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- An Unsuitable Book for P D James
- SHADES OF GRAY
- "What's there to be afraid of? After all, we're only dealing with men."
- Dalgliesh Echoes beyond His Reach
- Cordelia is Worthy of the Challenge
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An Unsuitable Job for a Woman
P.D. James
Manufacturer: Scribner
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The Skull Beneath the Skin
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Innocent Blood
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Shroud for a Nightingale
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The Black Tower
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Death of an Expert Witness (Adam Dalgliesh Mysteries)
ASIN: 0743222040 |
Book Description
Handsome Cambridge dropout Mark Callender died hanging by the neck with a faint trace of lipstick on his mouth. When the official verdict is suicide, his wealthy father hires fledgling private investigator Cordelia Gray to find out what led him to self-destruction. What she discovers instead is a twisting trail of secrets and sins, and the strong scent of murder.
An Unsuitable Job for a Woman introduces P. D. James's courageous but vulnerable young detective, Cordelia Gray, in a "top-rated puzzle of peril that holds you all the way" (The New York Times).
Customer Reviews:
An Unsuitable Book for P D James.......2007-07-28
James who is most famous for her books of Inspector Dalgleish, takes time to create a female PI in 1970s London. This book which was written in 1972 and later revised by James an set in 1977, should have been set in 1937. By the time this book was written, Agatha Christie had written ten Miss Marple books and the Avenger's Mrs. Peel had been a spy for eight years. Cordelia Gray's character is so much out of the thirties, and the 'young' people she meets seem to be part of the 'lost generation' from between the wars.
James' late 1970s London, seems never to have heard of the 1960s or The Beatles or Carnaby Street, etc. I'm not english, but, as an example, how many young people in 1977 went 'punting' on the Thames around Cambridge. You would think that it was something for 'old' people to do. And the french woman, Isabel, is something out of the 1920s, with her rich Papa back home lending her money and the occasional Renoir (as small one!) to hang in her rooms.
The story itself is interesting, a sort of locked room suicide that turns out to be a homicide. She even gets in a few digs at Dalgleish (she had written five of his novels by then) and what a 'fuss pot' he was for details. But the book just hasn't aged well like Christie, and seems to be done by a 'hack'. Too bad.
SHADES OF GRAY.......2006-08-08
Despite its rather mundane and unalluring title and the name of her lead character, Cordelia Gray, PD James has concocted a fairly riveting tale of murder, deception and betrayal.
She introduces us to Cordelia Gray, a 23 year old private detective who inherits her own agency when her older partner commits suicide due to untreatable cancer. Her first solo case comes in the form of investigating the suicide death of a young man. His father, a noted scientist, wants Cordelia to find out why he killed himself.
James' mainstay Adam Dalgleish is a ghost in most of the book but he does come in for the final section. Of course, Cordelia's digging leads her to believe the suicide is really a murder, and finds her own life in danger.
James' prose is highly atmospheric and she fills the book with interesting, if somewhat unlikeable, characters (Are Brits really as self-centered and pompous as they appear in these mysteries?).
AN UNSUITABLE JOB FOR A WOMAN is a well written mystery and again demonstrates the popularity of Ms. James.
"What's there to be afraid of? After all, we're only dealing with men.".......2006-08-06
Written in 1972 and winner of the Best Novel Award by the Mystery Writers of America in 1973, this clever mystery by P. D. James features a female detective who is no Miss Marple. Cordelia Gray, is a contemporary detective, liberated and independent. An attractive young woman in her early twenties, she has inherited a detective agency from her partner Bernie Pryde, and she intends to keep it running, make it profitable, and create a career for herself. Polite and at ease in elegant circumstances, Cordelia is also willing to take chances and do all the dirty work--and carry a gun.
On her first case following the death of Bernie Pryde, Cordelia is hired by famed environmentalist Sir Ronald Callender of Garforth House, to find out why his son Mark has hanged himself. Sir Ronald has had little interest in or affection for his son during his lifetime but now seems determined to understand the reasons for his son's shocking suicide. Cordelia soon learns that just prior to his death, Mark dropped out of college and found work as a gardener, severing relations with his father from whom he declared he would accept no money or support. Further investigation leads Cordelia to believe that Mark was murdered.
The characters, though "thin" and somewhat stereotypical, are quirky and memorable enough to keep the reader interested in their behavior--Mark's friends, who know more than they are willing to reveal; Sir Ronald's household, including Elizabeth Leaming, his secretary, formerly a student of literature; Miss Markland, the sad single mother who once lived in the cottage where Mark's body was found; and Christopher Lunn, assistant to Sir Ronald at the scientific foundation where they both work. Soon an attempt is made on Cordelia's life, and three more deaths occur before Mark's murderer and motive are revealed.
James is a master at keeping the reader guessing till the very end, creating numerous plot twists which change the reader's perceptions and expectations at every turn. The tension remains high throughout, and the conclusion, in which Cordelia has to make a report to Adam Dalgiesh, Bernie Pryde's mentor (and the main character of James's best-known series), allows James to connect Cornelia's story with that series and, perhaps, give it additional credibility. Cordelia Gray is an engaging detective conveying just the right balance of ingenuousness and fierce determination, traits that continue her appeal in James's The Skull Beneath the Skin. One of James's best novels, "Unsuitable Job" will keep even jaded mystery readers on the edge of their chairs. n Mary Whipple
Dalgliesh Echoes beyond His Reach.......2006-05-03
Baroness James deserves great credit for coming up with this most unusual and interesting novel. Her detective, private investigator Cordelia Grey, is a landmark in the history of female detective fiction. The clever way that Ms. James connects this unlikely operative to the mighty Adam Dalgliesh adds great insight into both characters. The story itself is full of the unexpected . . . while maintaining touch with the ordinary. The combination is enough to keep you misdirected and fascinated until the very end.
I recently decided to reread the book to see if it still ranks up there as one of my favorite detective novels . . . and came away even more impressed than ever.
Cordelia Gray is a young woman learning her investigatory trade when her partner, Bernie Pryde, cuts his life short. Bernie has set up matters to give her as good a chance as possible to prosper in sole detection, including leaving her an unregistered gun. But will she have any clients?
It's a relief when a prospective client shows up looking for Bernie and takes Cordelia back for an interview with the famous father of Mark Callender, who recently killed himself. What father wouldn't want to know why? Cordelia in short order finds herself off on a five pounds a day assignment.
As she tracks backwards through the last days of Mark Callender, Cordelia finds that she likes him and wants to do right by his memory. Using the lessons that Bernie taught her, that he, in turn, learned from Dalgliesh, Cordelia soon has her suspicions about the suicide. Before long, she's being threatened as well.
What's it all about?
Bring a big imagination, grab a very comfy chair, turn on a good reading light and settle down for a treat!
Cordelia is Worthy of the Challenge.......2005-10-11
As an ardent fan of P.D. James and her prolific detective Adam Dalgliesh, I was a little hesitant to stray from that series into the first one devoted to Cordelia Gray. Yet "An Unsuitable Job for a Woman" is a richly rewarding read, with the classic elements that mark James' writing and a mystery as twisted as anything that Dalgliesh would find himself up against (and the fact that he makes an appearance later in the book is a boon). James went out on a limb crafting a new detective, a young female one at that, but succeeds in establishing Cordelia Gray in easy company with her more reknowned detective.
"An Unsuitable Job for a Woman" introduces readers to Cordelia Gray, a twenty-two year old private investigator who has just inherited the entire investigation buisness from her partner after his suicide. She finds herself at odds with how to make ends meet, when a case is thrown her way that was originally intended for her partner. Cordelia makes her way to Cambridge, at the request of the famous scientist Ronald Callender. He is at a loss to explain the suicide of his young son and hires Cordelia to find out why his son killed himself. As soon as Cordelia starts searching and asking questions regarding the young heir's death, she finds herself convinced that the case is one of murder, not suicide, and that her own life may be at risk.
Cordelia Gray has her work cut out for her. Secrets abound everywhere, and she must make her way in a 'man's world' to uncover the truth behind the mystery. The writing is surprisingly fast-paced for a novel that is introducting a new character, but James throws in the necessary information about her new sleuth as the novel progresses. It is told in natural flashbacks through Cordelia's thoughts on the case at hand. I look forward to reading the other Cordelia Gray mystery and am sure I will find myself wishing there were more.
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An Unsuitable Job for a Woman (BBC Radio Collection)
P.D. James
Manufacturer: BBC Audiobooks
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Audio CD
James, P.D.
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ASIN: 0563529326 |
Average customer rating:
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An Unsuitable Job for a Woman
Manufacturer: Charles Scribner's Sons, Ny
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000EGPQWM |
Average customer rating:
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An Unsuitable Job for a Woman
P.D. James
Manufacturer: Faber and Faber
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
James, P.D.
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ASIN: 0571203892 |
Product Description
4 PD James Mysteries - 1) The Murder Room (An Adam Dalgliesh Mystery) - 2) An Unsuitable Job for a Woman - 3) Shroud for a Nightingale (An Adam Dalgliesh Mystery) - 4) The Children of Men, in either Hard or Softcover, (See Seller Condition Comments), Shipped in one
package to save on shipping costs.
Product Description
Set 2 Cordelia Gray Titles : An Unsuitable Job For a Woman The Skull Beneath the Skin. Two mmpb books.
Customer Reviews:
Woman, witch, or goddess.......2003-01-05
Fabulous book! Compelling characters and plot. Heartily recommend this book if you like sci-fi, fantasy, romance or historical fiction.
Surprising Rewarding.......2002-08-21
Despite the horrible cover, "Thrice Bound" is a highly rewarding novel. Roberta Gellis creates a richly textured world in her reinterpretation of Greek Mythology.
Hekate, Mother / Maiden / Crow, has to flee from her powerfully evil father. Before he drains her of her power and completely binds her to his will, like he did her mother. She flees to the Caves of the Dead, where her father's power is null, and there meets Kabeiros, a shape shifter who has been cursed to be in the shape of a dog when outside the Caves.
Together, Hekate who bound herself to Dionysis when he was an infant, bound herself to an oath of destroying her father, and bound herself to finding a way to cure Kabeiros leave the caves in search of knowledge.
"Thrice Bound" is a great read if you like your plot lines complex and are interested in Greek mythology. The only major problem that I had with the book was that Chapter 23 and Chapter 24 speak of the first `homecoming' of Dionysis to Olympis twice and in conflicting matters. Something was not edited correctly. Other than that, the book was great.
Terrific read for fantasy lovers.......2002-04-22
The thing about Roberta Gellis's fantasy featuring Hecate and the dog/man she is bound to save is that realistic settings, true emotions,natural conversations, pull the reader into a totally fantasic adventure. Into this mix come the mythological characters you maybe learned about in school, but with the difference that these characters are alive and doing the most interesting things. Hecate is some girl. A great read.
Loved it!.......2001-11-13
Roberta Gellis' Thrice Bound was a wonderful book. I love myth so I enjoyed the story. If you are the type of person who likes to take flights of fancy then you will enjoy this book. If you want realism and facts then don't read it. I love how Ms. Gellis worked in the legends assoicated with Hecate and and traits assoiated with the other gods and twined them into her story. Very interesting story. 5 stars!
Boring, boring, boring..........2001-09-06
Boring, boring, boring...and silly. What more can I say?
Average customer rating:
- Super Reader
- Simple, Gory, yet entertaining
- Hardly literary genius, but a solid comic style sci-fi
- The unquiet are nauseated readers
- Durham Red strikes again
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Durham Red #1: The Unquiet Grave
Peter Evans
Manufacturer: Black Flame
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Mass Market Paperback
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Durham Red 3: The Encoded Heart (Durham Red)
ASIN: 1844161595 |
Book Description
The Vampire Durham Red and her crew explore Morrowghast, a war grave planet where survivors have formed a brutal religion with churches made from skulls, etc. Its disciples despise Red with a passion and gear up to tear her limb from limb
Customer Reviews:
Super Reader.......2007-08-07
Red decides she needs a break way from it all for a while. However, the immense length of time she spends in suspended animation wasn't really what she had in mind.
Upon awakening it seems she has been canonised for her role with the Strontium Dogs and mutants, and a lot of carnage has been carried out in her name.
She also has to deal with the pretty horrific problem of a planet-sized brain sucker, or Mindfeeder if you want to be more polite, as well as a high up rat in the ranks.
Simple, Gory, yet entertaining.......2006-12-22
Not much thought went into the science part of this fictional story, but the quick pace and akward social encounters kept my interest throughout the book. I was a great brake from reading longer and more in-depth novels and I will be looking for more from Durham Red.
Hardly literary genius, but a solid comic style sci-fi.......2005-02-19
Quite what the first reviewer was expecting I don't know, but for what it is, the Unquiet Grave is quite a good book. Unfortunately for him, that makes it an adaptation from a comic book (2000 AD) based on comic book tradition and form, in which the main character runs around engaging in spectacular violence and generally entertaining escapades. Not literature, not as good as the original comic (The Vermin Stars has much to recommend it), but an enjoyable read.
As a side note, fans of Warhammer 40,000 may find themselves with a sense of déjà vu throughout as far as the setting and the human Iconoclasts are concerned, but this is hardly surprising considering either the publisher or the writer for the comic is is based upon (Dan Abnett).
The unquiet are nauseated readers.......2004-12-20
This garbage was supposed to be science fiction. If your knowledge of genetics lets you believe a "mutation" could cause human offspring to become a superstrong vampire, with no defects, in one generation, this may be the book for you -- I couldn't hack it. The setting was like a jungle filled with tigers -- no other animals. Serious SF does not have battlefleets without civilizations and industry supporting them -- economics have to be considered. If the characters have no constraints as to where they go or what they do, it's a fantasy, not science fiction.
Durham Red strikes again.......2004-10-26
The Unquiet Grave brings back to life the toothy bounty hunter babe from Bad Timing, Durham Red. After years of bounty hunting and endless strife have taken their toll, Durham decides to take a nap for a few years in a cryotube. 1200 years and many wars later she awakes to find everyone and everything she has ever known is gone.
On the good side, in her absence she has been declared a saint! Well it would be good if the humans, who still hate mutants, and her own followers weren't both trying to kill her.
Before she knows it Durham finds herself on the remains of a blasted planet forming alliances with her bitter enemies against an even deadlier foe.
If you like anything from the warhammer realm you will also like Durham Red and the other cast of characters to be found in the explosive new collection from Black Flame Publishing.
Amazon.com
In Glorious French Food, James Peterson argues that once you understand a recipe's "logic and context," and the techniques required to follow it, you actually have something much more valuable than the recipe itself--you have the knowledge to create variations, make simplifications, and cook with spontaneity. Although French cuisine is often accused of being fussy and time-consuming, Peterson's clear instructions demystify many traditionally finicky recipes, and in the process, teach us how to cook anything.
The hundreds of recipes presented here are a pleasure to peruse; kitchen novices can work their way through this hefty volume and come out the other end accomplished cooks. Peterson details necessary equipment, techniques, and ingredients for each recipe so that by the time you start making it, you're fearless. Some of his dishes are remarkably simple, like the beautifully fresh, ready-in-minutes Shaved Fennel Salad, or the richly aromatic French Onion Soup. Others are more complicated, but all teach a lesson: In the Roast Chicken chapter, learn to roast without a thermometer, truss without a needle, make gravy, and then succeed at Roast Chicken Stuffed Under the Skin with Spinach and Ricotta. Learn to make pasta dough, and then re-present leftover Provençal Lamb Stew (if there's any of this heavenly, melt-in-your-mouth tender, orange-scented stew left) as Meat-Filled Ravioli. Perfect for fans of French cuisine, this is also a remarkably handy reference guide for any kitchen. --Leora Y. Bloom
Book Description
From the James Beard award--winning author of Sauces-a new classic on French cuisine for today's cook
His award-winning books have won the praise of The New York Times and Gourmet magazine as well as such culinary luminaries as chefs Daniel Boulud, Jeremiah Tower, and Alice Waters. Now James Peterson brings his tremendous stores of culinary knowledge, energy, and imagination to this fresh and inspiring look at the classic dishes of French cuisine. With a refreshing, broadminded approach that embraces different French cooking styles-from fine dining to bistro-style cooking, from hearty regional fare to nouvelle cuisine-Peterson uses fifty "foundation" French dishes as the springboard to preparing a variety of related dishes. In his inventive hands, the classic Moules à la marinière inspires the delightful Miniature Servings of Mussels with Sea Urchin Sauce and Mussel Soup with Garlic Puree and Saffron, while the timeless Duck à l'orange gives rise to the subtle Salad of Sautéed or Grilled Duck Breasts and Sautéed Duck Breasts with Classic Orange Sauce. Through these recipes, Peterson reveals the underlying principles and connections in French cooking that liberate readers to devise and prepare new dishes on their own. With hundreds recipes and dazzling color photography throughout, Glorious French Food gives everyone who enjoys cooking access to essential French cooking traditions and techniques and helps them give free reign to the intuition and spontaneity that lie in the heart-and stomach-of every good cook. It will take its place on the shelf right next to Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking.
Customer Reviews:
If you can only own one French cookbook, this may be it.......2007-09-29
French cuisine, despite predictions of its demise by food writers admist inroads of other Western cuisines including Italian and Spanish cuisines, is still going strong. Many people will, have heard classic/haute cuisine, nouvelle cuisine, bourgeois/bistro cuisine, and regional cuisine that form the four important strands of French cuisine, and this book has touched on all four of these cuisines.
One important difference between this book and others is it uses 50 dishes as the starting point and teach 4 to 10 more dishes that share either the principal ingredients or are related by techniques. It is, as Peterson himself mentions in the preface, aiming to teach you to how to cook on your own and understanding cooking is not just a mechanical follow-one-recipe process: it is a little like how you learned mathematics in electrical engineering and apply the central methodology into diverse areas like power load flow analysis, calculating a circuit's small signal behaviours, using signal processing in protection relays.
Bear in mind that this book is geared towards big city or middle-sized suburban-area American homes. Duck a l'orange, for instance, is in the American adaptation version. This makes the book a little tricky to be used if you live in Auckland, Sydney, or in London, where the ingredients available will likely be different from what's available in US. For those armchair chefs who want to buy a book that tells how French food is actually prepared in France itself, another book, such as the Konemann publications, will likely be more useful.
By all means this book is not meant to be an exhaustive coverage of France's cookery. , but most books on French cooking tend to cover very small specialized subject areas (Provence's bistros) or are just a thin compendium of recipes (eg 100 recipe in a 200 page cookbook showcased as "Cuisine of France"). If you are interested to build a library of French cookbooks, I recommend the more exhaustive publications of Jacques Pepin, Alain Ducasse's Grand Livre de Cuisine (currently with 2 titles in English, but there are a few more published in the original French), and the ever reliable Larousse Gastronomique, in addition to this book. Otherwise for a tight bookshelf, this book on its own may be what you want for French cooking.
Almost perfect for me. .......2007-01-09
I am a big fan of his books after receiving copies of Sauce and Splendid Soups. He brings a fresh approach to the subject and it is written in a style more suited to my learning. I have always been slighly intimidated with the Classic side of French cooking. I hope by the end of the book I will be better aquainted, better versed and better versed.
Bon Appititte.
Glorious French Food.......2005-10-18
I absolutely love this cookbook. As a culinary student, I wish they had issued this book out instead of my $150 doller culinary workbook. This book is such a wealth of information. "Glorious French Food" is big, but Peterson's writing is so interesting and entertaining that I've taken it to the beach with me many times. I've always felt dishes are tastier when one learns the history behind the creations. As for the recipes, they are excellent. I test them on my boyfriend, who by chance is French and a culinary graduate. He feels the recipes are very accurate and will sometimes admit that some of them are better then his family's dishes. I highly recommond this book, for both fun and serious cooks out there. It's a great gift to give.
A very Novel Cookbook. Buy it to read!!!.......2005-09-07
`Glorious French Food' by leading culinary educator, James Peterson may be a true lost classic, in the cookbook world similar to `The Thirteenth Warrior' in the movies or the novels of Thomas Berger, including `Little Big Man'. I noticed a copy on the bargain stacks a few days ago and immediately felt regret for not having done a review of it to help, in some very small way to raise the reputation of this excellent culinary pedagogical text.
I have a very `love / hate' relationship with James Peterson's books. Peterson has a very well deserved reputation as the author of the classic reference, `Sauces', now in a second edition (rare for cookbooks) and his Jacques Pepin homage, `Essentials of Cooking' (for those of you who need your culinary show and tell in full color). He has also done several excellent texts on special subjects such as Vegetables, Salmon, Duck, and Soups. I have reviewed each and every one of these books favorably, yet my experience when doing specific Peterson recipes (except those in `Sauces') is mixed. I am not entirely surprised at this, as I sometimes find his individual recipe descriptions just a bit mixed up, as if his copy editor was taking a coffee break as they were editing that recipe.
Peterson may in this book offer a great explanation for this paradox. He says that his greatest ambition would be to write a cookbook with no recipes. This is not as easy as it sounds, since I reviewed Pam Anderson's book `How to Cook Without a Book' and I found it wanting in several regards. Peterson also says that his greatest compliment is when a reader says they made one of his recipes, but changed it a bit, and it came out very well. All this means is that Peterson is a relatively unconventional cookbook author who is best approached differently than you may approach `The Joy of Cooking' or `Mastering the Art of French Cooking'.
This book, even for its great size (almost 750 pages) is, like Madeleine Kamman's `The New Making of a Cook', a book meant to be read from front to back in an easy chair with no electronic distractions nearby. The first and most important reason for reading this book like a novel is its novel organization. Instead of chapters on Salads, Soups and Stocks, Meat, Poultry, Starches, Vegetables, and Desserts, there are a very neat 50 chapters on fifty of the most famous dishes from the French culinary canon. As you may guess from the size of the book, there is a lot more here than 50 recipes which, with a typical treatment, may take not much more than 100 pages to dispatch. Rather, most of the chapters are really about a family of dishes.
The very first chapter takes twelve (12) pages to cover `Assorted Vegetable Salads', all falling under the rubric of the French word, `Crudites' which, roughly translated, means raw vegetables. In this chapter are nine (9) dish recipes for Celeriac Remoulade, Grated Carrots, Red Cabbage Salad, Cold Cucumbers, Marinated Mushrooms, Baby Artichokes with Walnuts, Shaved Fennel Salad, Tomato Salad, and Parisian-Style Potato Salad. There are also two `pantry' recipes for Basic Mayonnaise and Crème Fraiche. Like the very liberal Chris Schlesinger (`The Thrill of the Grill', `How to Cook Meat', etc) and unlike the very traditional Madeleine Kamman, Peterson is extremely liberating with his advice. He tells us how to improvise crème fraiche and he tells us all the reasons why some substitutes, such as American sour cream, will just not work as well in some recipes. He does not tell us not to improvise. He also follows the party line on the right potato for the right dish, but he also says that you can probably get away with using any kind of potato for any kind of dish, which fits my experience in using a russet for both mashed potatoes (with a good potato ricer) and potato salad, two recipes for which russets are supposed to be inferior to waxy or `all purpose' varieties.
Part of what makes many great cookbooks such a pleasure to read is the extent to which the author introduces their own informed opinion into the writing. Both `Mastering the Art of French Cooking' and `The New Making of a Cook' would be great cookbooks without the lively opinions of Julia Child and Madeleine Kamman, but they are much better at getting their subject across than a dry presentation of quantities and procedures. If you think this is unimportant, take a quick look at a few recipes in `The Joy of Cooking' and you will see an ample amount of humor in even this encyclopedic collection of recipes.
One thing I especially enjoyed in this book was the affirmation of the doctrine in Ms. Kamman's book that in spite of all the butter, pork fat, goose fat, or olive oil in popular recipes, French cooking is NOT about high fat content. Peterson is especially good on fats in general and butter in particular, as he hits all the right notes about cooking with butter. For one thing, he discounts the common practice so popular with TV culinary personalities of mixing butter and oil to raise the burn point of butter solids. He says it simply does not keep the butter solids from going black. He also clearly differentiates plain clarified butter from the Indian staple, ghee, where the butterfat is taken to a darker brown than is done by simple clarification.
I even found something new on my favorite cookbook subject, omelets. Peterson gives two different techniques and clearly differentiates both the method and the cultural differences in French cooking between the omelet and scrambled eggs.
The bad news is that if this book may be in danger of loosing its market, and it may go out of print. The good news is that you should be able to get a copy from our beloved Amazon.com for cheap.
A Glorious Book!.......2005-06-19
This book has ample recipes for advanced beginners, with most for intermediate experience level home cooks. Yes, some recipes are for advanced cooks, or moderately persistent intermediate cooks! The meals are well worth the preparation.
These recipes are not rocket science; Peterson guides one well through the more unfamiliar techniques as needed. These are generally extremely well written recipes, often with a commentary on a dish's history or general context, and gives many lessons in technique, without "lecturing". Best of all, the few recipes I've tried have been very tasty!
Do read "Read this first", the first 30 pages, before progressing to individual recipes, to get a broad idea of what it to be presented, and needed as backgroundl Curiously, he recommends not to saute or cook at higher heat in a mixture of butter and oil. That's his choice, however I've seen this mixture as the saute norm, rather than an exception, in French kitchens in the USA and in France. He is an American cook, not a Classically trained French master chef.
Some recipe topics include: Various salads, assorted cooked vegetables, pates and terrines, omelettes, souffles, cheese fondues, vichyssoise (not truly French in origin, but actually American), oxtail soup and stews, vegetable and fish soups, mussels, scallops, soles and lobster dishes, with easily 5 dishes within each of the named categories. It goes on with chicken, duck, veal, rabbit, and many beef dishes. Desserts include tarts, mousse, custards, crepes, cakes, and preserves. Almost encyclopedic in coverage, more than enough to keep you busy for years, cooking classic French dishes.
Even if you do not get around to cook one recipe from this book, you will enjoy reading these tantalizing recipes, and with Peterson's writing style, savor the varied selections of French dishes, learning many techniques and "secrets" from a great chef, these techniques carry over into cooking with all sorts of ingredients available at your local grocery store!
Books:
- Beyond Suspicion
- Bone Island Mambo: An Alex Rutledge Mystery (Alex Rutledge Mysteries)
- Bound for Murder (Scrapbooking Mystery Series)
- Breach of Duty: A J.P. Beaumont Mystery
- Cat Fear No Evil (Joe Grey Mysteries)
- Cat on the Scent (Mrs. Murphy Mysteries)
- Catering to Nobody (Goldy, Book 1)
- Charmed to Death (Ophelia & Abby, Book 2)
- Claws and Effect
- Coral Reef
Books Index
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