Notes on a Banana

April 17, 2017
Leite is the author of The New Portuguese Table and the Leite’s Culinaria website, so it’s no surprise that the beginning and end of his memoir find him writing about food with infectious gusto and cleverness, giving a glimpse of why his website’s won James Beard Awards. He’s also written on the topic for the New York Times and other venues. Fans of that work will certainly wish there were more culinary stories in this work, but all readers will be touched by his first-generation Portuguese-American upbringing and struggles with his sexual identity as well as his battles to understand and treat his bipolar disorder. He expertly walks the line between sad and funny, making himself the clown and hero of this coming-of-age tale. His firsthand account of mental illness pulls no punches, serving up an honest and open perspective on personal and family issues that are often swept under the rug. Despite Leite playing the leading man, the true stars of the memoir are Leite’s parents, who mirror his passion (his mother) and thoughtfulness (his father) and allow Leite to continually draw the focus of the story back to family and food, love and learning. The ideals that have made Leite’s food writing so successful make this memoir worth a look.

March 1, 2017
A James Beard Award-winning food blogger tells the story of his struggle to come to terms with his Portuguese heritage, bipolar disorder, and homosexuality.The son of two immigrants from the Azores, Leite (The New Portuguese Table: Exciting Flavors from Europe's Western Coast, 2009), nicknamed "Banana," grew up in a Massachusetts town that was "pretty much in the geographic armpit of the state." His one joy was being around the "Sisters of the Spatula," the women who, along with his mother, ruled his childhood with love and food. But the older he became, the more Leite wanted to eat hamburgers and cakes smeared in "swirls of Betty Crocker chocolate frosting." Fitting in became an even greater challenge during his adolescence, which was marked by episodes of extreme panic, anxiety, and insomnia. Further complicating Leite's situation was the realization that his fondness for looking at male underwear models in the Sears catalog signaled a nascent homosexuality he desperately wanted to disavow. In college, the author had affairs with men while "dating" a woman he fantasized would be his wife but with whom he could never have sex. He also began experiencing the chaotic extremes of the bipolar disorder that psychologists had mistakenly diagnosed as depression. Leaving college without a degree, Leite went to New York, where he worked first as a waiter then as an ad writer while unsuccessfully trying to turn straight through involvement with the "gay curing" Aesthetic Realism movement. A long-term relationship with a man who "loved everything about the ceremony of the table" led to Leite's reimmersion in the cooking he loved and the Azorean culture from which he had separated himself. It also gave him the courage to seek the answers that had eluded him and his doctors about the truth of his condition. In this coming-of-age story and chronicle of self-acceptance, Leite impressively finds honesty and humor in the darkest of circumstances, making this a strong debut memoir. A brave and moving tale of food, family, and psychology.

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November 15, 2016

The winner of multiple James Beard awards, Leite grew up in a blue-collar Portuguese home in Fall River, MA, longing for middle-class stability and struggling with bipolar disorder, which was not diagnosed until his mid-thirties. Meanwhile, he threw himself into cooking. With a 100,000-copy first printing.

Copyright 2016 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

March 15, 2017
In this warm, witty, sometimes heartbreaking memoir, Portuguese American writer Leite shares his lifelong love affair with food and struggles with manic depression. As a young child, he and his colorful mother (who affectionately calls him Banana) secretly gorge on whole pies together, and as a seventh-grader, he is called faggot. He describes watching with awe and horror as another boy demonstrates how to masturbate, complete with a deep guttural moan as if he were hurt and an arc of something white. His conclusion at the time: If that was whacking off, you could count me out. Fans of the author's James Beard Awardwinning website, Leite's Culinaria, where he notes, My last name, quite coincidentally, rhymes with eat' in English, ate' in Portuguese, won't be surprised by his wonderful sense of humor and his keen powers of observation. He notes a Manhattan street sign that says, Depression is a flaw in chemistry not character. In his case, it's certainly true. Leite's involving memoir will engage foodies and all who appreciate candid and charming self-portraits.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2017, American Library Association.)