A personal memory: Mimi Sheraton, food icon from Brooklyn, dies at 97
With the death of Mimi Sheraton on April 6, Brooklyn has lost a singular voice among many gourmet critics. Growing up in Midwood, she enjoyed Sheepshead Bay restaurants: “Clams are my Brooklyn summers at Manhattan Beach and Sheepshead Bay when Lundy’s had an outside clam bar.” Food was written into her genealogy. Her mother loved cooking and her father worked in the Washington Market in wholesale produce.
Having written 16 books about food, cooking and restaurants, she later admitted to hate the chore of writing and deciphering the computer. Her copy usually arrived late, she admitted, until she approached her task from the viewpoint of the reader. Then she often phoned in her stories.
She shared the same elementary as I (P.S. 193 on Bedford Avenue) but we divided in high schools: she attended Midwood and I Madison. We both chose New York University where she studied journalism and marketing. After college, her interest in food piqued as she traveled all over the world sampling meals and building an education about food. In 1960, she used this experience to write “City Portraits,” a guide to eating in 60 cities.