afoodblog.com ? Blog Archive ? Cookbook Reviews, criteria

Before I get into reviewing the actual books, I think it?s important to keep a few factors in mind. A cookbook has two purposes. First, it is supposed to express some aspect of cuisine, tell a chef?s story, a cook?s outlook on food. Second, it must be of value to the reader; it has to have recipes or other related content that is of interest to the reader. As always with reviews, this is subjective. There are very few cookbooks suitable for all audiences. I am just one voice, and I cannot promise that my taste in cookbooks will match yours.

It is important to embrace a cookbook for what it is, not what it isn?t. If you read a book on classical French cooking, you shouldn?t be surprised to see lots of butter and cream. I will strive to note personal preferences, so long as it is clear that my preferences do not diminish the quality of a cookbook, but rather its utility to me.

A frequent complaint that I see in other cookbook reviews is about ingredient availability or cost. I will point out if ingredients are hard to acquire, but I won?t hold that against a book. Just because your particular region or budget makes it difficult to acquire bonito flakes (smoked tuna, a foundational flavor in Japanese food), methylcellulose (a gelling/thickening agent, gels when hot) or white truffles (easily reaching $2000/lb) does not invalidate the recipes or the cuisine. You may have to actually make an effort to produce great food. Similarly, substitutions, adaptations or simple carelessness are unacceptable when judging the quality of a recipe. If one does not cook a recipe as printed, it is not relevant to a review of the book, it is a review of one?s own imagination. It is appropriate, even encouraged, to reinterpret a printed recipe, but that is not helpful in a review of the book.

Finally, there is one variable that cannot be accounted for in the review, and that is the cook. Despite the growing level of precision in modern cookbooks, everyone has little mannerisms, regional variations, equipment or ingredient limitations that make the food they cook their own, not to mention the license to reinterpret recipes. In addition, the more familiar you are with ingredients and techniques, the more confident you will be in working with them, and the better your results will be. Thomas Keller talks about this phenomenon with respect to cooking from Fernand Point?s ?Ma Gastronomie?:
?There are no recipes in it. It?s a narrative where chef Point walks you through the idea of cooking, the idea of the dish. You actually execute the dish at the level of competence you have at that moment, which makes it your own dish. And then it evolves: the better you get, the better the dish becomes. That?s really a great way to learn how to cook. You interpret things at the level you?re at, and you continue to get better. And the dish becomes better. Repetition is another thing that?s really important in cooking. Success comes from repetition: the more you do it, the better you get. So if you don?t succeed at a recipe, it doesn?t mean that you?ll never succeed at the recipe or that the recipe?s not good. It just means that maybe you should continue to do it more.?

With those general criteria out of the way, I will write up some reviews of books in my collection.

Source: http://afoodblog.com/?p=250

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