Lin-Liu was living in China and running a cooking school when she decided to research the origin of noodles (no Marco Polo didn't bring them back to Italy from China). To do this she spent several months traveling the Silk Road from China through Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Iran, Turkey, Greece, to Italy. On the way she ate her way through the noodle cuisines of many cultures, for the better and the worse. She was welcomed into peoples' homes to learn to fix a variety of noodle dishes. She did not find the origin of noodles but she did discover how closely related many dishes in the different cultures were to one another. Parts of the trip were made alone and part with her husband. I could have lived without the parts about her angst about her marriage and her ambivalence about her role as a wife in exchange for more about the different cultures she encountered. I listened to the audiobook version but now need to check out the book to see the recipes.
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