Cooking Know-How: Be a Better Cook With Hundreds of Easy Techniques, Step-by-Step Photos, and Ideas forover 500 Great Meals

by Bruce Weinstein, Mark Scarbrough, Lucy Schaeffer (Photographer)

Welcome to a whole new kind of cookbook."Knowing how to cook has challenged lots of men. Women, too. What most people learn is a specific how to make this pasta sauce, or that loaf of bread. What about learning how to cook in general? And not just the 'how' but the 'how come?' That requires a technique book."What you'll find in this book is an alphabetical list of sixty-five recipe-driven, technique-centered explications that build out into hundreds of dishes."Armed with the knowledge of the simple mechanics of a dish, the five or so steps it takes to make it, you can walk into the market, find what's fresh (or on special), bring it home, and have dinner on the table without any worries, any overly romantic pretensions, or any cookbooks piled on the fresh every time--and your way, too."--from the Introduction"The recipes are structured without being fussy and the majority are relatively easy. This is a welcome rarity, imparting a useful, innovative framework as well as the confidence to depart from it."--"Publishers Weekly"

Genres: Cookbooks, Cooking, Nonfiction, Reference

406 pages, Hardcover

First published March 30, 2009

About the author

Bruce Weinstein and Mark Scarbrough are QVC favorites with five sell-out appearances. They've appeared on everything from the Today show to corporate-sponsored events, making ice cream, gelati, sherberts, and sorbets. They're also experts on the desserts that pair with these frozen treats, having written bestselling brownie and cookie books and all-purpose cookbooks with desserts aplenty and countless features for Fine Cooking, Eating Well, and The Washington Post. Their cooking podcast, Cooking with Bruce and Mark, is available on iTunes. They've written numerous cookbooks, including A la Mode and The Turbo Blender Dessert Revolution (11/1/16). They live in Connecticut.

Reviews

[Jean MacLeod · Rating 5 out of 5]

Lots of variations on a theme, which provides plenty of options. Would be an excellent book to add to one's library.

[Lynn · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book has 64 master recipes. Each master recipe has detailed step-by-step instructions with pictures. The beef stew recipe is nine pages long with 5 pictures. There are 8 variations listed for each master recipe. All the recipes are flexible, and the authors give many options for the ingredients. They tell you when it is OK to substitute, and when you need to stick to a particular ingredient. I find that it is easy to customize these recipes to what is in my pantry.

What makes this book special are the very detailed explanations about the how and why of every ingredient and every technique. For example, when a recipe called for heavy cream, I never knew if I could substitute whipping cream, which is what my local market sells. This book answered that question and many others. The recipe on pot roast tells you exactly what cuts of meat work best and why. The book tells you what to say to the butcher to get the cut you need.

When I cook with this book, I feel like I am enrolled in a cooking school. My favorite cook book before this was Julia Child's "The Way to Cook". Julia' book is similar with master recipes and variations, but "Cooking Know-How" has superior presentation and organization. The descriptions of techniques are also more detailed and the use of pictures is very helpful. There are recipes that I felt that I has mastered from Julia's book, but using the "Cooking Know-How" versions I have learned even more.

To say my family is happy I bought this book is an understatement.

[J. · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the best cookbooks I have, it explains the steps of a recipe and then gives a chart showing several different adaptations for that recipe. There are great photographs and clear definitions. Everything is defined and techniques are clearly explained. I love that if it calls for a spice mix, there is a recipe for that spice mix. I make everything from scratch and despise recipes that list as ingredients things like "box of cake mix" or "jar of sauce". Nothing of that sort here. Thisisa boom that teaches people how to cook without a cookbook using what they have available and according to their particular tastes. One great thing is how I can quickly look at a chart and see if I can adapt a recipe to make it safe for my son who has serious allergies to dairy and nuts. There are also plenty of vegetarian and vegan recipes and ones that can be adapted to be vegan or vegetarian. There is a quite a lot of direction on how to cook different types of meat dishes, so I don't think I would purchase it for someone who never eats meat. But my family eats meat only once or twice a week and there are plenty of recipes of all kinds. I could probably plan our menu for a year and never repeat the same thing twice using this cookbook.

[Danielle · Rating 4 out of 5]

Cook books, why not? I love them, and often read them from cover to cover.

A 5-star might come in time for this one time, once I have used it for a while. I really like how this book takes a style of dish that uses some specific techniques, break it down, step by step, with illustrations when necessary. Then, after they have given a dish such as "Chicken and Rice," they then have charted out other variations on the dish that makes each dish more versatile, and helps you create your own style were you can easily expand and improvise.

[Lucy · Rating 5 out of 5]

my first cookbook!

[Sue · Rating 4 out of 5]

Yum Yum.