No one can create recipes like a trained chef. To evaluate and write chef cookbook reviews, we try to ascertain whether a cookbook offers recipes that can be successfully reproduced at home. Lacking a staff, lacking access to the most exotic ingredients, chef cookbooks need to show us that they understand home cooking to win a great review from us. They must also be written with total clarity, so the home cook can follow techniques that chefs have mastered so completely that they don't even think about them.
Most chef cookbooks are glorious to look at, and are great coffee table books. We try to specify this in our reviews when we think a book is not as workable as it should be, but will be a conversation piece on the coffee table. Many of the books are also from the restaurants that chefs have made famous, and we like to reproduce a memorable meal at home. We also attempt to reflect this in our chef cookbook reviews. Many chefs specialize in a particular cuisine. For example, Mario Batali or Lydia Bastianich deal specifically with Italian cuisine. You will find their cookbook reviews in the list of international works. Please look through both lists to find more chefs cookbooks.
As always, we hope you enjoy reading our cookbook reviews.
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