Larousse

Jeg forstår ikke så meget fransk som min fransklærer gerne ville have jeg skulle have kunnet og jeg forstår derfor ikke nødvendigvis så meget hvad der står i denne gevaldig tunge etbindsencykopædi, men alene i sin bibliofile værdi er den værd at have. Siderne er smukt opsatte med flotte små farvebilleder. Encorbellement og couronne kan man læse om. Som fra inkunablens tid.

I had this book on the shelf for years, and supposed it to be snooty and French. It is - and terrific stuff, too.
Handling a roadkill just after Christmas I browsed the book for venison recipes and discovered one (see Roebuck) attributed to Christian Dior, of all people. To my slight surprise it read well - it had, I imagine, a sort of New Look simplicity. And it was a triumph.
Now I browse the great tome occasionally, finding all sorts of treasures, including little biographies of show more extraordinary people, mostly French cooks and critics. show less

I don't care if you're never going to use this cookbook. OWN IT. READ IT. NOW.
The recipes are written in a non-accessible form for the beginner, it's like when my mother tells me how to do a recipe (plus some measurements). Here's one example on how to make chocolate cream puffs:

"Prepare some confectioner's custard (pastry cream) and flavour it with melted chocolate. Separately prepare some chocolate fondant icing (frosting) using 200g fondant icing and 50g cocoa blended with 2 tablespoons show more water. Fill some choux buns with chocolate custard and coat with the fondant icing. Leave to set."

That's it. That's the whole recipe. Of course, things referred to here such as the pastry cream and choux buns do have a recipe mentioned in the book. It's pretty minimalistic. show less

A surprisingly complete tool for translating, or for conducting business in Spanish. While I have a number of denser and wordier dictionaries that should ostensibly be more 'authoritative', I -- and other translators I know -- have more confidence that this one will deliver up the apt term when needed. It also has an appendix on business correspondence, various equivalency tables and a list to clarify political-geography designations in Spanish.