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Summary: Easy family cuisine and variations for the gourmet
Review: Although I have over 150 cookbooks, this is my first by Jean-Georges. I've become acquainted with him through his appearances on Martha Stewart and enjoyed watching him create some of his recipes. However, it was a recent appearance on the Regis show that sold me on this particular book. From a simple version of mashed potatoes, he then proceeded to enhance it four different ways. Wow! Also recommended which version would best accompany different meats or fish. I am always a fan of cookbooks that show one main recipe as well as subtle ways to change accompanying ingredients to create simple or spectacular menus.
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Summary: I never had hope for cooking until this book.
Review: As someone who has subsisted largely on frozen dinners and prepared salads for most of my life, I'm shocked at the way this book has made really, really good food accessible and exciting. I'm obsessed with this book. You can go from zero to smoked salmon crepes, oeufs au caviar, braised hailbut and asparagus with mushrooms and cream sauce in a week. The book's recipes are simple, mostly quick to prepare, mostly easy to execute and very adaptable. The authors encourage you to substitute, and provide good bases from which you can improvise. It's inspiring, a book you can grow with.
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Summary: A rare example of a good chef's cookbook
Review: Chef's cookbooks are, to me, guilty until proven innocent-- guilty of containing recipes that require a full restaurant staff to create, guilty of containing ingredients that are mainly there to justify a sky-high tab. (Rule of thumb: if more than three recipes call for White Truffle Oil, don't buy the book.) This, like Charlie Trotter Cooks At Home, is one of the few exceptions that genuinely seems aimed at a single cook and not a professional team. The concept is excellent-- showing you how to make roughly the same dish at levels ranging from farmhouse simplicity to four-star sophistication, and then letting you find your own level. In truth, though the Level 4 recipes still tend to be a bit much, you'll find a lot of terrific and quite impressive things at Level 2 and 3 (what you might call the bistro levels). Just as importantly, you'll learn a lot about how chefs think about putting dishes together at these different levels, which will encourage you to improvise as well.
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Summary: Very enjoyable
Review: Fabulous illustrations, solid text, and progressively imaginative recipes make this book one of my best cookbook purchases in years. As the title promises, Mr. Vongerichten takes some basic recipes for simple dishes and progresses each into more and more interesting variations. As an amateur chef, this is the kind of book that makes my hobby very interesting and teaches me not just what to cook but how to cook.
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Summary: Your search has ended for the best cookbook of the year 2000
Review: First of all, the book is gorgeous. Better yet, the recipes are divine. They go from simply luxurious to positively decadent. The day I got the book I made Steak with Butter and Ginger Sauce. It was soooo easy and soooo good, and it was also different from any other steak I had ever made. The fabulous combination of Jean-Georges Vongerichten and Mark Bittman came up with the idea of taking a simple recipe and then building on that recipe to create a series of more sophisticated variations, and the idea really works. Mark Bittman's recipes are always clearly written, and Mr. Vongerichten is truly an alchemist in the kitchen. Whatever he starts with ends up being so much more than the sum of its parts, it's remarkable. Most cookbooks seem to have basically the same recipes distinguished by slightly different methods of arriving at a similar result. Not true of Jean-Georges Vongerichten. His recipes are very unique and usually uncomplicated. The difference is he combines ingredients that go very well together but that no one else has thought of. I have both his other cookbooks, and each recipe I have tried is easy to execute for the home cook. I would recommend both of them also. In fact, all three together would make a great gift set. An even better idea is to get them all for yourself and enjoy the results. Happy cooking and eating.
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Summary: Mark Bittman does it again!
Review: I am very familiar with the delicious recipes created by Mark Bittman. In this cookbook, Jean-Georges Vongerichten (New York City star chef and author of "Simple Cuisine" and"Cooking at Home with a Four-Star Chef") and Mark Bittman (New York Times Colomnist and author of "The Minimalist Cooks at Home," "How to Cook Everything," "Fish," and "Leafy Greens") have collaborated on a collection of sophisticated, yet easy to prepare dishes.These recipes use basic uncomplicated ingredients to produce exceptional results. Together, Jean and Mark provide great recipes and include some time saving kitchen hints. Their "gazpacho" was voted the best Food & Wine Magazine editors had ever tasted. It has just eight supermarket ingredients and can be easily made when you get home from work.
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Summary: Good ideas for beginners and more advanced cooks
Review: I cook a fair bit (many different cuisines). I am on the lookout for simple, tasty recipes ---I have two kids 2 and 5, so I no longer have time to try the fancier recipes of this book. However, the simpler recipes alone are worth the price of the book. They give some insight into how a famous chef might cook for himself when pressed for time. For example, I've baked salmon hundreds of times over the years but the recipe in this book (the one with crushed capers) has enough minor twists I would never dream of myself---cooking at 350 degrees, with the skin side up, for example--- that lead to much better flavor.
The chicken with sherry vinegar is another example---credited to famous chef Paul Bocuse, but requires only half an hour, and uses no fancy ingredients. Several subtle touches lift it from the ordinary and show that chicken can sometimes be the best of all meats. All my family members, including the 2 year old, wiped their plates clean by soaking up the juices with bread! The frenchtoast with bananas is another good and quick recipe. To sum up, this is not an encyclopedic cookbook. It shows you how to do a few things well. It was a useful addition to my kitchen shelf. It might also be a good first cookbook for the starter cook who desires a few top-class results with minimal effort.
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Summary: Beautiful, organized, and wide-reachig cookbook
Review: I just love this book. I rented it from the library and have renewed it all I can -- I guess I have to buy it! The thing I love the most is no matter what mood you are in -- fancy, simple, what have you, there's something in here to cook. Also, it makes it so easy for beginners. You start simple, and work your confidence into spectacular. My dinner club friends love this book as well. Well worth the money!
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Summary: Sometimes not so simple
Review: I was very excited when I got this book, and I still find myself using it regularly. But even though I cook a lot, I am sometimes confused by the recipes. How, exactly, do you seal that chicken in foil? In spite of my best efforts at following the directions exactly, I had liquid and steam gushing all over the place. If you use phyllo dough in the place of puff pastry, how many layers should you plan on assembling? Does it depend on the recipe? You'd think that Vongerichten and Bittman might at least mention some guidelines. Still, this cookbook has broadened the way I think about food, and I'm really grateful for that. I would certainly recommend it, but expect to be a bit confused now and then.
Rating:
Summary: great, but not perfect
Review: I've been inspired to try several of these receipes, even though I've gotten out of the habit of cooking lately -- the pictures are so attractive and the ingredients are so imaginatively combined. I have been pretty happy with the results, but find the receipes usually need a fair amount of tinkering and adjusting. For example, the spaetzle receipes which produce a dough so thick and dry that I find it impossible to push it through a colander! I find this odd, because I've used "the Minimalist" quite a bit, and everything in there works! Still, this book is worth it -- just run everything through once before you count on serving guests!
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