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Product Description
Thomas Keller, chef/proprieter of the French Laundry in the Napa Valley?"the most exciting place to eat in the United States," wrote Ruth Reichl in The New York Times?is a wizard, a purist, a man obsessed with getting it right. And this, his first cookbook, is every bit as satisfying as a French Laundry meal itself: a series of small, impeccable, highly refined, intensely focused courses.
Most dazzling is how simple Keller's methods are: squeegeeing the moisture from the skin on fish so it sautées beautifully; poaching eggs in a deep pot of water for perfect shape; the initial steeping in the shell that makes cooking raw lobster out of the shell a cinch; using vinegar as a flavor enhancer; the repeated washing of bones for stock for the cleanest, clearest tastes.
From innovative soup techniques, to the proper way to cook green vegetables, to secrets of great fish cookery, to the creation of breathtaking desserts; from beurre monté to foie gras au torchon, to a wild and thoroughly unexpected take on coffee and doughnuts, The French Laundry Cookbook captures, through recipes, essays, profiles, and extraordinary photography, one of America's great restaurants, its great chef, and the food that makes both unique.
One hundred and fifty superlative recipes are exact recipes from the French Laundry kitchen?no shortcuts have been taken, no critical steps ignored, all have been thoroughly tested in home kitchens. If you can't get to the French Laundry, you can now re-create at home the very experience the Wine Spectator described as "as close to dining perfection as it gets."
Review
To eat at Thomas Keller's Napa Valley restaurant, The French Laundry, is to experience a peak culinary experience. In The French Laundry Cookbook, Keller articulates his passions and offers home cooks a means to duplicate the level of perfection that makes him one of the best chefs in the U.S. and, arguably, the world. This cookbook provides 150 recipes exactly as they are used at Keller's restaurant. It is also his culinary manifesto, in which he shares the unique creative processes that led him to invent Peas and Carrots--a succulent pillow of a lobster paired with pea shoots and creamy ginger-carrot sauce--and other high-wire culinary acts. It offers unimagined experiences, from extracting chlorophyll to use in coloring sauces to a recipe for chocolate cake accompanied by red beet ice cream and a walnut sauce. You are urged to follow Keller's recipes precisely and also to view them as blueprints. To keep them alive, they must be infused with your own commitment to perfection and pleasure, as you define those terms. Keller's story, shared through the writing of Michael Ruhlman, shows how this chef was both born and made. After winning rave reviews when he was still in his 20s, it took a more experienced chef throwing a knife at him because he did not know how to truss a chicken to open his eyes to the importance of the discipline and techniques of classical French cooking. To acquire these fundamental skills, he apprenticed at eight of the finest restaurants in France. Grounded in classic technique, Keller's cooking is characterized by traditional marriages of ingredients, assembled in breathtakingly daring new ways, such as Pearls and Oyster, glistening caviar and oysters served on a bed of creamy pearl tapioca. Continually piquing the palate, his meals are a procession of 5 to 10 dishes, all small portions vibrantly composed. For example, Pan Roasted Breast of Squab with Swiss Chard, Seared Foie Gras, and Oven-Dried Black Figs require just three birds to serve six. The result: you are never sated, always stimulated. The 200 photographs by Deborah Jones include more than just beauty shots: they show how to prepare various dishes; how Keller, shown stroking a whole salmon, respects his ingredients; and how the perfection of baby fava beans still nestled in the downy lining of their succulent pod, or the seduction of an abundance of fresh caviar, calls out the best from the chef. --Dana Jacobi
Customer Review:A116J28MIS03J5
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Summary: Pinacle
I just finished making 'Pan Roasted Striped Bass with Artichoke Ravioli and Barigoule Vinaigrette' for my wife for Valentine's day. I picked this one because it looked like an easier recipe. It was challenging, took two days to make, I had to substitute several items, but it was worth it. Not only was it the best thing I ever made, it was the best I ever ate and I learned a lot in the process.
If you are looking for a challenge, this book is it. I would just give you one piece of advice. Don't feel that you have to do everything verbatim. I didn't make my own Ravioli Pasta and I had to use Haddock since Striped Bass was out of season, but again, this was the best meal I ever had. And I've been to some top restaurants in Boston, New York, Napa Valley and San Francisco.
This book will be worthless for a beginner. But if you've mastered the more difficult recipes from Gourmet magazine and the Food Network, this book is the greatest challenge and will be the greatest reward for you.
I'm too tired to think about trying another recipe for a couple of months, and too broke.
But you can bet I'll be 'window shopping' through the pages to get ahead on my next project.
My sincerest thanks to the authors for sharing their expertise.
Customer Review:A2AHBQFKDYU5Q1
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Summary: Excellent Reading for Chefs or Aspiring Chefs
I bought this book online from for my grandson for Christmas. He is a Chef and has won awards for his creations. I only glanced through it, but it is, indeed, a handsome looking book. The cover is wonderful, and my "quick read" before wrapping it for Christmas was most favorable.
When he called to thank me for it, it was obvious he was impressed as well as proud. Thomas Keller is his idol as the best Chef in the world.
I was also impressed with the rapid delivery of this item after I ordered it.
Customer Review:AQRGO1ENCJWI6
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Summary: a reference - beyond a recipe book
A book to read from a to z before even cooking anything! Thomas Keller shares his passion and experience with a genuine interest to make us better cooks with respect to the food. No 21 minutes meal fixes...
Customer Review:A1X7DATHEV4VJG
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Summary: If you want to try these recipes at home...
... you may want to check out the Carol Cooks Keller blog--- carolcookskeller dot blogspot dot com. In 2007-2008, this young woman cooked her way through this book, although she had young kids, a busy life, friends and neighbors to enjoy, and all the rest. She managed to do this by spreading the elaborate steps of the recipes through the week, doing a bit each day. For a cooking 'hobbyist' like me, that sounds fun--just like a motorcycle mechanic fools around with his bike all the time, or a woodworker likes to slip out to the shop to do a little work. So although this cookbook is not about everyday cooking, but instead a mad adventure with something new, her writings did inspire me to order this cookbook and start with the Gruyere Cheese Gougeres (pardon lack of accents!). Final hint: Carol's near-to-final October 17, 2008 entry lists the recipes from this cookbook that she recommends as Great First Steps. She also includes her Top Ten Favorites from the book. By the way, I have absolutely no connection with this blogger, nor did I read her postings in "real time", as she was writing it. Jus' sayin'-- if you REALLY want to get a feel for what it's like to cook these French Laundry recipes, Carol jotted down her step by step experience of every single recipe, as she cooked them, month by month, and included many helpful photos, comments from friends who tasted the food, and did a great job documenting both great successes, along with some total failures.
Customer Review:A3R9HPWFF9QWSN
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Summary: COOKBOOKS!COOKBOOKS!COOKBOOKS!COOKBOOKS!
Acting on the premise that one can never own enough cookbooks (the forty or fifty we own makes only a modest cooking library), we added three new cookbooks this year. All are excellent. And the year before, our son gave me a fourth cookbook that's also excellent.
Let's start with the classiest. Thomas Keller owns and operates The French Laundry restaurant in Yountville, California. "Cooking is not about convenience, and it's not about shortcuts. Take your time. Move slowly and deliberately, and with great attention," writes Keller in The French Laundry Cookbook, co-authored with food writer Michael Ruhlman (Ruhlman's The Soul of a Chef, 2001, is a really good book about what drives professional chefs to seek perfection). Food writers pretty much agree The French Laundry is either the best restaurant in the world, not just America, or if not Number One in the World, then Number Two or Three. If you want to eat there (as we do some day), you must call for a reservation two months ahead of time on the morning of the first day of the month. Call any later and the restaurant bookings for that coming month are all filled.
Keller's inventiveness with foods and his meticulous attention to detail are legendary. They are well documented in this fantastically beautiful book. It includes Keller's recipe for his signature appetizer, Pearls and Oyster, which marries caviar and oysters in a bed of creamy pearl tapioca. There a few -very few- of the 150 recipes in this book that an adventurous chef might try at home -there is an intriguing recipe for gazpacho and one for a lasagne that Keller cooks for the staff meal before the restaurant opens to the public--but most of the recipes are way beyond the capabilities of even the most advance home chef and require expensive, sometimes exotic ingredients. (Keller does a lot with caviar, lobster and foie gras, and where in Modesto do you purchase a pig's head or fresh killed squab?) The desserts sound heavenly but are complicated to make as well. (Doesn't fresh-made banana ice cream with chocolate-banana crepes and chocolate sauce sound good?) But then, The French Laundry Cookbook isn't so much a book to cook from as an inspiration, a work of art, a rollercoaster read. I'm glad we own it but I don't see myself cooking anything from it in the near future ... although there is a recipe involving artichokes that looks good.
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