40 Comments

How I miss Gourmet - in all its incarnations, though your era was the best. I have them all, back to 1969; once in a cleaning fit, put them out on the curb for garbage pick up - at 3 a.m I woke in a panic, raced out to the curb and rescued them all in a drizzling rain. I still 'read' them as if I had never seen them before - and still build dinners around recipes I find anew.

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Like most others-truly I miss Gourmet and you-so I'm glad for La Briffe. I, as most real subscribers, was shocked when Gourmet was shut down. I have had subscriptions to Bob Appetit, Food and Wine, Saveur, and I have none now because I loathe the triviality, the pretention, the vapidity. In addition to all the special articles you mentioned, I miss Laurie Colwin. Thank you for your writing, editing and understanding of the food world-it's a gift that keeps on giving.

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I had them all, the magazine subscriptions that is. TodayI have none, they are simply plonk.

My stacks of Gourmets during a move from a house to an apartment went to a young friend, an avid cook. At least they are treasured.

Please keep up with what you are doing and stay well.

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I am so sad too. Very, very sad. Thank you.

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I join all of Gourmet's fans in mourning its passing. Unfortunately, none of the other food magazines have quite mastered the joy of its articles, photos, and recipes. Like so many others, I looked forward to finding the current issue in my mailbox. I sift through old issues each season and pick a few issues to reread and find the just right recipe to make. Thank you to you and your team for a memorable, outstanding contribution to the food world! And The Gourmet Cookie Book comes out each holiday for my grandchildren to help me pick out what we'll make together!

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Thank you for this great article. I also still mourn the loss of Gourmet and go back to 1958! I will never understand why they chose the other publication over Gourmet. This latter has gone from insipid to just plain annoying. The previous editor tried so desperately to be hip and the present one tries desperately to be inclusive and forgets that it is about the food. In the 60s I was offered a lifetime subscription to Gourmet and snatched it up; upon Gourmet’s demise, I was left with a lifetime subscription to the other publication, adding insult to injury. Thank you for reminding me about the cookie book - I was able to find one and look forward to reading it with the holidays approaching. Again thanks for your wonderful articles and I hope there is another book in the works!

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I still miss Gourmet, too. I’d subscribe to it in a heartbeat if it ever came back. I have all my copies of them stacked up by month so I can grab a stack of them for Thanksgiving, say and get inspired. I don’t have the cookie book, but my other Gourmet cookbooks still inspire too.

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I was in NYC when it happened. I went to the business center in the hotel to check emails, and saw the headline. When I got back to our room, my husband thought a family member had died. That’s how I felt. What a stunning accomplishment, Gourmet magazine during the Ruth years. I miss it, and the cookie book is on my shelf, as are my closely guarded copies of that beautiful magazine. Thank you!

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I am grateful for all the years we had Gourmet and sorely miss it still.

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I may have cried, shouted, and thrown things when then mailed me Bon Appetit as a substitute for Gourmet.

I have the cookie book. It's truly a walk through America's aspirational kitchens through the ages. And there's a lot of delicious and classic cookie recipes in there!

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I miss Gourmet. I miss the restaurant directory, very NYC-heavy. I miss you. I'm still burned up that Gourmet was axed and .... something else was saved.

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I always think of the last Gourmet cookbook as the green covered Gourmet Today. I had it on order when the news broke that Gourmet was being closed down. But I also have The Gourmet Cookie Book. I don’t remember how I got it, but it was probably at my local bookstore. I don’t remember thinking at the time that it was the last Gourmet cookbook. I’m glad I have it, especially with the new to me knowledge about it.

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My love for travel & cooking—& eating!—all came from growing up reading my mom’s Gourmet. She kept every issue from the 60s, moving the shelves from house to house around the country for years until a relocation overseas ended the collection. Still miss flipping through those stained pages for recipes.

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Got it, thank you!

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I just noticed the link for "David Rakoff on Jews and bacon" links to his book via amazon, not the Gourmet archive article. Is it possible to update or share the link? I has difficulty searching the archives for it as well.

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Sadly there is no ink to the article on the Gourmet archive. I used the link for David's book because it apparently contains some version of the piece we published which we called Some Pig.

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I have the Gourmet Cookie Book! I did not buy it on sale. It makes it into my holiday cookie baking rotation every Christmas. And I am sorry about Gourmet's demise, and the other magazines with intellect going down the tubes, like EatingWell.

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