Secrets of the Great French Restaurants

by Louisette Bertholle

Book Overview

No Synopsis Available.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0025104500
• ISBN13: 9780025104501
• Release Date: January 1974
• Publisher: MacMillan Publishing Company
• Length: 708 Pages
• Weight: 2.55 lbs.

Customer Reviews

French Restaurant Food

In many ways, this is a rather remarkable collection of proven recipes from some of the best restaurants in France, although I have reservations about the some of the procedures. This cookbook has an interesting genesis. It is a collection of recipes from starred restaurants in the Guide Michelin. The copyright is 1972, so the recipes are best of breed haute cuisine restaurant food from the 1950's and 1960's in France. The procedures in the recipes are those of the manuscript authors, not the originating restaurant chefs themselves, so the original recipes per se have been lost and re-written. Items such as cream, butter, truffles, and foie gras are used with reckless abandon. I was in seventh heaven when I saw many recipes for potatoes that used butter and cream in artery-clogging quantities. The ice cream chapter uses frozen creme anglaise or flavored whipped cream as a base, not an ice cream maker. More importantly, this is not an educational text; there is no explanatory or descriptive text. The procedures are brief and schematic only. My main concern is that many recipes tell you to cook a piece of protein, then keep it warm while you prepare the sauce; problem is that many of these sauces take half an hour or more to make; there is no way your piece of protein will still be edible after being kept warm for such a long period of time. If you are a foodservice professional looking for some good dishes to add to your menu or a home cook who knows his way around the French kitchen, this book is for you. There are some recipes I think an ordinary home cook can do as is, but you have to be knowledgeable to know which is which. Major problem: the TOC is practically useless, and the index has an unusual style, making it difficult to find a specific recipe; resign yourself to spending some time flipping through many recipes to find the one you want. However, there are many recipes that are very interesting and worth trying. The few that I have done really were not that difficult to do, yet produced really great food. There are many more such recipes that I wish to try. I am, on the whole, impressed with this cookbook. This is more akin to an encyclopedia that will provide you with years of exploration and discovery.