This week I am, was, and will be....

I am talking tonight at the Malvern library about the future of food writing. To a group of budding ones, perhaps? They're the future, I shall tell them. And so am I, of course.I've had a wonderful time looking at past writers on food. M.F.K. Fisher is a long-time favourite; I love the wit and sensuality of her writing. And I have been re-reading A.J. Liebling, He was a war correspondent, wrote for The New Yorker, and was sent on his first foreign assignment to Paris, in 1939. He had lived in France in the 1920s. His food writing is a model to us all: knowledgeable, witty, full of informed opinion. Read him on the decline of hotel restaurants in France because of cars - or, as he puts it, "the motorisation of the French gullet". His view is that the hotels and auberges of the 1920s served such excellent food because their "living depended on the patronage of travelling salesmen, whose robust appetites and experienced palates had combined with their economical natures to maintain the standards of honest catering".Heaven knows what he would make of the scene today. But I can guess.If you don't know his writing, see if you can find Leibling Abroad, which is four books in one volume. The one I have, which was a gift from a cousin who thought I should know about Leibling, was published in 1981. By Playboy Press.On Sunday I am introducing a film in the Jewish International Film Festival, Festins Imaginaires, (Imagined feasts) which is a documentary about the recipes written by people dying of hunger in concentration camps and prisoner-of-war camps. I know about the recipes recorded (at great risk to themselves) in Theresienstadt, which was published as In Memory's Kitchen. I also knew that US prisoners had also recorded recipes they remembered. Was it to sustain themselves? Was it to recover their lost selves? Was it about maintaining their identity in dire situations where one of the aims was to deprive people totally of their individuality?It was shown at the Berlin Film Festival earlier this year. http://www.octobreproduction.com/films.htmlPlaces visited: I'm not usually fond of prepared foods, but the opening of the Lafayette store in Toorak Road this week might well change my mind. http://www.lafayettefinefoods.com.au    It's a lovely store, full of light and delicious things. There's a great deal of food that's ready to be re-heated, as well as salads and other food to go, including some very fine sweet treats. .And some great gifts. I'm giving the Florence Broadhurst gardening gloves to a friend who loves gardening and Broadhurst's designs, and the maple syrup (among other things) to family members. What makes Lafayette so special, I think, is the quality of the ingredients, and the skill of the cooking. The Brighton store has been a success for some years; the one at 429 Toorak Road will more than match that, I think.I   Restaurants: Lunch at Mister Bianco, where Joe Vargetto's lunch deal is a winner. I had (twice) a great salad of roasted heirloom tomatoes and marinated mozzarella. So was the salmon, served with a salad of rocket and shaved fennel and orange segments. I rather like the new wine-on-tap arrangement for house wines. And I like the full wine list, and the full menu. It's very good Italian cooking with strong Sicilian influences, prepared by someone who really understands cooking techniques and who is able to adapt traditional flavours to modern tastes, and keep them intact. www.misterbianco.com.auBooks: My latest is The Makers: a story of food, family and foreigners, launched this week at Craft & Co, the amazing new place at 390 Smith Street, Collingwood. Eat, drink, and the chance to make food and drink. It opens officially next week, more details then. In the meantime, the book is available from http://www.homemakeit.com.au/