Kitchen Sense v. The Food Encyclopedia

By Juliette Rossant Super Chef invited Jennifer English, host of Sunday Brunch and founder of the James Beard award winning Food and Wine Radio Network, to discuss why she thinks Mitchell Davis's Kitchen Sense (Clarkson Potter 2006) and Jacques Rolland and Carol Sherman's The Food Encyclopedia (Firefly Books 2006)were two of the most significant cookbooks of 2006. Jennifer said: I love Kitchen Sense for many many reasons. First, I believe that it is a "real" cookbook. The kind the industry has strayed away from in recent years. I think that over time, Kitchen Sense will be recognized as a "classic" much like The Silver Palate, or The Joy of Cooking. In fact I will go so far as to say that Kitchen Sense might be The Joy of Cooking of our time. It teaches this generation all of the kitchen sense, food wisdom and practical tips that we no longer learn from our mothers, grandmothers and home-ec classes. In fact it is filled with the everyday useful lessons that get glossed over on food network or obfuscated by the myriad magazines which cover the topic. Jennifer continues about The Food Encyclopedia: Regarding The Food Encyclopedia. Everyone who cooks or eats should own this book. It is not too intimidating or esoteric. And while it may fall short in the eyes of only the most diehard foodies, it recognizes what the general public needs and can handle. If you turn to the Fish and Shellfish chapter (p.274) in Kitchen Sense it is easy to hear what Jennifer is talking about: Mitchell's strong, clear voice in each recipe. Here is he is on Stewed Octopus: There are as many secrets to making octopus tender as there are octopus cooks– including cooking the octopus with a wine cork in the pot. I find that freezing the octopus before cooking is consistently effective in producing tender octopus. (p. 281) Super Chef agrees with Jennifer on Kitchen Sense. There are sections full of common sense like the Seusian entitled "One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish" which discusses catagories of fish, so that if the kind called for in a particular recipes is not available, you can choose a similar fish. Many of the recipes have practical sections on advanced prep and leftovers, making them even more user friendly. However, there are also plenty of other cookbooks that cover the A-to-Z of basic home cooking like those published recently by food magazines (Gourmet and Bon Appetit) or by America's Test Kitchen or in tomes like Mark Bittman's How to Cook Everything. What sets Mitchell's book apart is its straightforwardness. The recipes turn out good "American" (in a broad sense) food. He isn't trying to do everything -- there is only one octopus recipe -- but he does offer great standards. What about The Food Encyclopedia? Super Chef prefers and recommends the formidable Larouse Gastronomique for its wonderful history, photos and recipes of classic French food. True, The Food Encyclopedia adds American to Asian and European cuisines -- with a definite Canadian slant to the Canadian-published cookbook. It has entries for crab varieties in North American waters as well buttermilk pie and Jigg's Dinner: The Newfoundland equivalent of New England boiled dinner, a combination of salted beef or salt pork, turnips, potatoes, cabbage, and carrots boiled togeter with water in a large pot... The meal is named after the comic strip character Jiggs from the cartoon Bringing Up Father, created by George McManus in 1913. (p. 350) What is more interesting and curious are the entries for chefs, food writers and food pioneers. Alain Ducasse has an entry -- but not Thomas Keller? Graham Kerr gets an entry, but few if any of the Food Network's big name chefs ("chefs" and not "cooks") receive mention. The authors have included an entry for Claudia Roden, an expert on Sephardic cooking, yet they also turn to her for a comment on bagels, not a more authoritative Ashkenazi cuisine expert like Joan Nathan, who receives no entry. The Food Encyclopedia has colored illustrations by Allan Macknicki and saves photos for the personalities. It maybe to save money, but it does not make sense all the time: photographs do capture some kinds of ingredients or dishes better than illustrations. Nevertheless, it is a serviceable reference book for the general public -- if you'd rather plunk out $50 for this book, rather than $75 for Larouse Gastronomique. Previous articles: Claudia Roden: Arabesque Green Eggs and Ham Cookbook Jewish Traditions Cookbook: Rosh Hashanah Cook's Companion: Stephanie Alexander Joan Nathan: New American Cooking Mark Bittman: Best Recipes in the World [Cookbook Reviews - complete] Technorati Tags: superchefblog, Juliette Rossant, super chef, celebrities, chefs, food, restaurants, cooking, branding, cuisine, blogging, food blogging, cookbook reviews, cookbooks --> back to Super Chef