Product Description

Prepare to enjoy eighteen of Julia Child s kitchen classics in a sumptuous second collection from her pioneering cooking show The French Chef.The French Chef was a cooking series unlike anything yet seen on TV. Warm and exuberant Julia was a natural television star whether scooping up a spilled potato pancake or coaxing a reluctant souffl Julia was not afraid of making mistakes. Soon a nation fed on Shake n Bake and Tang would be experimenting with quiche Lorraine and boeuf bourguignon and cooking would become a national pastime.This special collection presents 18 episodes from her groundbreaking series. In her signature style and with bloopers intact Julia demonstrates such classic recipes as cr pes suzette omelette gratin e p t de campagne b che de No l and many more.Bon appetit!Disc 1 Starters Sauces and Sides Cooking Vegetables Vegetable Adventures Elegance with Eggs More about Potatoes Terrines and Pat s The Hollandaise FamilyDisc 2 - Main Courses French Crepes I Cooking Your Goose Roast Suckling Pig Fish in Monk's Clothing Cheese Souffle Sole Bonne FemmeDisc 3 Breads and Desserts French Crepes II Buche De Noel Croissants Gateau in a Cage French Bread VIP Cake: Le PrantomeSystem Requirements:Running Time 30 Mins.Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: MISCELLANEOUS/SPECIAL INTEREST UPC: 783421405196 Manufacturer No: WG40519

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #9824 in DVD
• Brand: WGBH BOSTON VIDEO
• Released on: 2005-11-22
• Rating: NR (Not Rated)
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Formats: Box set, Closed-captioned, Color, DVD-Video, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Number of discs: 3
• Dimensions: .50 pounds
• Running time: 432 minutes

Amazon.com
A regular program on WGBH Boston from 1963 to 1972, The French Chef is perhaps best known for its down-to-earth hostess Julia Child with her dry wit and practical approach to "fancy" French cooking. Eighteen classic programs, in black and white and color, feature the ever-practical Julia Child educating viewers in everything from starters and side dishes like braised spinach, shirred eggs, and hollandaise sauce, to main courses like seafood crêpes and braised goose, to breads and desserts like croissants and the exotic gâteau in a cage. Julia Child leads viewers step-by-step through each recipe, imploring budding chefs to use their fingers and hands, let go of their fear of failure, avoid a sense of panic and maintain a sense of humor so that neither the cook nor the soufflé collapses. Helpful tips include advice about preparing dishes ahead of time, how to save a recipe gone awry, and an ever-present sense of humor that includes a waving goose and more than a few chuckles from Julia Child at her own inevitable bloopers. While current recommendations about food safety may necessitate altering some suggestions like defrosting a goose in the sink for 4 hours and modern dietary guidelines might frown upon the use of pork back fat in a terrine or pâté, the majority of these recipes can easily be prepared without alteration today. If you love French food and want to learn how to prepare it yourself, join Julia Child for 18 lessons that are sure to have you cooking up exotic dishes in no time. --Tami Horiuchi

Customer Reviews

The French Chef 1 & 2
I have been waiting for years for these DVDs to appear. Julia Child was an amazing woman who inspired me as a young bride to cook. She was, in addition to being a superb chef, a wonderful teacher. Her techniques and the recipes stand the test of time. My daughter, an excellent cook in her own right, has heard me talk about Julia Child and now she has her own copies of both DVDs. My daughter had watched Julia Child as a guest on television shows but now that she has actually seen the "Master Chef" in action she appreciates why I have been in love with Julia Child for so long. Julia Child goes back to the basics of cooking, showing the techniques that you have to master to become a really good cook.

Not Just Nostalgia -- Useful
This is a culinary time capsule. I was one year old when The French Chef debuted on TV, and yet tonight I made the creamed spinach featured in the series, and not only was it simple, economical, and DELICIOUS (truly, like something I might have had in a restaurant), but it also used just a tiny bit of butter and a tiny amount of cream, and the rest was stuff you'd have on hand (plus the spinach).

This is an EXCELLENT way to be cooking (perfectly Atkins even). I topped it off with two poached eggs, just as Julia suggested, and that was dinner.

So many recipes today require lots of ingredients and you end up using only a portion of what you have to buy (usually only to find the recipe wasn't well written, could have been improved, and wasn't all that worthwhile). This is truly real-world and economical cooking, and even better than that, what you learn cooking one thing (in which you've learned a simple little technique and dish to add to your repertoire) transfers to cooking other things, and before you know it you're a good cook and INSPIRED cook, not having to stick slavishly to someone else's recipe, but just cooking based on experience.

There's excellent kitchen wisdom in this series to go along with the nostalgia, and I'm looking forward to trying more -- tomorrow for lunch, in fact.

It was also fun to hear Julia say things like that you could pick up a French omelette pan for $2.50 or so when the particular episode was made, and to correct herself to say "brown" a dish after saying "gratinee" and thinking (at the time) no Americans would know what she was talking about -- same thing with common cooking terms we know today like "bouquet garni" that Julia's audience was being introduced to for the first time but that today most any cook is going to know. Additionally, Julia makes suggested wine pairings that I'm certain still hold up today.

This series was particularly good for the episodes on vegetables and eggs, as, again, you will have a small repertoire of things to try that are easy, excellent, and use ingredients you're likely to have on hand or can easily and economically pick up.

Enjoy.

The Queen of cusine
Who wouldn't enjoy this down to earth, witty teacher of cooking!
Awesome!