A delightful collection of reliable recipes, folk history, and local color by Cape Cod's best-known and most-admired chef. With a new Introduction by Anthony Bourdain
Howard Mitcham was the legendary author, chef, artist and poet
whose three major cookbooks, Provincetown Seafood Cookbook, Creole
Gumbo and All That Jazz- A New Orleans Seafood Cookbook, and Clams,
Mussels, Oysters, Scallops and Snails have influenced a generation
of today's chefs. James Howard Mitcham was born in Winona,
Mississippi and graduated from Greenville High School together with
his friend the writer Shelby Foote. At the age of 16 Mitcham became
deaf from spinal meningitis, but that didn't seem to stop him or
even slow him down as he regaled friends with stories in his
booming, Southern-accented voice. He earned a degree in art and
architecture at Louisiana State University, then moved to New
York's Greenwich Village, where he ran the Jane Street Gallery in
the 1940s. Many of Mitcham's friends learned sign language to
converse with him. For people who didn't know how to sign, Mitcham
would carry notebooks and pens so they could write him notes. He
co-authored a food column for the Provincetown Advocate with Jan
Kelly, who called Mitcham "brilliant and never boring. Mitcham died
on August 22nd, 1996, at the age of 79.
AnthonyBourdainis a writer, Emmyand PeabodyAward-winning television
personality,and former chef. Since 2002, he has hosted several
culinary programs, includingAnthonyBourdain- No Reservations, which
ran for seven years on the Travel Channel, and his current
series,AnthonyBourdain- Parts Unknown, on CNN. He is the
best-selling author of the memoirKitchen Confidential- Adventures
in the Culinary Underbelly, as well astwo cookbooks, three crime
novels, a biography of Typhoid Mary, and several other works of
nonfiction.
"The Provincetown Seafood Cookbook is something I go back to read
often. It’s grounding. It’s not so much a cookbook as it is a piece
of cultural anthropology. A sincere love letter to a very special
place that maybe doesn’t totally exist anymore.
I bought my copy in 1991 when I first moved to
the Outer Cape from New Jersey. The stories it told helped me
connect to this spit of sand on a mystical, pagan level. It teaches
respect for a place, the people, a simpler lifestyle, ceremony, for
the ocean and for the fish.
The recipe for Squid Stew (page 151) is as
simple and true as it is transcendental. This book is the closest
thing to a bible in my house. First published in Provincetown in
1975, it was long out of print, but it’s once again available
(Seven Stories Press, 2018). Do yourself — or any cook who cares
about this place — a solid and grab a copy." —Tony Pasquale, The
Provincetown Independent
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