Glorious French Food: A Fresh
Approach to the Classics by James
Peterson
If You Can Only Own One French Cookbook, This May Be It
In Glorious French Food, James Peterson argues that once you
understand a recipes logic and context, and the techniques required to
follow it, you actually have something much more valuable than the recipe
itself--you have the knowledge to create variations, make simplifications,
and cook with spontaneity. Although French cuisine is often accused of
being fussy and time-consuming, Petersons clear instructions demystify
many traditionally finicky recipes, and in the process, teach us how to cook
anything.The hundreds of recipes presented here are a pleasure to
peruse; kitchen novices can work their way through this hefty volume and
come out the other end accomplished cooks. Peterson details necessary
equipment, techniques, and ingredients for each recipe so that by the time
you start making it, youre fearless. Some of his dishes are remarkably
simple, like the beautifully fresh, ready-in-minutes Shaved Fennel Salad, or
the richly aromatic French Onion Soup. Others are more complicated, but

all teach a lesson: In the Roast Chicken chapter, learn to roast without a
thermometer, truss without a needle, make gravy, and then succeed at
Roast Chicken Stuffed Under the Skin with Spinach and Ricotta. Learn to
make pasta dough, and then re-present leftover Provençal Lamb Stew (if
theres any of this heavenly, melt-in-your-mouth tender, orange-scented
stew left) as Meat-Filled Ravioli. Perfect for fans of French cuisine, this is
also a remarkably handy reference guide for any kitchen. --Leora Y. Bloom
Personal Review: Glorious French Food: A Fresh Approach to
the Classics by James Peterson
French cuisine, despite predictions of its demise by food writers admist
inroads of other Western cuisines including Italian and Spanish cuisines, is
still going strong. Many people will, have heard classic/haute cuisine,
nouvelle cuisine, bourgeois/bistro cuisine, and regional cuisine that form
the four important strands of French cuisine, and this book has touched on
all four of these cuisines.
One important difference between this book and others is it uses 50 dishes
as the starting point and teach 4 to 10 more dishes that share either the
principal ingredients or are related by techniques. It is, as Peterson
himself mentions in the preface, aiming to teach you to how to cook on
your own and understanding cooking is not just a mechanical follow-one-
recipe process: it is a little like how you learned mathematics in electrical
engineering and apply the central methodology into diverse areas like
power load flow analysis, calculating a circuit's small signal behaviours,
using signal processing in protection relays.
Bear in mind that this book is geared towards big city or middle-sized
suburban-area American homes. Duck a l'orange, for instance, is in the
American adaptation version. This makes the book a little tricky to be used
if you live in Auckland, Sydney, or in London, where the ingredients
available will likely be different from what's available in US. For those
armchair chefs who want to buy a book that tells how French food is
actually prepared in France itself, another book, such as the Konemann
publications, will likely be more useful.
By all means this book is not meant to be an exhaustive coverage of
France's cookery. , but most books on French cooking tend to cover very
small specialized subject areas (Provence's bistros) or are just a thin
compendium of recipes (eg 100 recipe in a 200 page cookbook showcased
as "Cuisine of France"). If you are interested to build a library of French
cookbooks, I recommend the more exhaustive publications of Jacques
Pepin, Alain Ducasse's Grand Livre de Cuisine (currently with 2 titles in
English, but there are a few more published in the original French), and the
ever reliable Larousse Gastronomique, in addition to this book. Otherwise
for a tight bookshelf, this book on its own may be what you want for French
cooking.

For More 5 Star Customer Reviews and Lowest Price:
Glorious French Food: A Fresh Approach to the Classics by James Peterson 5 Star
Customer Reviews and Lowest Price!