Food writer Ruth Reichl talks about her new cookbook

Legendary food writer Ruth Reichl's life has been a banquet of sorts. Her been-there, ate-that resume includes serving as the last editor of the late, great Gourmet magazine; critiquing restaurants for The New York Times and the Los Angeles Times; and penning both cookbooks and food memoirs. Her latest, "For You, Mom. Finally." (Penguin, $13), recently came out in paperback.

Q. In the book, you talk about what a lousy cook your mother was. Did that cause you to get into food?A. I don't think it was so much that. But what it did was make me focus on flavor. I mean, if your earliest memories are thinking - "Is this food safe? Can I eat it?" - then you become focused on flavor in a way most people don't.You started cooking as a child?A. Yes. If you start cooking when you are young, everyone tells you how great it is! It never occurs to you that you could create a bad meal.Wasn't there a period where women didn't like to cook?A. For my mother and her generation, they were barraged with the idea that you had to get freed from the kitchen and its drudgery. My mother prided herself on getting dinner on the table in 10 minutes, no matter what it tasted like.What made cooking cool again?A. Food TV had a lot to do with it. It made cooking sexy and creative.Where is food journalism headed now?A. It's oscillating between stupid food journalism and things that are getting into a lot of serious food politics, like good blogs and magazines like Gastronomica.How seriously should we take food criticism on blogs?A. I think blogs have made food criticism better. Right now, you've got a knowledgeable public, people who devour restaurants and reviews. They're informed as consumers. Still, a good critic should make you pay attention to things you didn't know before.Has how recipes are written changed?A. Increasingly, they need to hold people's hands, telling them what "till golden" means and what sort of pan they should use. Many older recipes were, like, four sentences, because they assumed you knew everything.What about restaurants? How different are they from when you were reviewing them?A. The biggest change to me is that Americans are remaking their restaurants into what they want them to be, not just a European idea of putting your hands in your lap and having a waiter order for you.And the idea of luxury has changed. It used to mean ingredients like caviar and lobster; now it means something that was grown by the chef or locally sourced. People are really holding restaurants accountable now. It's fascinating.