What could possibly go wrong in undertaking a project such as this?

Powell’s book came after cooking for an entire year. Yes, lots of calamities occurred. The apartment was a fixer-upper, and things broke all the time - pipes, heat, plumbing. It read like an urban 21st-century Money Pit. Because she got the contract for this book after getting exposure on television news programs and newspapers, the book seemed like a foregone conclusion, and eventually, it led to a movie contract. My parents saw the movie. My mom loves all things French and adored the movie. Me, well, this book had chick flick written all over it.

Julie has been with her husband since they started dating at age eighteen, but her three close friends were all single and came to her for relationship advice, as though she was a pro. They also encouraged Julie to start a blog - remember those - that she eventually monetized, which supported the cooking. There were a lot of booze sessions and cooking disasters that nearly ruined her marriage, but Julie cooked through the year and became an expert at crepes and liver and wine pairing. Ask her, and her favorite food was still bacon and jalapeño pizza from Domino’s and Texas-style hamburgers, but cook she did, and it did ease the pain of turning thirty.

I can envision how this book is a better concept for a movie, which most viewers claim was a quality film. I don’t watch most movies, so I can’t comment.

Julie and Julia does have its merits. In the 1940s, as a young wife living in Paris, Julia Child also needed a project to keep her from living bored while her husband went to work. Powell includes letters Julia and her husband exchanged prior to marriage, and I found these intriguing, a mirror to the past. Julia Child saw an advertisement for a Cordon Bleu class for GI veterans and she joined, the only woman in the class. One can say that the rest is history because Julia Child became one of the most famous chefs of the 20th century.

After returning to the United States, Julia started her own cooking show on the new medium of television. Women everywhere saw that cooking gourmet meals was accessible to them, and many tried the recipes they saw on the show. This led to her writing MtAoFC complete with detailed instructions and photographs. Forty years later, Julie Powell channeled Julia and navigated through the book’s pages. While her escapades had me rolling my eyes, I give her an A for effort, and the blog entries and comments lent comic relief to an otherwise straightforward story.

I also learned the best combination of toppings to put on a quality burger, and my burger-loving family will salivate at the prospects of that. Julia Child’s food, too much butter for my taste, not to mention my picky eating teens. To each their own, I might attempt the spinach and artichokes.

While researching to write this review, I noticed that Julie Powell passed away from COVID complications about two and a half years ago. Her medical conditions did not allow her to have any children, but she was the mom to three cats and a dog. The article I saw did not mention adoption or surrogacy, all possibilities for growing a family a quarter through the 21st century.

Julie and Julia did not win any literary awards. It essentially was a human interest story that caught the attention of news programs looking for stories to fill time. Because Julia Child was involved, viewers caught on to the idea of taking a year to cook through an award-winning cookbook. If I had the time, the idea is intriguing to say the least. I have never been one for chick lit or movies, finding them to be sappy and melodramatic. Give me action and sports every day.

It *is* women’s history month. Even though women have traditionally run the kitchens in their homes, throughout history, most of the award-winning chefs have been men. That has changed in recent years as women have captured the workforce outside of the home in the last two generations, cooking included. In the 1950s, Julia Child told housewives that they too could be a cook. Forty years later, Julie Powell took this advice to heart. This brain candy got me through a day of reading. I doubt I will see the movie, but it was a light-hearted way to get through a day.

3 stars

I have been eager to watch the movie, Julie and Julia ever since its release. However, I still haven't seen it. To be honest, I had no clue what the movie was about, except that it was in some way related to Julia Child. I have adored Julia Child for a very long time, which is why I was attracted to the movie trailer. As a red seal chef, there is another aspect that appeals to me. This book, on the other hand, I wasn't even aware of until a few weeks ago. So, I guess it's quite obvious that I have a connection to this book as well.

Having said all that, I may never see the movie now, as I don't really feel the need to. This is one of the funniest things I've read in a long time. Over the twenty-five years of my life as a practicing chef, I've come across some of the weirdest, strangest, and most bizarre things one could imagine. Therefore, I was fully able to relate to all of the author's ups and downs throughout the book. I have a much better understanding of the trials and tribulations of the task described in the premise. The way the author describes how she deals with some of those cooking mistakes is hilarious. To say I can relate doesn't quite do it justice, but you get the idea.

It seems to me that there was some sort of strange symbiosis between the author herself and Miss Child, even though they have never met. It was as if they could read each other's thoughts in a way. I do talk to recipes as if I'm talking to the person who wrote them, so it was refreshing to see that I'm not the only one!

One doesn't need to know how to cook to find this book a real treasure. It's well-written, funny, and a great escape from the daily routine. Highly recommended.

Julie Powell in real life is not a person that I necessarily like.

However, Julie Powell in the movie presents a different image. She seems to be nicer and more likable.

Taking this into consideration, I would give this book a pass and simply choose to watch the movie.

The movie is infinitely better in my opinion. It offers a more engaging and enjoyable experience.

By watching the movie instead of reading the book, you're not missing anything of significance.

The visual and auditory elements of the movie bring the story to life in a way that the book may not be able to achieve.

So, if you're looking for a quick and entertaining way to experience the story of Julie Powell, I would highly recommend watching the movie.

Completely and utterly disappointing.

I was truly in love with the idea that Julie came up with: to recreate each of the 524 recipes in Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking. I had never read her blog before, and my expectations for the book were sky-high.

Unfortunately, Julie turns out to be a completely repulsive, unappealing and vulgar human being. Her self-deprecating so-called "humor" failed to make me find her charmingly witty. Instead, I simply believed what she was telling me and concluded that she was in fact the most disgusting person alive. The fact that she keeps her crappy apartment in filthy, squalor-like conditions, with maggots growing in the kitchen that she was theoretically using on a daily basis, kind of made me want to throw up. If it hadn't been for my fascination with food and my love of Julia Child, I would have stopped reading (which is quite rare for me).

The book isn't even really about the cooking or Julia. It's instead just a new platform for Julie to continue with her self-indulgent blogging. It seems as if she is more interested in sharing her own unappealing traits and experiences rather than focusing on the wonderful world of French cuisine and the legacy of Julia Child. It's a real shame that what could have been a great exploration of cooking and a tribute to a culinary icon turned out to be such a disappointment.

Sorry Julie Powell, you seem like a miserably unpleasant person. I pity your husband. It's quite disheartening to observe your demeanor. You come across as someone who is constantly dissatisfied and perhaps even bitter. One wonders what could have led you to such a state. Maybe it's the pressures of life, or perhaps unresolved issues within yourself. Whatever the cause, it's a pity that your negative attitude seems to pervade your interactions.

Your husband, on the other hand, has to deal with this on a daily basis. He must endure your unhappiness and try to find ways to cope. It can't be easy for him. I can't help but feel sorry for him. He deserves to be with someone who is more positive and uplifting. Someone who can bring joy and happiness into his life.

Hopefully, you will one day realize the impact your attitude has on those around you and make an effort to change. It won't be easy, but it's possible. And perhaps then, both you and your husband can find some measure of peace and contentment.

Let me start by admitting that I read this book right after having watched the Meryl Streep - Amy Adams movie.

Let me add that I am one of those who very rarely thinks a movie is as good as the book. Even more rarely do I think the movie’s better than the book.

Well, in this case, the movie is definitely better than the book.

On the brink of turning thirty, scatterbrained, working as a temp in a government agency, and about to move to a tiny Long Island flat with her husband, three cats and a pet python (!), Julie Powell decided to set herself a challenge: in the course of one year, cook all 524 recipes in iconic chef Julia Child’s classic cookbook, Mastering the Art of French Cookery. And, just as importantly (soon, more importantly), blog about it. What followed were loads of ups and downs, triumphs and disasters.

For me, as a self-proclaimed foodie, the main attraction was supposed to be the food. Yes, it did come through at times, but it was overshadowed by too much extraneous material. There were too many reminiscences, mostly about sex, too many side stories about friends and their sex lives, and too many anecdotes that had little or no connection to Julie or her Julie - Julia Project. I'm not a prude, but when you go on and on about sex and adultery and lusting after celebrities in a book about food, it just doesn't work for me. That's not what I want to read.

Plus, there's so much that is simply revolting about the home and kitchen Julie describes. There's cat hair, cat poo, the python and its food (mice). There's an outbreak of flies and, inevitably, maggots crawling all over. Yuck. If I were one of the people invited to Julie's feasts, I would have boycotted her after reading Julie and Julia.

All that aside, there are the two main characters themselves. Julie, who is more in the spotlight here than in the movie where she shares screen time equally with Julia, comes across as childish, whiny, careless, and too highly strung to be likeable. She tries to be funny, but her 'humour' is often misjudged. For example, there are some snide remarks about those mourning the loss of family members and friends in 9/11. Julia, in the book, is mostly only present in short, one-page-per-chapter snippets depicting scenes from her life in the 1940s when she met and married Paul Child. That's it. I get some sense of who Julia was, but not nearly enough, and there's nothing about her book, how it got published, and so on. For someone who claims that Julia Child showed her how to find her way in life and who seems to admire Julia Child so passionately, it's strange that in a book with Julia's name in the title, Julie Powell writes so little about Julia herself.

Watch the film instead. It may not be as funny (if you consider this kind of writing funny), but it's warmer, sweeter, much more likeable, and it's actually as much about Julia as it is about Julie.

Julie really let me down. Her tone was so tired.

I've dealt with too many self-loathing Gen Xers who believe that revealing their personal issues is novel and shocking. But it's not. Have they ever heard of reality TV? It's just degrading. If they're looking for cheap therapy through the blogosphere, good luck getting stable and coherent advice from the comments section.

Moreover, she thought it was funny to insult her husband, considered admitting to maggots under her dish drainer as a good adventure, and was blasé about marital infidelity. I can hardly imagine liking her in person. I definitely don't like her as she is presented in print.

However, by the end, when she discovers that Julia Child doesn't like her, I felt sorry for her. And she's not a complete failure. She worships Buffy the Vampire Slayer almost as much as I do.

I have the impression that when she started the project, Julie was a deeply depressed girl who was trying to lose herself in the details of the challenge. Frankly, it reminds me of Eat, Pray, Love in that regard. (Find yourself, eat great food, and get a book deal out of it!) But she failed to show significant questioning or growth. Maybe she was unprepared to engage vigorously with the process. Maybe she was too lazy. Maybe her writing was too poor to convey profound change. But then, what's the point of the book?

To me, this is a truly captivating book that delves into the theme of finding sanity within the framework of structure. Julie, who is initially at a loss about what to do with her life, ingeniously manufactures a project for herself.

By resolutely completing at least one new recipe each day and blogging about her culinary adventures, she discovers that she becomes so thoroughly consumed by this endeavor that she scarcely has any time left to obsess over her dead-end job or her possible infertility.

This narrative reminds me a great deal of "Rosemary Goes to the Mall," a fascinating podcast where an art instructor undertakes the project of shopping from and obtaining a bag from every single store in the Mall of America.

It is a pretty good read, although it is a little embarrassing in the sense that I can easily understand and identify with Julie. She has a tendency to use strong language like "fuck" quite frequently. She is sarcastic and at times can even be mean. However, her husband is incredibly supportive, as are her friends.

Overall, it serves as a reflection of "us" - my friends, my urban age group, highlighting the various challenges and idiosyncrasies that we all face in our lives.