The Tummy Trilogy: American Fried; Alice, Let’s Eat; Third Helpings

In the 1970s, Calvin Trillin informed America that its most glorious food was not to be found at the pretentious restaurants he referred to generically as La Maison de la Casa House, Continental Cuisine. With three hilarious books over the next two decades–American Fried; Alice, Let’s Eat; and Third Helpings–he established himself as, in Craig Claiborne’s phrase, the Walt Whitman of American eats. Trillin’s three comic masterpieces are now available in what Trillin calls The Tummy Trilogy.