How I Learned to Cook: Culinary Educations from the World's Greatest Chefs

ISBN-10: 1596912472

ISBN-13: 9781596912472

In this indispensable companion to the smash hit Don't Try This at Home, forty great chefs, including Mario Batali, Eric Ripert, and Fergus Henderson, share pivotal moments of their culinary educations.Before he was a top chef, Tom Colicchio learned to love cooking while he slung burgers at a poolside snack bar. Barbara Lynch tells the story of lying her way into her first chef's job and then needing to cook her way out of trouble in the galley kitchen of a ship at sea. Stories of mentorship abound: Rick Bayless tells the story of finally working with Julia Child, his childhood hero; Gary Danko of earning the trust of the legendary Madeleine Kamman. How I Learned to Cook is an irresistible treat, a must-have for anyone who loves food and wants a look into the lives the men and women who masterfully prepare it. Publishers Weekly Forty chefs representing notable restaurants all over the world offer a bit of humorous history on how they cut their teeth in the kitchen. Many relate their apprentice moments quaking in the shadow of the Great Chef, such as 14-year-old Daniel Boulud's meeting the famous Paul Bocuse for the first time in his restaurant in Lyon and getting smashed on a glass of blanc cassis, or David Bayless's surreal collaboration with Julia Child on camera after admiring her since he was a kid watching her '60s TV show. Most savory are testimony from the trenches in the heat of the dinner rush, as in Jonathan Eismann's hilarious account of toiling in a fashionable New York City West Village restaurant during the high '80s when his drug-addled staff began dropping like dominos around him at the peak hours of service, and Gabrielle Hamilton's attempts in her tiny fledging restaurant, Prune, not to kill her sous chef with exploding wet fava beans frying in deep fat. Despite voices somewhat skewed in favor of male chefs, the stories are entertaining and well chosen by literary agent Witherspoon (Don't Try This at Home) and New York Times contributor Meehan. (Nov.) Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.

Introduction 1The Big Red Book, or El Practico 3Boiling Point 13Country Living 18Sweet Child O' Mine 25One Fish, Two Fish 34Digging in the Dirt 42That's Entertainment 49Extra, Extra! 56Found in Translation 63Blanc Cassis 69Ready for My Close-Up 76Skull Man 85And the Winner Is... 93The Noodle Whisperer 100The Swim Club 112Teacher's Pet 116Cooking the Books 126The Crack-Up 136Everything I Need to Know About Cooking I Learned in an Ashram 144French Lessons 150"It's All Fun and Games Until..." 160Lunch with Victor 170A Brief History of Fate 178The Disciple 181Lost at Sea 186A Flower in Venice 196Early Riser 202Curveball 208Blame It on the Del Rio 214Growing Pains 221Backseat Chefs andOther Trials of Opening a Restaurant 227The Bad Egg 233Walking on Eggshells 238Christmas in Paris 248Catching the Wave 256Six Little Words 263The Living Proof 270Clothes Make the Man 278Under My Thumb 284Hawaii High 290Acknowledgments 305

\ From Barnes & NobleThere is no single recipe for learning to cook superbly. That's one of the reasons why this stand-alone sequel to Don't Try This at Home is even more entertaining than its predecessor. In their debut book, Kimberly Witherspoon and Peter Meehan queried dozens of great chefs about their worst meal ever. In How I Learned to Cook, they ask 40 maestros of the kitchen to share true tales of their apprenticeships. Contributing stories to this hilarious, poignant brew are Mario Batali, Anthony Bourdain, Pino Luongo, Michel Richard, Dan Barber, Daniel Boulud, Fergus Henderson, and Norman Van Aken.\ \ \ \ \ Publishers WeeklyForty chefs representing notable restaurants all over the world offer a bit of humorous history on how they cut their teeth in the kitchen. Many relate their apprentice moments quaking in the shadow of the Great Chef, such as 14-year-old Daniel Boulud's meeting the famous Paul Bocuse for the first time in his restaurant in Lyon and getting smashed on a glass of blanc cassis, or David Bayless's surreal collaboration with Julia Child on camera after admiring her since he was a kid watching her '60s TV show. Most savory are testimony from the trenches in the heat of the dinner rush, as in Jonathan Eismann's hilarious account of toiling in a fashionable New York City West Village restaurant during the high '80s when his drug-addled staff began dropping like dominos around him at the peak hours of service, and Gabrielle Hamilton's attempts in her tiny fledging restaurant, Prune, not to kill her sous chef with exploding wet fava beans frying in deep fat. Despite voices somewhat skewed in favor of male chefs, the stories are entertaining and well chosen by literary agent Witherspoon (Don't Try This at Home) and New York Times contributor Meehan. (Nov.) Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.\ \ \ Library JournalA companion to the editors' Don't Try This at Home, this volume contains brief essays written by 40 chefs describing their experiences in becoming some of the most famous names in the world of culinary arts. Readers are treated to entertaining anecdotes written by Mario Batali, Jacques Torres, Marcella Hazen, and others, with behind-the-scenes stories of some of the world's greatest restaurants and chefs. We share Ming Tsai's first experience with chocolate ganache: off in his measurements by a factor of ten, he ended up with a chocolate body wash and to this day has a great distaste for the food. We are also given the secret recipe for the "Det burger" of Sara Moulton's Ann Arbor days. Culinary inspirations range from childhood experiences to working with Julia Child to being a short-order cook. There's some value in these tales for those interested in a career in cooking, and for the rest of us there's the joy of hearing wonderful stories of the great chefs. Recommended for most public libraries and culinary arts collections.\ —Elizabeth Rogers Copyright 2007 Reed Business Information\ \ \