Category Archives: Books

Books I’m currently reading, reviews of books that I’ve read.

The Collective Culinary Journey

I love reading about food — history, memoirs, and yes, recipe books. I read some blogs; admittedly, I need to read more of them. What I’ve discovered is that I enjoy the collective story of the culinary journey.

I recently came across the blog Poor Man’s Feast, written by Elissa Altman, and the 2012 winner of the James Beard individual food blog award. Her writing is everything a food writer should be, and the blog is an amazing homage to memory, food, and her mother.

Right now, I’m currently digesting The Tenth Muse: My Life in Food, by Judith Jones. As an Editor at Knopf Publishing Co. she is responsible for bringing us “Mastering the Art of French Cooking by Julia Child, and Madhur Jaffrey, the Indian actress turned cook. The stories in the Tenth Muse are rich in American culinary history and rife with food memories. Sometimes I wish I’d had a young adulthood like that, taking notes on what and where I feasted. Jones brings into startling focus the recipes she tested for the cookbooks she edited as well as the joys of eating a simple meal.

One other current endeavor: I am finally reading Alice Waters, namely her 2007 food philosophy book The Art of Simple Food: Notes, Lessons, and Recipes from a Delicious Revolution. In this book Waters covers cooking equipment, pantry necessities, and types of food as a foundation before presenting the actual recipes. By starting with the basics, she helps the new cook feel more secure as they try new techniques. I find her readable, and likeable — and I haven’t even gotten to the recipes yet! Waters gives us a clear direction on her philosophy about cooking; fresh, seasonal, local. And yes, it provides us with yet another piece of the collective culinary journey.

I can’t read every cookbook out there — I don’t even have time to read all the ones I check out from the library — and some of them I give up part way through. Either they are too dense or the material isn’t as interesting as I thought it would be. Reading about cooking, and the way people write about food helps me have a better understanding of my personal culinary journey. Not culinary perfection, but a balance between the simple and the complex.

Weekday Vegetarian as an Option

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This is a guest post written by my Partner, D’Marie.

I have been a vegetarian for a long time, approaching twenty years now. I have been a full on vegan for three or four and wheat free for two. This has been a long process, not an overnight change.

Even the initial decision to become a vegetarian, back when I was in college, was a gradual one. I decided to slowly weed out different types of meat from my diet so that I could, one day, become a full vegetarian. At that point I couldn’t imagine becoming vegan. And, because the idea of leaving behind meat was such a scary one, I was even slow on that count. I remember explaining to friends that I was allowing myself to eat red meat only two days a week at first and poultry the rest of the week.

The idea presented in the following TED talk by Graham Hill is very similar. Instead of thinking of vegetarian or vegan diets as a binary choice — all or nothing — find a way to make it about moderation and slowly changing habits.

Hill has since released a digital book Weekday Vegetarian: Finally, a Palatable Solution (Kindle Single), that outlines the plan and includes recipes and tips.

If all you can do is cut your meat intake by 70%, then that’s an amazing impact on your own health as well as the environment.

If you, like me, find yourself realizing at some point that you’re just done with meat, then maybe you can start to transition from dairy, eggs, and honey and become a vegan next.

Either way, you’ll be on your way to a healthy, happier, more compassionate way of living.

The Conscious Cook Book Review (a little late)

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I’ve got The Conscious Cook by Tal Ronnen in my hands right now. Yes, it is a two year old book, but he is still making news.

I hadn’t heard of him before because I wasn’t following vegan blogs, and really don’t have that much time. So I didn’t catch reviews by those of you out there talking about the book. That’s how I missed the news of a hot new chef making waves.

I cracked the book. It has a gorgeous layout, and it’s hefty, which means it is printed on good paper; and, it has great, no, stunning photographs.

I began reading. His pantry list is limited, but descriptive. The restaurants he lists in the back are ones he helped. And then come the recipes. The book follows the classic layout, starters, salads, soups, entrees, and dessert. Then suggested party menus; eating seasonally and favorite vegan restaurants.

I wanted to know what makes Tal Ronnen the Conscious cook. I know why I am the Kitchen Shaman. There is a spiritual element in my cooking. I make magic with flavors and textures, and tempt you to not only eat healthy, but also eat well. Ronnen is doing the same thing, “Delicious meatless recipes that will change the way you eat.” But in reading the book, aside from his interviews with chefs and product guys, I did not find evidence of his being a conscious cook.

It’s a good thing I am a chef, because with each recipe I was asking myself, what would the beginning cook know about minced or chiffonade, braising, or basting? Each recipe, though beautiful and filled with high end ingredients to tempt even the hardiest foodie, comes across as pretentious.

Yes, pretentious. When I read Live to Cook by Michael Symon, it was down to earth. He told you how you can make things at home. What techniques to use that transfer from a commercial kitchen to your home kitchen. Ronnen doesn’t even offer this tidbit. This is a chef’s book. A book to read and say, “how pretty, if I only knew how,” and leave on the shelf. It does read well, and I enjoy the context of the recipes. But does Ronnen know that regular sugar is not vegan? Did he let the reader know to use vegan sugar not the white refined stuff? Does he know that there might be issues about vinegars being clarified through egg whites? (I’m trying to clear up this issue right now because I love different vinegars). Yet vinegar, agave nectar (another disputed food itembecause of the way it is processed), and sugar are some of his main ingredients for salad dressings and marinades.

This is considered a transitional diet cookbook, meaning those who don’t think they can live without meat can try these recipes and still find flavor and crunch. Still not miss the fat and grease of a meat-based diet.

I doubt I’ll try any of the recipes. I thought briefly of testing each one, but it isn’t going to happen. And I don’t mean to be so hard on someone who is working toward educating people about a meatless diet. But Tal, next time you write a cookbook, maybe you could bring it down to the home cook’s level, and maybe give us a few directions on technique.

April Reading List

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Here’s the culinary reading list so far this month…

Salt: A World History: I know, we’ve seen this one before, but I had to send it back to the library before I was done reading. This time I intend to finish it. Salt has had a huge impact on our world, and how it shaped world history.

Food Plants of the World: An Illustrated Guide: A comprehensive and thorough documentation of the approximately 350 foods that we humans consume.

Seeds of Change: Five Plants That Transformed Mankind: There is a newer edition of this book, Seeds of Change: Six Plants That Transformed Mankind. Henry Hobhouse added cocoa to quinine, sugar, tea, cotton and the potato as foods that impacted history. I’m wondering why corn is not in there?

I just finished with Feasting on Asphalt: The River Run by Alton Brown. This is a written diary of the series by the same name, produced for the Food Network. I found it useful for ideas, but not nearly as entertaining as the show itself.

December Reading list

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Here’s a list of what I’m reading right now.

Eating India, Chitrita Banerji
Will Write for Food, Dianne Jacob
Julie & Julia, Julie Powell
The Professional Chef’s Knife Kit, Culinary Institute of America
Live to Cook, Michael Symon

This is my second go around with Live to Cook, Iron Chef Michael Symon’s book of recipes. Eating India is an intimate journey of one woman’s love affair of her Homeland food. Will Write for Food is about how to become a food writer, if you are interested in writing abut food. And, The Professional Chef’s Knife kit, well, because you know that I want to know more about the tools I work with on a daily basis.

This seems a large list for a busy chef, but that’s the beauty of libraries, I can renew the books (most of the time) and continue reading through them. I’m finding Eating India a little slow, but I am determined to finish it. Iron Chef Symon, of Food Network fame has an approachable and easy writing style. Will Write for Food is simple and straight forward, Dianne Jacob’s no nonsense approach makes it seem like any one of us can be food writers. I haven’t gotten to the other two yet, but I did see the movie Julie & Julia and loved Meryl Streep’s interpretation of Julia Child. Amy Adams as Julie Powell was adorable and believable as an amateur cook attempting to muscle through the weighty and brilliant tome Mastering the Art of French Cooking by Julia Child.

I’ve got a growing list of books to check out, several on spices, and two on serving and front of the house approaches. That will be next year’s reading. I’m working on gathering enough information on spices to present to you, the reader, an intelligent and easy to follow guide. What comes after that? Keep turning the metaphorical page.

Curry has an Amazing History

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Curry: A tale of cooks & conquerors by Lizzie Collingham is my current quest to further culinary knowledge. I’ve read a fourth of the book and learned more history then I was taught in high school about other countries. But I grew up in the West, in America, and here it is about cowboys and cows, not curries, vegetables, and Persian overlords.

This is not a recipe book, it is one person’s view of how curries evolved in India through the influence of other cultures. And it is an academic, not popular, view.

Hopefully after this, I’ll find some light reading. Here’s a review of the book.

Cuisine of India: I need a road map

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I have stepped into the grand adventure of teaching myself how to cook the cuisine of the subcontinent India. It is not an easy task, and involves hours of research, reading, and learning techniques in the kitchen. Mostly it is a language barrier.

During the research process, I have discovered that terminology is specific to region. Names of ingredients and processes are different, but mean the same thing. And that can be terribly confusing for someone trying to learn how to cook new foods.

The prime example is the backbone of India cuisine, Masala. But what is it, and how do you define it? Wikipedia says “any spice mixture.” And that can mean either a dry spice mix, or a cooked spice mix. But how is it determined? Almost every website I read has a different kind of description for the same thing. Masala can be a wet or dry spice mix. chaat is a dry mixture, punjabi is a wet mixture. However, more identification of regions is necessary for my American head to wrap around. I am trying to learn something on my own, that most Indian cooks know instinctively, through language and region.

India cuisine has had many influences on it’s flavors and styles. It is hard to know what food was cooked prior to the euro invasion. Potatoes, eggplant, and many chili’s came from the New World via the Portugese. Other influences over the last several centuries has determined what kind of curry, or masala, or rice (biryana) I am cooking.

The next book I will be reading is called Curry, a tale of cooks and conquerors. It will be interesting to see what I learn, and how much of it makes sense. Bouncing around the web reading about punjabi, and chaat, and masala, and curries, and subjis (or subzis) is spinning my culinary knowledge wheels. I don’t have a road map here, and I feel lost. As a chef, I want to know the culinary secrets of India Cuisine. When I discuss it, I would like to sound at least knowledgeable in some small way.

And really, wouldn’t it just be easier to go to India to learn about the food? Travel around, cooking and eating my way through the ingredients, styles, techniques, and choices of the land?

Current Reading: The History of Food

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I am currently reading A History of Food by Maguelonne Toussaint-Samat.

I was on a hunt for anthropological/archeological information about food and how food traveled through the ancient world. I found it. This is the Food Bible, written published in 1988, and revised just last year, this book contains information that dates from prehistoric times to current. There’s a lot of information packed in these pages.

The writer is French, though, and there seems to be much information on how food got to and from France/Gaul. There is some information on the Americas, but mainly how the food got from the American continent to Europe. Still, if you want to know the details about wine, bread or oil, this is the book to read.

I spend 2 hours a day on public transportation which gives me quality time to spend with this book. I am a happy chef!

Why I cook

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I was reminded today why I cook, why I work in the food industry, and what is important about this career. I watched a documentary called How to cook your life, it featured Edward Espe Brown, a Buddhist Monk Master and Chef. He is the author of The Tassajara Bread Book, Tassajara Cooking, The Tassajara Recipe Book, and Tomato Blessings and Radish Teachings. (Tassajara is the Zen Center where he works and teaches). The way he talks about food, and cooking in a Zen Center reminds me of my connection with Food and my Spirituality.

I cook for people because I want them to be healthy and happy through the food I provide. Yes, I do it in a large scale setting, but I do it for love and passion, not money. Money would be nice, it would be helpful to pay my bills and be out of debt. Because of that particular motivation, I lost sight of the more important value, spirit.

I decided I deserved to be promoted and I deserved to make more money, because of my time in the company, and what I perceived I had done for them. They perceived differently. I was rejected and told their perception of my performance. I was hurt and angry. Now, they are shuffling me into a position I don’t really want, and I have to find some good, some quality, and some understanding of why the Universe has put me there.

I’ve decided that the lesson is humility, and getting back to the basics of my understanding of why I provide food for people.

It is not an easy lesson; especially when co-workers ask why I am working the Salad Station on the buffet. I shrug, I say I don’t know, but I know I need to do this job with gratefulness, and mindfulness, and not with resentment and anger, because even if I am just filling up a bowl of lettuce on a buffet line, if I do it with negative connotations, that will translate to the food I am handling.

Brown pointed out the three tenants of Tenzo cooking; The joyful mind, the kind mind, and the grateful mind. I must utilize this on a daily basis. And maintain an attitude of gratefulness that I even have a job. And while doing that continue to look for a work environment that supports and upholds a similar philosophy to mine.

Dilemmas and top chefs

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I’m currently attempting to digest Omnivore’s Dilemma by Michael Pollen. It’s rough going, learning how they turn raw product into the final thing. I’ve known for awhile about some of the twists and turns in food production, but the levels and lengths they go to are pretty frightening.
Still, at work I’m consuming meat as I tell myself “Stop it, Stop that!” The good thing is I am allergic to corn, so most of the products made out of corn are not available to me.

The raising, harvesting and production of Corn consumes a great quantity of petroleum. This is not good for the eco-systems or the Earth. So, in some small way by being allergic, I am helping.
It is a small consolation.

On a much more positive note, on Top Chef Masters, they were required to make an all Vegan Dinner for Zooey Deschanel. Some of them did well, and some of them did not. It was so much fun to watch these incredible Chefs try to cook without meat! I was very pleased to see Top Chefs finally bring in a vegan challenge. They should do it every season!