Simple Cuisine: The cookbook that redefined healthful four-star cooking - Softcover

Vongerichten, Jean-Georges

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0028609913 ISBN 13: 9780028609911

Publisher: Macmillan, 1998

Synopsis

The Groundbreaking First Cookbook by America's Preeminent Four-Star Chef First published in 1990, Simple Cuisine has been declared a classic by such publications as The New York Times and Eating Well magazine. With simple, quick cooking techniques—steaming, sautéing, and stirfrying—and flavorful, low-fat sauces, Jean-Georges Vongerichten proves that robust restaurant tastes can easily be recreated by home cooks. More than 200 recipes, ranging from Sea Scallops with Garlic and Saffron Oil to Lamb with Artichokes and Olives, will delight with their robust flavors and simple preparations. More than 20 thirty-minute menus are collected here for when you need to quickly put together a dinner party. And when it's time to indulge, Jean-Georges serves up delectable sorbets, ice creams, and sweets. What's more, Simple Cuisine proves that fine dining at home doesn't need to take all day to prepare. Here, the complex sauces of classic French cuisine have been replaced with basic building blocks—vinaigrettes, flavored oils, extracted vegetable juices, and simmered vegetable broths—with the ultimate goal of enabling the home cook to prepare elegant food that is light and effortless. Haute cuisine does not need to be enjoyed only in a restaurant. With Simple Cuisine, Jean-Georges Vongerichten has proven that the exquisite flavors of four-star cooking can be enjoyed at home, without spending hours in the kitchen. Visit us online at www.mgr.com/cooking

About this title

Review:

Groundbreaking when it was first published in 1990, Jean-Georges Vongerichten's Simple Cuisine has since become a classic. Its author, chef-owner of Manhattan's Vong and the four-star Jean-Georges, pioneered the use of vinaigrettes, juices, flavored oils, and broths to produce light but deeply flavorful dishes with a minimum of fuss. The 1998 paperback version presents 200 recipes for these simple but sophisticated treats. They are based on the building blocks listed above, plus phyllo dough, cunningly employed as a puff-pastry alternative. Vongerichten fans and those seeking easy dishes with an haute cuisine pedigree will be delighted.

Beginning with recipes for Vongerichten's stockless basics, the book then explores simple sautés and steamed dishes, Asian specialties, cheese and potato dishes, sweets, and American fare such as burgers, all of which are given the Vongerichten touch (meaning that we end up with interesting combinations like lamb burgers with cilantro and goat cheese). Recipes such as Sea Scallops with Garlic and Saffron Oil, Salmon in Rice Paper with Citrus Vinaigrette, and Cheese Galette with Pecans are easier to prepare than their names might suggest. Desserts like Almond Milk Ice Cream, Hot Cherries with Honey Kirsch, and Bitter Cocoa Sorbet are followed by a chapter of 30-minute menus and a handy cross-reference of the building blocks to the dishes that contain them. As useful as it proclaims itself to be, the book works for all who want to cook the Vongerichten way--but at home and with minimum of effort. --Arthur Boehm

About the Author:

Jean-Georges Vongerichten, a native of Alsace, studied under such culinary masters as Paul Bocuse, Paul Haeberlin, and Louis Outhier. He further honed his cooking skills in Bangkok, Singapore, and London before becoming an acclaimed chef at Restaurant Lafayette in New York City. He owns restaurants in London and New York, including Jean-Georges, awarded four stars by The New York Times.

About this edition

• Publisher: Macmillan
• Publication date: 1998
• ISBN 10: 0028609913
• ISBN 13: 9780028609911
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 228