Ad Hoc at Home
Thomas Keller shares family-style recipes that you can make any or every day.\ In the book every home cook has been waiting for, the revered Thomas Keller turns his imagination to the American comfort foods closest to his heart—flaky biscuits, chicken pot pies, New England clam bakes, and cherry pies so delicious and redolent of childhood that they give Proust's madeleines a run for their money. Keller, whose restaurants The French Laundry in Yountville, California, and Per Se in New York...
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Thomas Keller shares family-style recipes that you can make any or every day.In the book every home cook has been waiting for, the revered Thomas Keller turns his imagination to the American comfort foods closest to his heart—flaky biscuits, chicken pot pies, New England clam bakes, and cherry pies so delicious and redolent of childhood that they give Proust's madeleines a run for their money. Keller, whose restaurants The French Laundry in Yountville, California, and Per Se in New York have revolutionized American haute cuisine, is equally adept at turning out simpler fare. In Ad Hoc at Home—a cookbook inspired by the menu of his casual restaurant Ad Hoc in Yountville—he showcases more than 200 recipes for family-style meals. This is Keller at his most playful, serving up such truck-stop classics as Potato Hash with Bacon and Melted Onions and grilled-cheese sandwiches, and heartier fare including beef Stroganoff and roasted spring leg of lamb. In fun, full-color photographs, the great chef gives step-by-step lessons in kitchen basics— here is Keller teaching how to perfectly shape a basic hamburger, truss a chicken, or dress a salad. Best of all, where Keller’s previous best-selling cookbooks were for the ambitious advanced cook, Ad Hoc at Home is filled with quicker and easier recipes that will be embraced by both kitchen novices and more experienced cooks who want the ultimate recipes for American comfort-food classics. The New York Times - Christine Muhlke serves up cozy dishes from [Keller's] "casual" restaurant, Ad Hoc, a set-menu, elbows-on-the-table spot in Yountville, Calif., where the meatballs and fried chicken are inarguably better than your mother's.
\ Christine Muhlkeserves up cozy dishes from [Keller's] "casual" restaurant, Ad Hoc, a set-menu, elbows-on-the-table spot in Yountville, Calif., where the meatballs and fried chicken are inarguably better than your mother's.\ —The New York Times\ \ \ \ \ Publishers WeeklyKeller, one of America’s most acclaimed chefs (The French Laundry; Bouchon), shifts his focus from fine dining to family-style meals for the home cook in this accessible and dazzlingly beautiful book based on the fare served at his Ad Hoc restaurant, in Napa, Calif. He does not disappoint, providing a thorough primer on the foundations of cooking, offering clear and easy-to-follow instructions on techniques such as butchering and trussing chickens and tying a pork loin. He also includes a section on becoming a better cook, which helps fine-tune the cook and instructs on using salt properly, learning to make one really good soup and getting organized. Throughout are helpful sidebars that clarify potentially murky subjects, including brining fish and meat, salad basics and using fats. Dishes such as braised beef short ribs, buttermilk fried chicken, and fig-stuffed roast pork loin highlight a vast array of offerings that range from crab cakes to shortbread cookies. This collection is what legions of Keller fans have been waiting for, a book that allows them to replicate the merest glimmer of his culinary genius in their own homes. (Nov.)\ \ \ Library JournalNoted French Laundry chef Keller planned Ad Hoc, opened in 2006 in Yountville, CA, as a temporary, casual restaurant patterned after the family (staff) meals—a four-course single menu with no choices—of his other restaurants. For home cooks intimidated by Keller's higher-end cookbooks, his new work showcases Ad Hoc's simpler fare, with more than 200 recipes for family-style meals. In the introduction, Keller emphasizes that a great product plus great execution results in great cooking. The recipes begin with his favorite—poultry, followed by meat, fish, soups, salads, vegetables, breads, a hodgepodge of sweet and savory "staples," and, of course, desserts. There are additional recipes for basic dough, sauces, and stocks. The recipes are comfort food with a twist-scalloped potatoes (potato pavé), vegetable soup (vegetable garbure), and grilled cheese made with brioche and Gruyère. These are approachable and doable but are not all for the calorie-conscious cook. Butter, eggs, and heavy cream abound and are combined with fresh fruits, vegetables, meat, and fish. VERDICT This beautiful volume continues the well-written and artful precedent set by Keller's The French Laundry Cookbook and Bouchon, delightful to the eye as well as the stomach. With a planned media blitz, this work is sure to be in demand in libraries and will also be a popular gift book. [Nine-city author tour.]—Christine Bulson, SUNY at Oneonta Lib.\ \
