texasmesquite

Books for the cook

These food tomes will make great holiday gifts


By Ron Mikulak • rmikulak@courier-journal.com • December 3, 2008


One of the pleasant side benefits of the assistant food editor's job is I get products to review all year long. I still get a childlike pleasure when I discover a mysterious, unsolicited package in the mailroom, even tho
I routinely unwrap wooden spoons with brand names stamped into the bowl, new-style spatulas that never work quite as well as old-style spatulas, or banal cookbooks written by the latest perky TV food celeb.
But now and again, pleasant surprises occur: a new kitchen gadget that is fun to use and useful; and cookbooks that are keepers, serious books that inform, intrigue and get me excited about trying to cook something new.
Since it is now the gift-giving season, I have sorted through those keepers to suggest some cookbooks that might stimulate the creative juices of experienced or wannabe cooks on your holiday gift list.
"Cooking" by James Peterson (Ten Speed Press, $40)
Of all the books that crossed my desk this year, this one seems most perfect for an eager beginner.
"Cooking" abounds in basic explanations and advice, full-color how-to photos of everything from chopping onions to making hot and sour soup. I love cookbooks that clearly illustrate process; the photos in Peterson's book clarified what I thought I knew, and gave some cool ideas for what to try next.
"How to Cook Everything" by Mark Bittman (John Wiley & Sons, $35)
The completely revised 10th-anniversary editiondoes double duty as a full course for the novice cook and an inspiration for those comfortable in the kitchen.
In terms of format, Bittman avoids photos, opting instead for sharp, clear black-and-white drawings of how to shape and stretch pizza dough, for example, quarter an artichoke or fold a filled blintz.
In "How to Cook Everything," in addition to full, clear recipes, the author adds sidebars and charts that suggest easy variations -- "bean, greens and pasta combos," for instance, or "12 Simple Additions to Stir-Fried Chicken."
"Ten: All the Foods We Love and 10 Recipes for Each" by Sheila Lukins (Workman, $19.95)
For intermediate cooks, this recent release would be a suitable match. Ten recipes for cocktails, vegetable soups, Sunday suppers, shrimp, beans, corn, pasta, tomatoes, chocolate and several other categories are enough to inspire but not overwhelm.
Is your new boyfriend a meat and potatoes guy? The "Steaks" chapter suggests strip steaks with an easy Latin American-accented spice rub, rib-eye with mushroom ragout and London broil with an Asian marinade. The "Stews" chapter tells how to make a beef daube, a lamb and vegetable tagine and even rabbit stewed with holiday spices.
This hefty paperback has photos of a few finished dishes, but no other illustrations. Occasional sidebars offer technical advice, menus and clarifications of troublesome concepts, such as the difference between short and spare ribs, and whether to choose thick or thin asparagus.
"One Pot French" by Jean-Pierre Challet and Jennifer Decorte (Sellers, $19.95)
Another solid paperback for the intermediate, "One Pot French" is arranged in a format I find especially appealing. Each of the recipes is laid out on a single page, usually facing a color photograph of the finished dish. This format makes it easy to prop the book open in a stand, follow the recipe and see the final goal.
After a useful opening chapter with recipes for kitchen basics (how to make a bouquet garni, chicken stock, tart pastry and béchamel sauce, among others), the author presents a variety of French dishes that can be prepared in one cooking vessel.
His theme is that sophistication does not have to be complicated or intimidating, that mastering a handful of techniques and concepts can be parlayed into a pleasing range of dishes.
Make a mousse au chocolat or tarte tatin (chocolate pudding or apple pie), pot-au-feu or coq au vin (beef or chicken stew), pommes savoyarde or gratin dauphinois (two versions of scalloped potatoes), but let your guests do the translating.
"Things Cooks Love: Implements, Ingredients, Recipes" by Marie Simmons and Sur la Table (Andrews McMeel Publishing, $35)
The recipes in this ingeniously conceived bookare organized according to the kitchen tool that is most useful in making the dish.
The Asian kitchen chapter, for example, discusses specialty ingredients such as miso, nori, fish sauce and wasabi, and then how to use a bamboo steamer to make shrimp and pork dumplings, or a rice cooker to make green rice with tomatoes and coconut.
Each chapter begins with a discussion of how to use the tool or implement, how best to clean and store it, and alternatives for making the ensuing recipes if you are not fortunate to have, say, a stove-top pepper roaster (use a grill pan) or a chinois (use a fine mesh strainer, or line a colander with double-layered cheesecloth).
This book could be dismissed as an elaborate product catalog (after all, Sur la Table is an upscale kitchen supply company), but if you can keep the demon of acquisition at bay and focus on the recipes for using the gadgets you already own, you will find this handsome, heavy hardback fun, informative and stimulating.
"Secrets of the Red Lantern: Stories and Vietnamese Recipes From the Heart" by Pauline Nguyen (Andrews McMeel Publishing, $40)
"Secrets" is one of the handsomest and most sincere cookbooks that arrived this year. Nguyen, a Vietnamese refugee whose family settled in Australia, writes at length about her family's difficulties in reconciling her family's traditional values with that of a new society.
Both a memoir and a cookbook, the book is illustrated with charming family photos from both Vietnam and Australia and luscious shots of the food she ate at home, in her parents' restaurant and in her own eatery, the Red Lantern.
Some of the recipes seem accessible and uncomplicated. The lemongrass and chili chicken, for instance, calls for nothing more exotic than fish sauce and lemongrass. Other dishes use items harder to find in American stores, such as pork skin, tapioca pearls and coconut juice (not milk).
While not as useful a book as others, this is an evocative one, a book perhaps more to be read and mulled over, one to make the reader more appreciative when eating at Vietnamese restaurants.
"Veganomicon: The Ultimate Vegan Cookbook" by Isa Chandra Moskowitz and Terry Hope Romero (Marlowe and Co., $27.50)
This hefty tome is just what relatives of the newly proclaimed vegan need to assure themselves that their loved one has access to good nutritional advice, information about purely meatless options and recipes that the vegan's omnivorous family members can enjoy.
A serious, straightforward book with no illustrations beyond a few garish photos of selected dishes, "Veganomicon" intends to be an all-purpose cookbook that covers stocking the pantry, useful kitchen tools, basic terminology and discussion of a range of vegetables and grains before getting to the recipes.
Arranged by category (appetizers and snacks, salads, soup, casseroles, pasta and grains, desserts) each recipe is coded to indicate if it is soy-free, gluten-free, low-fat, quick to prepare and easy to shop for. While there is a chapter on cooking with tofu, tempeh and seitan, the bulk of the recipes use vegetables and grains, an aspect I find especially appealing.
The tone throughout is upbeat and amusing, especially in the frequent sidebars, which are practical, chatty and engaging without being cutesy.
"Banana: The Fate of the Fruit That Changed the World" by Dan Koeppel (Hudson Street Press, $23.95)
A food book rather than a cookbook, "Banana" reveals everything you need to know about the most popular fruit in the world, including its biology, history, role in U.S. imperialism in Central America and the uncertain future of the commercial banana crop, given that 99 percent of the world's supply is genetically susceptible to a fast-spreading disease.
"Banana" is the kind of food book I especially enjoy -- one that takes one food topic and explores that food's ramifications far beyond its place in the kitchen.
ugh the contents often disappoint.