The Galactic Gourmet

After the main course of Genocidal Healer came the pineapple chunks of Galactic Gourmet. Gurransevas, Tralthan FGLI master chef, takes on "the greatest challenge of his professional life: making hospital food palatable" (blurb). He starts by throwing his mighty Tralthan weight about, but hubris is finally clobbered by nemesis -- in the best possible taste, of course. White's ability to avoid the black-and-white characterization that marked, or marred, most 'traditional' sf pulp writing is well showcased here. As Harry Harrison once said (possibly at the bar of Dublin's old-time Parliament Inn): "You could always tell who the hero was by his white space helmet." A white chef's hat doesn't really count, or does it?