On Aug 31, 5:43*pm, "Gregory Morrow" > wrote:
> http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/31/di....html?_r=1&hpw
>
> August 31, 2009
>
> Sheila Lukins, 66, Dies; Awakened Taste Buds
>
> By JULIA MOSKIN
>
> "Sheila Lukins, who, as an owner of the Silver Palate food shop and an
> author of four Silver Palate cookbooks, helped usher in the new American
> cooking of the 1980s, died on Sunday at age 66, at home in Manhattan.
>
> The cause was brain cancer, diagnosed three months ago, said her daughter
> Annabel Lukins Stelling.
>
> The Silver Palate opened in 1977 on New York's Upper West Side, when few
> Americans had heard of raspberry vinegar or ratatouille. "Entertaining" was
> still a wifely responsibility, and cooking as a hobby was just becoming
> popular among educated women like Ms. Lukins. She had graduated from New
> York University in 1970, moved to London with her husband, Richard Lukins,
> from whom she was divorced, and took classes at the Cordon Bleu cooking
> school.
>
> On returning to New York, Ms. Lukins, by then the mother of two small
> daughters, ran a catering business out of her apartment in the Dakota -
> called, in the racy spirit of the time, the Other Woman Catering Company.
>
> "Back then, New York bachelors would throw dinner parties, but all they
> really wanted to do was pick out the wine," said Julee Rosso, a marketing
> executive who became Ms. Lukins's partner in the Silver Palate.
>
> Ms. Lukins experimented by serving Greek mezes, Moroccan chicken pies and
> gazpacho at a time when only French-style standards like duck à l'orange
> were considered elegant enough for entertaining.
>
> The partners spotted a niche that had been created by the emergence of
> working women, who were interested in good food but lacked the time to
> produce it. "In my neighborhood, the supermarkets closed at 5, because women
> were home during the day - and if they weren't, their maids were," Ms. Rosso
> said.
>
> From a 156-square-foot shop and kitchen at Columbus Avenue and 73rd Street,
> the women and their recipes - Mediterranean chicken salad, curried butternut
> squash soup, spicy carrot cake - intrigued, and then guided, the
> increasingly adventurous palates of New Yorkers.
>
> In 1979, Patricia Wells, writing in The New York Times, called it a "tiny
> food shop with big ideas," referring to its handmade zucchini pickles and
> blueberry preserves, made from local produce whenever possible. Silver
> Palate products were the first foods sold at Saks Fifth Avenue in Manhattan,
> reflecting an upswing of interest in cooking by affluent residents. (Dean &
> DeLuca in SoHo and E.A.T. on the Upper East Side, both of which opened
> within two years of the Silver Palate, were exploring similar cuisine.)
>
> The shop reached a national audience in 1982 with the publication of "The
> Silver Palate Cookbook" (Workman), which has sold more than two and a half
> million copies. Its recipes, like chicken Marbella (with olives, prunes and
> capers) and blackberry mousse (garnished with trendy kiwi fruit), became
> dinner-party classics for a generation of modern cooks.
>
> The book's big, sophisticated flavors were produced from accessible
> ingredients and modest cooking skills, not from French techniques or canned
> cream soups. Editors admonished the authors for their exuberant seasoning
> style. "No, girls, no," a copy editor wrote on one recipe. "No one puts 25
> cloves of garlic in ratatouille!" The authors retested the recipe and kept
> it.
>
> Ms. Lukins, who was an artist and collector of photography, drew the
> illustrations for that book and ones she later wrote with Ms. Rosso and
> alone, including, "The Silver Palate Good Times Cookbook," "The New Basics
> Cookbook" and "All Around the World Cookbook." In all, her books have sold
> more than seven million copies.
>
> The Silver Palate was sold in 1988, and the store closed in 1993, but the
> name continues on a line of specialty foods including sauces, condiments and
> oatmeal, some of which are still made according to Ms. Lukins's recipes.
>
> Since 1986, Ms. Lukins had been food editor of Parade magazine, writing a
> monthly column.
>
> Sheila Gail Block Lukins was born in Philadelphia in 1942 and spent her
> childhood in Norwalk and Westport, Conn. Besides Ms. Stelling, of Boulder,
> Colo., she is survived by another daughter, Molly Burke of New York City;
> two grandchildren; a sister, Elaine Yanell of Westport, Conn., and a
> brother, Harvey Block of Branchburg, N.J."
>
> </>

A shame, as I LOVE the two Silver Palate cookbooks.

Not to speak ill of the dead, I never found her solo stuff to be as
good. Anyone else have an opinion?

No matter, for the Silver Palate alone, she will be both missed and
remembered.

Kris