Mexican

* The Cuisines of Mexico, Diana Kennedy, Harper & Row, 1972.

Although British-born, Diana Kennedy is the prima donna assoluta when it comes to Mexican cooking. A library without her volume on Mexican cookery is like a meal in Mexico without tortillas. I like to believe that I inspired her to produce this work, the first of several. Once she encouraged me to write a Mexican cookbook when I visited her in Mexico. She was then married to Paul Kennedy, the late Central American correspondent for The New York Times. I demurred. Having just finished a devastatingly good meal in her home, I said I would wait for her to produce the definitive volume. And she did.