Reading Mastering the Art of French Cooking

[supernova]

I've had this classic on my cookbook shelf for ever and just never read it. I've watched so much Julia over the years, I felt like I had "read" in some way. So, I got it down the other day, wanting something to read over my morning eggs and tea and realizing I'd never plumbed the original.

Here's a few observations:

It is thoroughly enjoyably to read as a book, even without standing in the kitchen, mis-en-place at the ready. These ladies not only know how to cook, but also how to use language. Though it is information I have become familiar with in my cooking life, it's a pleasure to read it again in a way that doesn't dumb anything down and expects that you will understand by the time you follow the instructions.

While there are ink drawing illustrations, this is not a picture book. At no time do the illustrations overwhelm the text. This is something that, as a technical writer, I go back and forth on in relation to cookbooks. Here, the graphics are inline with the text and complement it rather than overwhelm it. I see a lot of cookbooks now with LOTS of very pretty pictures that sure make my mouth water. But in some ways the gorgeous pictures can be overwhelming too. They seem to say "you'll never make that recipe look like this very stylized and produced picture, no matter how hard you try." The ink drawings in MAFC are a guideline from which you can easily imagine your version. This is, to me, the culinary version of painting a house beige when you want to sell it. You want the buyers to be able to imagine their belongings in the space. The authors leave room for you to create these Gallic staples, in other words.

Julia Child is just about as startling in print as she was live on TV. In the forward section, she describes a ladies-who-lunch affair she went to as a young woman. At that time molded gelatin concoctions were all the rage, to wit:

I cannot forget one ladies' lunch back in the 1950s. Our hostess proudly led us to our seats around a nicely appointed table where we each sat down to a pretty china place upon which stood an upright, somewhat phallic-shaped molded aspic holding in suspension diced green grapes, diced marshmallows, and died bananas. Surrounded lavishly but neatly with squirts of whipped cream, this lovingly constructed edifice rested on several leaves of iceberg lettuce far too small to hid anything under.

[Warpy]

1. I loved her use of language, too

and fondly remember reading that book the way sensible people read novels. Just think, if Paul Child hadn't been sent to France, she might have resigned herself to Jello molds for the rest of her life and we might never have left the meatloaf vs. TV dinner standard US diet.

I have to admit I found part of her cookbook daunting, especially the number of recipes that called for demi glace. I had a kitchen that was 8x8 and there's no way a stockpot large enough for all those bones would have fit.

I need to pick up another copy one of these days and reread it.

[supernova]

2. Yes, i love reading cookbooks

always have. Nice to daydream.

I can do stocks, and might attempt a demi glace when the weather turns cold. Nothing like the stove to heat up the house. :-)

The thing that daunts me is the section dealing with lobsters! Eek! I don't mind eating them, but wow, I don't know if I could chop a live one in half. :wow:

[Warpy]

3. They're BUGS

and while they display aversive behavior to noxious stimuli, they lack the brain structures needed to interpret them as pain.

Just put that cleaver on its head and start there. One whack and it's in lobster heaven, especially if you do what I did and bang the top of the cleaver with a hammer.

It's a lot more humane than dying slowly of lobster old age.

[supernova]

4. Oh, how appetizing!

"They're BUGS"

:P

:rofl:

[elleng]

5. Dunno about chopping in half,

but in high school, my mother and I asked my boyfriend to place it in the boiling pot! These days, life is much more simple, eh? GROCER does it!

[beac]

7. In college, I worked in the kitchen of a stereotypical, dictatorial European male chef.

He had no problem screaming blue murder at any and all of his employees for the tiniest of slip-ups.

Amazingly, on the weekly night when lobster was the special, he always took the extra time to fold them over on their shoulders with their claws facing back toward their tails which her curled toward their tummies (imagine a seafood version of "child's pose" in yoga.) He claimed a half hour in this position "put them to sleep" and thus they never felt the cleaver whacking them in half.

I still can't say whether I believed him, but it was oddly comforting to see a man who seemed otherwise devoid of compassion showing so much of it to an entree.

[cbayer]

6. If you have not already, I recommend reading Julie and Julia.

It is delightful in many ways. The movie has just been released, but I find it hard to imagine that it could top the book.

:hi:

[elleng]

8. Now enjoy Out of the Kitchen, Onto the Couch!

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/02/magazine/02cooking-t.html?hpw