Product Description

Modeled on Strunk and White's The Elements of Style, The Element of Cooking is an opinionated reference work destined to stand alongside the shelf among the great works of the kitchen: On Food and Cooking by Harold McGee, Escoffier, The Joy of Cooking and the CIA's The Professsional Chef. Unlike those monoliths of the kitchen, this book is slim, clear and very to the point: here are the things you need to know how to do, here are the words you need to speak the langauage of food, and, most importanly, here are the ways you need to think about an approach food, the absolute essentials that every, not only good but great, cook knows.

Just as Strunk and White sits on the desk of every student and professional who has to write a sentence, The Elements of Cooking is destined to be the go-to book for any amatuer or professional cook. It defines terms, offers the basic ratios of important preparations (sauces, cakes, etc.) so that you will never need a recipe again and provides countless, simple chef's "secrets" that every home cook should know.

In eight introductory essays, Ruhlman has pared down the essentials of great cooking: understanding how to salt food; making stock; making sauces; using heat properly; working with eggs; having the right tools (there are only 5 essentials); what to read and use as a resource; and lastly, and most importantly, the use of finesse, that extra attention to detail that turns food glorious.

Simply written, this is a book that can be read in an afternoon and it's lessons be practiced for a lifetime.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #23725 in Books
• Published on: 2007-11-06
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 256 pages

Amazon.com
Amazon Best of the Month November 2007: Inspired by the Strunk and White classic, Michael Ruhlman's The Elements of Cooking will quickly prove to be an essential culinary reference for both seasoned cooks and novices who might not know gravlax from gremolata. After a thorough "Notes on Cooking," Ruhlman, a prolific cookbook author and popular blogger, settles in for an opinionated and informative A-Z roundup (from Acid to Zester) of cooking terms, lessons, and techniques reduced to their essential essence. Even with only one recipe (for veal stock), it's a must-have for every kitchen library--a book that will help you re-think your approach to food. --Brad Thomas Parsons

From Publishers Weekly
Ruhlman's slim 12th book, inspired by Strunk and White's classic The Elements of Style, would more accurately have been titled Selected Elements of French Cooking. Organized in dictionary format, the book offers short definitions of culinary terms most likely to be encountered in a Continental restaurant kitchen: à la ficelle, jus lie, lardo, mise en place, oblique cut, oignon pique, rondeau, roulade. Entries for ladle, rolling pin and other common implements seem almost superfluous, while international items such as wok, tandoor, udon and cardamom are nowhere to be found (though to be fair, nam pla, kimchi and umami are included). An opening eight-page section announces, with finger wagging, that veal stock is the essential and discourses on eggs, salt and kitchen tools. Ruhlman (The Soul of a Chef) is an elegant writer and the entries he does include can be useful and sometimes entertaining. The real problem is the idiosyncratic, highly personal approach: you just don't know what you'll find in this book and what you won't. (Nov.)
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Review
"The last few decades have seen an explosion of interest in cooking as well as a serious breakdown in the language of the kitchen. The result: chaos. In The Elements of Cooking, Michael Ruhlman seeks to clear the babble and put us all on an even playing field. His explanations of terms and especially techniques are concise, clear, even diplomatic. Best of all they make sense." -- Alton Brown, host of the award-winning Food Network show Good Eats

More than a culinary dictionary, The Elements of Cooking is the essential codebook for young cooks and culinary students who want to learn the secret language of the kitchen." -- Paul Kahan, chef, Blackbird

The combination of content and size makes The Elements of Cooking simply the best reference book and educational tool available for anyone interested in the basics of the culinary arts." -- Eric Ripert, chef, Le Bernardin, and coauthor of A Return to Cooking

"A useful, well-thought-out, clear, and precise collection of cooking terms, The Elements of Cooking is essential for cook apprentices and necessary and enjoyable for seasoned chefs." -- Jacques P - pin, author of Chez Jacques: Traditions and Rituals of a Cook

"Michael Ruhlman plainly intends for The Elements of Cooking to be a staple of the amateur home cook's bookshelf, wedged somewhere in between The Joy of Cooking and Marcella Hazan. It has earned its spot."

-- Jesse Wegman, The New York Observer

Customer Reviews

Elements
From stocks, sauces, salt, ghee to Nage- a court like bouillon or anromatic liquid. This book has all the facts and terms that you will come upon when looking at recipes. I learn about food sources I never knew about before picking up this book as well as some old ones that gave me new insights to my meal I prepare. Good for anyone who cooks.

worth a look, but for me ultimately unfulfilling
This book is a great idea, and in many respects lives up to what it aims to achieve. It teaches an understanding of cooking rather than a parrot-recipe-imitate approach to food, but unfortunately, one thing you quickly learn is that other books are better at the 'how and why' approach to cooking such as On Food and Cooking: The Science and Lore of the Kitchen.

This book presents an attitude that I endorse, but doesn't provide the knowledge or the understanding to change cooking practices. There is not much that I am able to do better having read the book. Perhaps I may change cooking stock in a pressure cooker, but while the book details the preparation of veal stock it doesn't really detail the disadvantages of other methods. Unlike Strunk and White's The Elements of Style , this book does not have a left-hand column(common mistake) and right-hand column(correct way). Neither does it have a section on the "principles of composition", which would be very useful. The second and main part of this book is a useful glossary of cooking terms, but not a "how and why" on common cooking scenarios.

This is no Strunk and White, and while it is opinionated the author relies heavily on the knowledge and authority of others to communicate his ideas. There is much of "so and so does this" instead of a "because of this, do this to get that", which I would have preferred. There is name dropping and an assumption that some jargon terms are understood.

The book guides the reader in the right direction, but leaves him with little substance.

While I give it three stars now, this book may stay with me for some time as a reference, and I am glad that I now know what books to buy next.

An excellent primer
This is a good primer about the fundamentals (elements) of cooking. It is French biased, definitely. But the essays about the use of salt, heat and stock are invaluable. This is an excellent purchase for more than casual cooks to read through, then keep handy for reference.