Those who knew Lindy Mechefske recognized that her passion for food was matched only by her appetite for life. Lindy both understood and embodied the idea that community begins in the kitchen and that cooking is always a labour of love.
Lindy’s brilliantly written works invite us, her readers, into the tastes of the people she wrote about, asking us to consider their culinary affections and what food might tell us about them. By extension, her books gave us ample opportunities to explore our own plates and palates and how food is an entry point into the world.
“Before I worked with Lindy at Goose Lane, I had an appreciation for her work, notably through Sir John’s Table, a book that Goose Lane published back in 2015,” says Simon Thibault, Goose Lane’s Acquiring Editor for Non-Fiction. “I had been asked to review it upon publication and called it, ‘a sumptuous glimpse into the life Sir John A Macdonald, […] bringing the past into the present.’ Months later she and I were on a phone call together for a roundtable discussion on food writing, and she mentioned that she had remembered and appreciated the review. ‘You get it,’ she said, ‘you get why we do this, why and how we talk about food.’”
Lindy was that rare combination of passionate, brilliant, and talented. Her books weren’t just collections of recipes: they were stories, histories of people and moments captured in meals meant to be savoured and shared.
Her work, of course, did not go unrecognized. She was of constant note to the Taste Canada Awards, Canada’s highest honour for culinary writing. Sir John’s Table won Gold in 2015 for Culinary Narrative. She would go on to win again in 2019 for Out of Old Ontario Kitchens. Her final work, Walk, Eat, Repeat, was honoured as a finalist in 2025. Lindy’s books were celebrations of food that were well worth celebrating in and of themselves.
“When I first started working at Goose Lane, the manuscript for Walk, Eat, Repeat was one of the first titles to come across my desk,” recalls Simon. “I became the book’s editor, and Lindy and I spent many an hour over phone calls and Skype sessions discussing this unforgettable culinary adventure. We did this because we knew there were other books on the Camino, and we knew there were plenty of books on food and travel, but Lindy had something unique with this book. Her travelogue was more than a series of stories about placing one foot—or one meal—in front of the other. Walk, Eat, Repeat was a book about a daily offering of grace and generosity. Grace and generosity as practice, as sustenance, provided daily, towards others, and towards oneself.”
May you continue to walk, and eat, in grace, and generosity, dear Lindy.
