Customer Reviews

Joie de Vivre: Simple French Style for Everyday Living

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I loved this book- the recipes are quite simple but it is a sweet look at an ideal day in the life of a french family. He goes through the ideal petit dejeuner, dejeuner,etc, explaining what he and his family like to eat and do. The photos are also very nice. It is more an inspirational book than recipe book.

I've read my copy 3 times cover to cover. Not only does Robert explain the simple secrets that make french living so tranquil and natural but each chapter includes simple recipes that anyone can follow.
I now practice Joie de Vivre in my daily life eventhough I live in the middle of a busy city.

I have been fortunate to visit France twice and was a guest in the home of a French lady who is a family friend. Joie de Vivre does a good job of describing the daily routine of the French and their attitudes toward food, family, friends, and enjoying life. I have never been as relaxed as I was when I was in France. Of course, I WAS on vacation, but it was still quite a relaxing experience. Things go at a slower pace than they do in the US and there is more enjoyment of simple things and simple times. Neighborhood grocers, patisseries, butcher shops, and bakeries, make it simpler to have fresh food every day. It also makes the experience of shopping for these items more enjoyable. We walked to the market, the bakery, etc. and it was wonderful. No zooming in the car to find a parking space. This book makes achieving the French lifestyle in the US sound like it would be simple. For those of us who don't live in cities with neighborhood shops, it is a great idea, but would take much more effort to achieve. Also, starting dinner at 8 p.m. sounds unreasonable. My daughter is bathed and in bed by this time and my husband and I are finishing dinner, cleaning the kitchen , and getting ready for a good night's sleep. The French do not watch much television which, I think, makes all the difference in how much extra time they have. They end their days later and start them later. It would be impossible for me to begin dinner at 8:30 p.m., go to bed at 11:30 p.m., get up at 6 a.m., get my daughter to school and myself to work by 8 a.m.

Joie de Vivre can inspire you to add elements of the French lifestyle to your own life.

Frenchman Robert Arbor owns several restaurants in NYC and New England. The purpose of his book is to share typical French attitudes toward food, friends and family with an American audience. The book is organized to reflect an ideal day which includes breakfast of bread and coffee, a few hours of marketing, lunch---weekday and weekend options, afternoon snack and dinner---with a dinner party option. Each section is followed by a few simple recipes. The reader learns a great deal about Arbor and his family and their home routines in both America and France. If one accepts Arbor's life as typical, then I suppose one can also accept his attitudes as typical, but the book would have benefited from other voices.

Robert Arbor describes daily life in France and how it differs from the average, typical American's day. The French take the time to savor their meals, converse with friends and family, and enjoy every aspect of daily life as much as possible. They don't rush about in a stressed-out state of mind, as many do here in the U.S.
I thoroughly enjoyed this book and now, more than ever, want to make another trip to France. Aside from providing simple suggestions to make life more pleasurable, this book is full of wonderful, simple recipes. I've already made the Potatoes a la Nicole and quite a few batches of fresh strawberry jam (it's a hundred times better than any store-bought jam, and better for you!)
If you're looking for an up-lifting, "feel-good" book that will help you improve your outlook on life in general, read Joie de Vivre. You'll be glad you did.

We all know that the French love their food and take it very seriously. That's what they're famous for. In Joie de Vivre, Robert Arthur takes you through the different segments of the typical French day, starting with a simple and relaxing breakfast, and going all the way through the cup of herbal tea before retiring to bed. He explains in very simple language how to get the most out of even the simplest, most mundane things in life that Americans typically either take for granted or rush through in an effort to get to the next task. The French have learned to reap enjoyment from things that many other people have learned to treat as annoyances. By following at least some of the suggestions in this book, one can significantly reduce stress levels and will be able to enjoy life more thoroughly. Even doing something as simple as waking up half an hour earlier and having a quick and easy breakfast of coffee and toasted baguette with butter and preserves can make a huge difference and will likely lead the reader to try some of the other suggestions. The only thing I didn't like about the book is that at some points it seems to be written by a child. I don't know if this was done intentionally to emphasize the simplicity of it all, but it sometimes felt like I was reading a 7 year old's essay. If you can put up with a childish writing style, the ideas behind the words can make a world of difference in your life.

Finally... REAL French cookbook! That is, a cookbook that doesn't just tell you how to measure a cup of this and a teaspoon of that, but instead explains the basic French attitude towards food handling.... which Mr. Arbor argues is the essence of the French attitude towards life.
If a person mastered the few meals in this book, he or she would never go hungry and would have many devoted friends. Such an enlightened person would never need to crack a cookbook either...although.... Robert Arbor does admit he never bakes at home and neither do most of his fellow French. (France is full of wonderful bakeries, afterall, and for baking most people really will need measuring devices, but that's a different book.)

Arbor also gives advice on how to arrange one's kitchen, how to have a lovely time feeding guests (it's all in the timing) and how to have plenty to eat without resorting to junk or fast food. I plan to give this book to my twenty-something son for Christmas. (Either a woman will thank me oneday or he'll simply have a great time on his own.) It's a GREAT gift idea for any young person learning to set up house-keeping. Joie de vivre, indeed. My compliments to Arbor.

Nice, but focused on a few perfect recipes, and the "French Life" as seen from the kitchen. If you are a fan of "Encore Provence" but found it over-the-top, this is for you. More homey and real life.

Author's reflections on ways that Americans could enrich their lives by appreciating and cultivating domestic delights. Lots of recipes initially led me to believe that the book was mostly fluff; my husband had the same reaction. I did read the whole book and found it to be sweet and gently inspiring.

Whether or not the lifestyle described here is true or not, as pointed out by some of the other reviewers, matters not. M. Arbor obviously cherishes the existence he writes about so lovingly.
Arbor lingers over descriptions of what he terms a typical French day. The reader senses his exuberance shining through the pages as they read about his breakfast, his time at a friend's garden, his love of fresh vegetables newly picked, shopping in the tiny family run French specialty stores that provide only the best food--all preservative free. As he sings the praises of the perfect roast chicken--stuffed with a piece of simple French bread and crowned with Provence herbs and root vegetables--I have tried this recipe and it is very good, your mouth will literally water. He urges the reader to delight in the little moments of life as defined by family and friends, good food and great wine. His glee is as ambiant as the light filterng through his morning window and as palpable as savoring the home-made pain du Chocolat he describes for an extra special afternoon snack. What he describes is indeed idyllic--a veritable fairytale land where all the senses are sated. Real? Who cares? It sounds wonderful to me. I felt as if I had spent a week with Arbor in his tranquil French village.

In fact, just reading about it all allowed me to plunge back in time to when I myself was a little girl and my mother sent my brother and I to a garden of a neighbor to pick zucchini blossoms. My mother would fry this in a simple batter---oh what a marvelous treat. If not for Arbor's reminisciences, I would have never remembered how wonderful the whole experience was or how much I attribute such things to the real meaning of "home".

On a more realistic level, Arbor's lifestyle may be difficult to reproduce here in the United States where we rely more on cars and supermarkets to shop rather than applying the "faire les courses" mentality of the French way of marketing. Perhaps here in New Orleans, or in other large cities, this is easier to accomplish, but I would say those who live in a more suburban or rural existence where bakeries, patisseries, chacuteries, cremeries, etc. simply do not exist or have been replaced by large supermarket chains promoting convenience rather than quality, will have a more difficult time of advocating Arbor's lifestyle. Of course, anyone can find ways to shrug off the tension of American life at any given moment by simply stopping to smell the coffee and enjoying smaller pleasant moments of life instead of always expecting the biggest events that we are unrealistically conditioned to believe we deserve.

Arbor's message is simple and at the same time lovely to read about: Say "no" to stress--Simply smile and enjoy--eat well, drink well and cherish those that make up our individual worlds. A wonderful glimpse into what could be possible for those who crave a more European lifestyle. Also recommended are Will Clower's Fat Fallacy and Anne Barone's Chic and Slim Series--these books are recommended for those who are interested in how the French manage to stay so slim after indulging in all that greatly satisfying food.