Ratio: The Simple Codes Behind the Craft of Everyday Cooking: Volume 1 (Ruhlman's Ratios) - Softcover

Ruhlman, Michael

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1416571728 ISBN 13: 9781416571728

Publisher: Scribner, 2010

Synopsis

As the culinary world fills up with overly complicated recipes and never-ending ingredient lists, Michael Ruhlman blasts through the surplus of information and delivers an innovative and straightforward book that cuts to the core of cooking.

Instead of spending time wading through the millions of recipes available in books, magazines, and on the Internet, just remember 1-2-3. That's the ratio for cookie dough: 1 part sugar, 2 parts fat, and 3 parts flour. Biscuit dough is 3:2:1 or 3 parts flour, 2 parts liquid, 1 part fat. Change the ratio and bread dough becomes pasta dough, cake becomes muffins, and popovers become crepes. Vinaigrette is 3 parts oil to 1 part vinegar, and is one of the most useful sauces imaginable, giving everything from grilled meat to lettuces intense flavor. Distilling dishes to their essence-using a few simple techniques and even fewer ingredients-is what every professional or home cook needs to know. Broken down into thirty-three ratios and suggestions for enticing variations, preparing food goes from craft to art...all without a recipe.

Providing one of the greatest kitchen lessons there is, Ratio gives readers a starting point from which a thousand variations begin-making cooking easier and more satisfying than ever.

About this title

Review

"Cooking, like so many creative endeavors, is defined by relationships. For instance, knowing exactly how much flour to put into a loaf of bread isn't nearly as useful as understanding the relationship between the flour and the water, or fat, or salt . That relationship is defined by a 'ratio, ' and having a ratio in hand is like having a secret decoder ring that frees you from the tyranny of recipes. Professional cooks and bakers guard ratios passionately so it wouldn't surprise me a bit if Michael Ruhlman is forced into hiding like a modern-day Prometheus, who in handing us mortals a power better suited to the gods, has changed the balance of kitchen power forever. I for one am grateful. I suspect you will be too." -- Alton Brown, author of "I'm Just Here for the Food"

About the Author

Michael Ruhlman is the author of twelve books, including the bestselling The Making of a Chef and The French Laundry Cookbook. He lives in Cleveland with his wife, daughter, and son and is a frequent contributor to The New York Times and Gourmet as well as his highly popular blog at Ruhlman.com.

Edition details

• Publisher: Scribner
• Publication date: 2010
• ISBN 10: 1416571728
• ISBN 13: 9781416571728
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 270