Wayne Gisslen

The recipes in this book are the ones that make the seasoned guys say, "It's very culinary school." For example, the Corn Chowder is probably known by anyone who has taken any culinary arts class in college. These overdone classics are still useful to know and even if it has long hit the status of being a 'broken record', it has set the stage for tens of thousands of professionals for many years.

Being more specific, this particular edition needs to be taken with a grain of salt, especially show more in regards to food safety. Additionally, the international dishes leave much to be desired and have observed that they seem to perpetuate white-washed versions of some dishes without consistently addressing nuances or guiding one where a more native-informed version could be found. To ti's credit, it doesn't claim to be anthing authentic, but to students who have no prior exposure, I feel their tendency is to think the versions found in textbooks are to be definitive or somehow representative to that cuisine, even if techniques or flavor profiles aren't remotely close.

Overall, the book promotes good technique (some things could have been thought out more, like the sandwich spread technique, lol), but overall, I still think it's an important book to have for any culinary student. I don't think I'd recommend it to an aspiring professional taking the work-to-learn approach. show less

An insanely useful book and educational tool. Of all the professional cookery books I have this is the one that gets used, read and reread. Yes, Gisslen makes the occasional pact with the Devil, but the results are absolutely, scientifically foolproof.

Great explanations of techniques, but there is no way in hell I'm going to use emulsified shortening.

Gisselen's book starts out with explaining the difference between home cooking and restaurant cooking and then showing how home cooks can be more efficient in their methods and more confident in their preparations by incorporating the skills of the professional chef. The second chapter deals with basic cooking methods but could have been more exhaustive. The following nine chapters present basic suggestions for preparing different types of food: soups and sauces, fish and seafood, salads, show more pastas,and other first courses, beef, lamb, pork, and veal, etc. In those chapters are also recipes serving either 4 or 16 people (with both English and metric measurements) so you can prepare for either a family or a party setting. In the few days that I have owned this book I have found it of great value.

Of particular value are the appendices. Appendix 1 contains basic recipes such as basic white, brown, and fish stocks; béchamel, velouté, tomato, brown, Hollandaise, and Béarnaise sauces, etc. The second appendix gives units of measurements. Included is a good breakdown of metric measurements and an approximate weight-volume equivalent measurements of various foods. show less