Elon, Beth

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Elon, Beth

PERSONAL:

Born in New York, NY; married Harold Brod (deceased); married Amos Elon (a journalist and historian); children: Danae. Education: Attended University of Vermont; graduated from University of Bridgeport.

ADDRESSES:

Home—Tuscany, Italy.

CAREER:

Author, editor, and literary agent. Bridgeport Herald, Bridgeport, NY, editor of men's fashion; Mamaroneck Daily Times, Mamaroneck, NY, woman's page editor; Advertising magazine, New York, NY, editor; served as press secretary for Hubert Humphrey and Muriel Humphrey during 1960 U.S. presidential campaign; worked as a radio correspondent in Israel during the Six-Day War, 1967; Keter Publishing, Jerusalem, Israel, foreign rights director; Harris/Elon Literary Agency, Jerusalem, Israel, cofounder and director.

WRITINGS:

The Big Book of Pasta, photographs by N. Sheffer, Lambda Publishers (Brooklyn, NY), 1996.

A Mediterranean Farm Kitchen, Modan Publishing (Moshav Ben Shemen, Israel), 2000.

(Editor) Sherry Ansky, The Food of Israel: Authentic Recipes from the Land of Milk and Honey, Periplus (North Clarendon, VT), 2000.

A Culinary Traveller in Tuscany: Exploring & Eating off the Beaten Track, Little Bookroom (New York, NY), 2006, published as Tasting Tuscany: Exploring & Eating off the Beaten Track, Bantam (New York, NY), 2007.

Also author of The Pasta Book. Author of food columns for newspapers in Israel.

SIDELIGHTS:

Beth Elon, an American writer who has lived in Italy for more than three decades, is the author of a number of cookbooks, including A Culinary Traveller in Tuscany: Exploring & Eating off the Beaten Track. In the work, Elon, who makes her own wine and olive oil in her restored seventeenth-century farmhouse, offers more than one hundred recipes from ten relatively unknown regions of Tuscany; in the words of Booklist contributor Mark Knoblauch, "the unusual culinary specialties of these places really make her prose flow." The author looks at such unique creations as milk-fed aboriginal baby lamb, hot-pepper marmalade, pork roast with juniper berries, seasoned pig's fat, and onion-and-polenta tarts. "Her culinary background leads her to place particular attention on regional and seasonal foods," Sheila Kasperek noted in Library Journal. Elon also provides information about each area's artistic and cultural sights, including museums, churches, and castles, as well as descriptions and contact information for local restaurants, markets, and food festivals. According to Andrew Purvis, writing in the London Telegraph, Elon "layers her food writing with colourful observations about landscape, history and folklore." "It's hard to imagine a more knowledgeable or enthusiastic escort through this land," observed Town & Country reviewer Andrew Sessa.

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Booklist, April 15, 2006, Mark Knoblauch, review of A Culinary Traveller in Tuscany: Exploring and Eating off the Beaten Track, p. 16.

Library Journal, June 15, 2006, Sheila Kasperek, review of A Culinary Traveller in Tuscany, p. 91.

London Telegraph, June 17, 2006, Andrew Purvis, "Fuelling Up for the Journey," review of Tasting Tuscany: Exploring and Eating off the Beaten Track.

Town & Country, August, 2006, Andrew Sessa, "A Tuscan Tasting Tour," p. 76.