Cooking

September 17, 2007
Peterson's masterful survey of kitchen skills is a refreshing dose of tradition for anyone weary of quick-and-simple recipe books. The substantial volume is replete with step-by-step color photos, often 10 to 15 per recipe or process, that show the stages of a steak's doneness or how to make napoleons. The immense store of “recipes to learn by” is arranged partly by course and partly by main ingredient, with each section proceeding through many of his 10 basic techniques. Peterson is careful to include a range of dishes for every skill level, and cooks with any amount of experience will appreciate the numerous boxes that highlight preparation tips and tricks. Dominated by recipes like Fish Meunière and Boeuf à la Bourguignonne and with a prodigious chapter on sauces, the book feels like an old-fashioned French culinary education slightly updated with some nominally international dishes (Lamb Korma, Chiles Rellenos with Tomatillo Sauce), an attribute that may turn off some modern-minded cooks, but will reward those keen to absorb Peterson's deep knowledge of food and well-honed explanations for how best to prepare it. Color photos not seen by PW
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Starred review from September 15, 2007
Peterson is a cooking teacher and author of more than a dozen other cookbooks, including "Essentials of Cooking and Whats a Cook To Do?" His big, new book, which includes 600 recipes and more than 650 color photographs (taken by the author), is in some ways an expanded version of "Essentials", which focuses on technique. It opens with a fairly brief description of ten basic cooking techniques and then moves on to Recipes To Learn By, organized by course or main ingredient. Many of the recipes are traditional French standbys, from Celeriac Rémoulade to Beef à la Mode, although there are dishes inspired by Thai, Mexican, and other cuisines as well. Along with photographs of ingredients and finished dishes, there are dozens of helpful step-by-step sequences. Essentially an intensive course for home cooks in the classic techniques that underlie good cooking, this is recommended for all cookery collections.

Copyright 2007 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

October 1, 2007
Peterson applies an analytical, yet very practical, approach to the oft-misunderstood everyday art and craft of cooking, and the result is this instructive and authoritative volume. His unwavering focus on what a student really needs to know has produced a superior textbook. Peterson identifies 10 means of cooking food: roasting, braising, poaching, saut'ing, steaming, frying, grilling, smoking, barbecuing, and boiling. (Purists may question his disregard of microwaving.) He then applies these techniques to a cornucopia of ingredients in a comprehensive series of recipes comprising the foundation of cookery. They range from boiling eggs and grilling burgers up to creating aclassic foie gras terrine. He includes examples of cooking from Mexico, Italy, and Asia. Hundreds of photographs by the author himself offer tyro cooks glimpses not only into how the finished product should look but also what to expect at progressive stages of the cooking process.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2007, American Library Association.)