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elfsA long time ago, I was hopeful for the book Cooking for Geeks I'd seen a few of their example recipes on line and the presentation looked amazing. The thing that I failed to recognize at the time was the geeky precision of the recipes: each one was presented in a format that brooked very little modification. The book itself isn't bad, although it does get a bit int nutritionalism, the idea that in order to understand food we have to understand biochemistry. (If you want a truly rank-and-file version of this, look at Cooking for Engineers, which gets truly flow-chart-y about recipes.)
In contrast, Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat begs you to experiment, to play with these ingredients, and more than anything else, learn to enjoy them as the best possible substitutes for the one thing our diet wants you eat more of, even though it's horrible for you, sugar. It's assumed we need sugar, and our generation was duped into believing it was okay to eat it. Nosrat knows this, and she wants you to eat something else instead. Salt, fat, and acid flavors our food; fat, fiber, cream, crumb, grease, and so forth provide textures; everything else is aroma: it isn't your mouth that detects smoke or cinnamon, it's your nose. SFAH knows this, and teaches this, and that's what puts it above almost every other cookbook I've encountered recently. SFAH revels in the pleasure not of successful cooking, but of successfully eating what you enjoyed cooking. The whole process of cooking, from beginning to end, starting with buying the ingredients, should be a sensual experience that leads you someplace.
The biggest secret I've discovered in learning how to cook should have been the most obvious, but then when it comes to discoveries I am often oblivious. Every new skill you learn unlocks new pleasures that can only be shared with those who share the skill. Once you've learned to make changes and appreciate what those changes did to your overall dish, and then your overall meal, you start to feel and hear and taste things differently. Your acquaintances who don't cook will not have the experiences necessary to follow you. The other day I made pancakes but used Diamond-brand instead of Morton salt, and while everyone else insisted they were "fine," I knew there wasn't enough salt in them; Diamond salt crystals are rougher and pack with less density, so a half teaspoon of Diamond salt is significantly less salty than a half teaspoon of Morton's. Never forget to taste everything, even the raw batter.
But it was so much fun to cook. This week I've made pancakes, a meatloaf that was modestly successful (too greasy; I should put it on a draining rack, which the recipe did not recommend), and a pasta sauce that I punched up with a bit of epazote, tiny bit of vegemite, and a splash of whiskey. (I've started using either vegemite or straight up ajinomoto in a lot of my savory sauces, and epazote in soup is amazing if you get it just right.)
So really, if you love to cook, or want to learn how, I recommend two books: Mark Bittman's How To Cook Everything and Samin Norat's Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat. You can't go wrong. And if you do, well, order take out and try again tomorrow.
In contrast, Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat begs you to experiment, to play with these ingredients, and more than anything else, learn to enjoy them as the best possible substitutes for the one thing our diet wants you eat more of, even though it's horrible for you, sugar. It's assumed we need sugar, and our generation was duped into believing it was okay to eat it. Nosrat knows this, and she wants you to eat something else instead. Salt, fat, and acid flavors our food; fat, fiber, cream, crumb, grease, and so forth provide textures; everything else is aroma: it isn't your mouth that detects smoke or cinnamon, it's your nose. SFAH knows this, and teaches this, and that's what puts it above almost every other cookbook I've encountered recently. SFAH revels in the pleasure not of successful cooking, but of successfully eating what you enjoyed cooking. The whole process of cooking, from beginning to end, starting with buying the ingredients, should be a sensual experience that leads you someplace.
The biggest secret I've discovered in learning how to cook should have been the most obvious, but then when it comes to discoveries I am often oblivious. Every new skill you learn unlocks new pleasures that can only be shared with those who share the skill. Once you've learned to make changes and appreciate what those changes did to your overall dish, and then your overall meal, you start to feel and hear and taste things differently. Your acquaintances who don't cook will not have the experiences necessary to follow you. The other day I made pancakes but used Diamond-brand instead of Morton salt, and while everyone else insisted they were "fine," I knew there wasn't enough salt in them; Diamond salt crystals are rougher and pack with less density, so a half teaspoon of Diamond salt is significantly less salty than a half teaspoon of Morton's. Never forget to taste everything, even the raw batter.
But it was so much fun to cook. This week I've made pancakes, a meatloaf that was modestly successful (too greasy; I should put it on a draining rack, which the recipe did not recommend), and a pasta sauce that I punched up with a bit of epazote, tiny bit of vegemite, and a splash of whiskey. (I've started using either vegemite or straight up ajinomoto in a lot of my savory sauces, and epazote in soup is amazing if you get it just right.)
So really, if you love to cook, or want to learn how, I recommend two books: Mark Bittman's How To Cook Everything and Samin Norat's Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat. You can't go wrong. And if you do, well, order take out and try again tomorrow.
