Cookbook Review: How to Cook Everything

June 24, 2009

Now that I’ve been cooking for over a year, I’ve gotten to know some of the cookbooks I’ve been using on a regular basis.  In this post I’d like to do a quasi-review of Mark Bittman’s How to Cook Everything, discussing what I think it does well, where I think it’s lacking, and which audience it serves best.

What It Contains

If the title doesn’t give it away, the book covers everything, from breakfast to dessert, baking, salads, grains, vegetables, ice cream etc.  It has overviews of different foods and ingredients, and frequently illustrations on how to prepare them.

Bittman’s style is to give a basic recipe for an ingredient or technique, then provide variations on it.  It has a large glossary and menus for different meals.

What I’ve Cooked and How Good Was It

I received this book in December 2007 for Christmas, and ever since it has been a book that I turn to frequently.  Here are a few recipes that I’ve made and blogged:

• Tuscan White Beans –  Really good – much better than expected.
• Spiced Up Black Beans – Delicious.  Simple recipe but tastes great.
• Tomato-Onion Salsa -It was decent.  Worked well as a sauce, but not a salsa.
• Simple Creamy Pumpkin Soup – Very good pumpkin soup.
• The Best Calzone I’ve Ever Eaten – Amazing.  Literally the best calzone I’ve ever had.
• Basic Pizza Dough – Great basic recipe for pizza dough.

I’ve also made other dishes from the book that I never wrote about (for example, his roast chicken) and have used it as a reference frequently on different topics (trussing said roast chicken).

On the whole, his recipes have turned out quite good. Bittman’s nickname is the Minimalist, and in many circumstances this holds true as his recipes often have fewer ingredients when I compare them to other cookbooks.

The tomato-onion salsa wasn’t great, and I’ve had a couple duds in his Vegetarian book (some of which are mirrored in this book), so I think sometimes his minimalism can leave a dish lacking.

Still, many of his recipes are outstanding and I often turn to it as a starting point when considering a certain dish.

What I Like

Beyond the calzone, there are three highlights that make this book great: the overviews of ingredients and techniques, the presentation of a basic recipe plus variations, and the minimalism of the ingredients.

At the beginning of chapters or the introduction of new ingredients, Bittman always has a few pages describing the ingredients used, how to buy, store, and prepare them. This is invaluable when cooking with new ingredients.  Additionally, before many recipes he has small paragraphs explaining certain elements of the dish or a technique.  These are great for understanding what you’re doing and why.  Throughout the book there are also illustrations of different preparation techniques (like carving a roast chicken) that can be very helpful when doing something for the first time.

With regards to his style of giving a basic recipe and then variations, I think this is one of the most helpful ways to learn about cooking, ingredients and flavors.  First of all, the basic recipes are great for learning just how to cook something.  For example, when I decided to cook bulgur, I just wanted to know what it took to cook it – I didn’t need a huge list of ingredients for some fancy dish.  I learned more by cooking plain bulgur with some butter rather than following a more complex recipe.  Then, when you read the variations, you can get an idea of how different ingredients and flavors interact (i.e. what spices are added to make the soup Indian flavored).

The minimalism of the ingredients is great in the sense that the dishes are easier and less intimidating to make. If I have to go buy a huge list of ingredients for a weeknight dinner, I’ll probably pass.  His style makes cooking more accessible.

Oh, also, it is great as a reference for many food questions, recipes, and ingredients.  Sorry, that’s four I guess.

What I Don’t Like

Though the illustrations are helpful, sometimes they are too small or not clear enough.

I like his style of a basic recipe with variations for learning, but a huge tome like his book isn’t the best way to learn to cook.  It is easy to miss ingredients, techniques, etc.  Sometimes I think a simpler book, like Andersen’s How to Cook Without a Book can offer a better starting point. I see the book as combining the reference capabilities of something like the Joy of Cooking with accessability for new cooks through minimalist recipes and extensive explanations of ingredients and techniques – the reference-breadth can hurt the accessability, but is still obviously useful.  So it’s a quasi-negative (I’m big into the word “quasi” in this post apparently).

Who Should Buy It?

On the whole, this is a great book. I would highly recommend to people beginning to learn to cook. It is accessible with its ingredient and technique explanations and helps the user learn more with its style of basic recipe + variations.  Also, because it has such breadth, someone learning to cook doesn’t have to buy a bunch of books.  This book is definitely sufficient.

I probably would not recommend it to someone who has been cooking for a long time. The recipes are actually pretty varied for how much I talk about minimalism and accessability, but on the whole it covers the more basic side of cooking.

Does anyone else use the book?  Agree or disagree with my assessment?

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