Do you cook? I assume, since you are reading this blog, that you have a deep interest in food. You probably do cook and, additionally, you may want to cook more often and craft better meals.
Whether you are a “more and better person” or one of those New York types who uses their oven to store shoes — it’s true, Suzen has had them here at Cooking by the Book — this book — Kevin Dundon’s Back to Basics: Your Essential Step-by-Step Cookbook — is a most enjoyable and, yes, essential tome.
I love this book and, when this review is finished, the book is not going to be buried away on some remote shelf in our library. No, this is a book I intend to use, and you’ll see posts from it throughout December. It’s a serious book, but a carefully presented one, too. There is loads of information here and lovely, sophisticated recipes. Yet, the book is written and richly photographed in a gracious way that invites you to try the recipes from cover to cover.
Kevin Dundon is an accomplished Irish chef, now with his own hotel and cooking school. He has a half dozen cookbooks in his portfolio and many television appearances. With his background as chef, writer, and hands-on teacher, Kevin is perfectly poised to both educate and entertain you. This book will do just that.
Kevin’s philosophy is that if you know the basic techniques, for say cooking meat, then you really can undertake a truly luscious recipe. So, this cookbook — which I believe is ideal for beginners — does not have a meatloaf recipe. Not a one. You get an introduction to cooking meat and then a sumptuous recipe for Roast Beef with Yorkshire Puddings, Roast Potatoes and Gravy.
You find well-crafted invitations to prepare:
- Chicken Ballotines with Smoked Cheese Gnocchi in Herb Butter
- Navarin of Lamb
- Salmon en Papillote with Homemade Red Pepper Jelly and Summer Vegetables
- Chicken Risotto
- Sticky Toffee Puddings
- Chocolate and Pistachio Fudge
There’s a decided French influence to many of the recipes. A ballotine is a poached parcel or package of meat like a flattened chicken breast, stuffed with a juicy filling such as cheese, first poached, then fried for a final crisping. That’s a fairly sophisticated dish, yet the writing and step-by-step pictures here will let you create it in your home with ease.
This recipe is the perfect example of why I find this book to be so usefully brilliant: just because you are a humble novice, excellent food can readily be mastered. By you. Now. Really, right now.
I look forward to cooking from this book, learning from it, and enjoying every bite.
And, if your oven now does hold shoes, it is time to visit the Container Store, retrofit your closet and buy some chicken breasts on the way home.