How to Cook Without a Book: Recipes and Techniques Every Cook Should Know by Heart

`How to Cook Without a Book' by former `Cooks Illustrated' executive editor, Pam Anderson promises to teach us all to cook the way our mothers and grandmothers cooked, from memory, without consulting a cookbook except for the most obscure pastry measurement. And, at that, they usually owned but one cookbook. I had high expectations from this book, but I was not surprised when it turned out to be just a little disappointing.The most illuminating statement in this book is yet another confirmation of Tom Colicchio's premise in his book `How to Think Like a Chef', where he establishes the principle that chefs do not create recipes, then search for their ingredients to make the recipe; they look to see what they have on hand and create a recipe from these materials. This is why the Iron Chef premise is really a perfect exemplar of how chefs really work. Their source of inspiration may be what is good in the market or what they happen to have on hand in their walk-in. But, this is only half of the equation. Inspiration may arise from ingredients, but you need to know what to do with those ingredients. Presentation of methods for dealing with ingredients takes up the lion's share of the book.But getting back to the original premise, Anderson takes this premise to the logical, but not entirely satisfactory conclusion that one basis of cooking without a book is to have a well-stocked pantry, refrigerator, and freezer. While I am in the unusual position of having all the time I need to go to the market every day to shop for the day's meals, there was a time when I worked ten to twelve hours a day, and padded my larder with lots of staples such as pastas, beans, rice, canned vegetables, frozen meats, and the like. And, most of that stuff sat in the pantry until I threw it out. Stocking a pantry is a very good idea, but it should not be done from a list given to you by a cookbook author, no matter how good her credentials or how worthy her rationale is for the list. I have it on the authority of no less than Madhur Jaffrey that the best way to build a pantry is to add to it those things that are parts of dishes you know you will make on a regular basis. Thus, being from a Pennsylvania Dutch background, I always have canned sauerkraut, canned dried corn, hot bacon dressing, and chow chow on hand, even though none of these items ever appear in a recommended pantry list.A second weakness with Anderson's implementation of her program is that her rationale behind cooking without a book is done in order to save time. This means that many of the recipes in the book are either simple in themselves or simplified versions of classic long cooking dishes. My favorite example of this for both its strengths and its weaknesses is her recipe for lasagna, which is certainly fast, using wonton wrappers in place of traditional Italian lasagna noodles. Her method is so far removed from the original dish that she admits that it really must be served almost immediately after cooking. This is not the lasagna I know and love, which will stoutly stand by on the sideboard or the buffet line for hours and will gladly be refrigerated to serve again another day. All of this lasagna virtue is given up in order to get a faster dish. I would sooner eat an alternative, easier baked pasta dish than have to deal with this ersatz dish.The concern with cooking time leads the author to violate some of the most sacred maxims of cookery, such as the recommendation to cook a pound of pasta in at least four quarts of boiling water. Ms. Anderson states that it takes a fairly long time to bring four quarts of water to a boil, and that two quarts will do the job quite nicely. All this in spite of the fact that Rachael Ray makes pasta in three out of five episodes of '30 Minute Meals' by bringing four quarts of water to a boil and still finishes the pasta dish well within her allotted half-hour.All these concerns do not eliminate the value of this book in presenting a wide variety of cooking methods and how to plug in different ingredients to a common method to get interesting, new results. This is exactly what Mario Batali did, for example, when presented with a lobster in one of his Iron Chef appearances. Molto Mario simply made lobster saltimbocca, a dish usually made with veal or chicken. Ms. Anderson presents 21 different methods, plus all their variations. And, many of these methods contain some genuinely useful ideas, such as the recommendation to make an omelet dinner for four by making one large eight egg omelet and cutting it into quarters rather than either buying four omelet pans or turning out an omelet every five minutes. With all this good stuff, I still have reservations, as when Ms. Anderson lumps together Broccoli, Cabbage, Squash, and Potatoes in a single category, giving the impression that these four vegetables can be cooked in the same way in a pasta dish with `firm vegetables'. This ignores another prime chef's skill in knowing the differences between ingredients and how to coax the very best out of each ingredient.Ms. Anderson's lesson is a very good one. I just think that while she may have given one alternative to people who have to cook and may not embrace the task, she has taken a lot of the fun and interest out of cooking for someone who relishes cooking. One may get the same lesson with fewer questionable shortcuts from either Colicchio or Alton Brown's `I'm Only Here for the Food'.Recommended for good ideas and techniques, as long as you know the difference between the good and the bad ideas.

Like that this well organized cook book gives the experienced cook a platform to build on.

I bought this cookbook five weeks ago, and I haven't eaten out since because what I make at home now actually tastes better and has way more variety than what I can get in restaurants. This is not a book of recipes; it is a book of cooking techniques. So instead of you looking to see if you have all the ingredients you need to make the recipe you're looking at in some cookbook, this book teaches you how to recognize which cooking technique you need to use to make something that tastes good using the ingredients you just happen to have. Basically, once you learn the techniques, then you can go stare at the random food items in your cupboard or in your grocery store, find a couple that seem like they would taste good together, and know what technique to use to combine them to make a meal that is so good that you will choose to eat at home even if you can afford to eat out. You will really appreciate this training the next time you get snowed in by a blizzard and are forced to use up whatever you just happen to have left on hand in your cupboards.I found that learning to use techniques to cook instead of following recipes solved a lot of the problems I used to face. Now there are no long complicated lists of ingredients to assemble. There is no more frustration from buying fifteen different bizarre ingredients that I will use once and never use again because they were for an exotic dish that I didn't like once I made it and I can't find any other recipes that call for those same ingredients. There is no more irritation from finding out that I can't make a recipe I want to try because I have only five of the seven ingredients that it calls for. There are no more vegetables going to waste in my refrigerator because I only needed a small portion of the eggplant or whatever and didn't know what to do with the rest of it. Oh, and did I mention that using these techniques allows you to make just a little of something so that you're not forced to eat the same meal for both lunch and dinner three days in a row? And you can even get rid of your shelf full of cookbooks filled with endless recipes because you'll actually know how to cook once you've read "How to Cook Without a Book" and have practiced the techniques in it for a month or so.If this sounds too good to be true, I can only tell you that I am relating my personal experience. Those of you who grew up with a mother who knew how to cook and who cared enough to teach you how may or may not be as impressed with this book as I was. I cannot judge since I do not come from that background; however, I highly recommend this book based on my experience.

Wonderful book. Really interesting approach to cooking and loads of practical tips.

I would give this a perfect rating because I read through it and its very comprehensive. The only negative comment I have is that there are no pictures.. That doesn't mean the book needs pictures - its just nice to see a sylized photo of what your cooking should look like.. or possible a section with pictures on selecting meat and produce. I dont want to nit pick as it is definately a quality book that will at least temporarily replace "the joy of cooking" in our house.

Although this had a few nuggets of great advice and techniques, I was disappointed with the failure to follow through on actually how to cook without a book - it would have been very helpful to have information on how ingredients work together, what ingredients taste like or change with different methods for those unfamiliar with the ingredient, how spices react with ingredients or other spices and then coupled with techniques would assist the reader to cook without a book.

Just what I needed. Wonderful concept of how to teach someone to cook. I made one soup and family and friends loved it. Not only that, It taught me soup basics that I will use with other soups.

Don't waste your time with this one!