Rating: Summary: I loved the book! Review: I read it while I was attending a Culinary Arts Certificate program at Boston University. It was insightful, and gave me a real appreciation for what chefs look for and their passion for food as well as cooking. As well as showing the human side of chefs he also tells of how it is for those married to or living with a chef. I highly reccommend this book to anyone who is considering a career in the Culinary Arts.
Rating: Summary: I want to try the restaurant where Adam Shepard is cooking! Review: I met some great cooks in reading this book. I particularly thought that Adam is likely to be a great restauranteur. This book has really reinvigorated my interest in cooking. I got into Julia's Mastering books after finishing college but have mostly done survival eating for the last few years. That will change.
Rating: Summary: A perfect description of how a Culinary School works. Review: I read this book after I attended a Culinary school (Western Culinary Institute in Portland OR) myself. As I read the book it reminded me of things I went thru myself. This book is highly reccommended to anyone thinking of attending a culinary school and wondering what it is like. This book also gives you some recipes you can try out at home too. A great addition to anyones culinary library. Highly reccommended.
Rating: Summary: Excellent narration of what it is to be a begining student. Review: Your son decides to become a chef. Where should he attend? Read the books, visit the schools and then decide. My son chose the CIA and we read the book. Now a student second month, each time the phone rings with a new tale of life at the CIA , I remember the story. How true it is. I was so pleased when he received a 10 on his consume. Thank you for such a truthful tale, a greatful CIA mom. PS everyone in the family parents, grandparents and aunt have read the book.
Rating: Summary: Next best thing to looking over his shoulder! Review: If anybody was ever curious what it'd be like to go through the CIA program, this book gives you the grueling details! I only wished I could get a whiff of the onion soup...! Not to take away from Mr. Ruhlman, but if anyone is still hungry for more along this vein, I'd also recommend "Becoming a Chef" by Dornenburg/Page which details some of America's top chefs, their training, the business side of culinary operations and includes some really nice recipes.
Rating: Summary: A wonderful, realistic view of life in culinary school. Review: After deciding to take an "informal" culinary skills class at a nearby professional school one of my fellow students let me borrow this book. I didn't want to put it down! It's enlightening, especially for anyone contemplating a career change into this arena. I'm sure many readers were motivated to "go for it" but for myself it was a realistic sanity check on just what the task at hand truly is. This is a great book, well worth reading if you're into this area. I hope I get a similar shot one day!
Rating: Summary: Wonderful Book! Review: I really enjoyed this book. I couldn't put it down, it was so interesting! I will never look at a restaurant meal in the same way again....now, if I could only chop an onion so it's somewhere between chunks and an amorphous glop!
Rating: Summary: ruhlman's book a delight for both laymen and pro Review: I admit I was a bit skeptical about this book--I'm not a professional chef or even much of an amateur--but I soon found myself absorbed in the story and forgot my early misgivings. Ruhlman has a knack for making even the most mundane aspect of kitchen maintenance fascinating: from the preparation of one's "mise-en-place" to the proper chopping of onions, and his description of making the unpoetic "brown sauce" is sheer magic. The book has changed the way I look at cooking, whether it be the work of a pro or (alas) my own. Ruhlman's true genius, however, lies in his evocation of character: the chefs at the Culinary Institute emerge as a congery of believable weirdos with but one thing absolutely in common--a passion, bordering on mania, for what they do. Why else would one tolerate the vicissitudes of unemployment, the infernal heat of the kitchen, the cretinous insolence of lower employees, the relative anonymity wherein one must slave, if not for! a certain tetchiness of temperament--shared by all true artists, perhaps--which makes such a life a necessity? Ruhlman does an unsurpassable job of bringing this ethos to life, and a very interesting ethos it is. Highly recommended.
Rating: Summary: Needs Salt !!! Review: When I first read the review of this book I had just purchased The New Pro.Chef and I have had dreams of attending the Culinary Institute. So my sights were set a little high. They fell like one of my souffles. I feel the author did a good job describing some of the staff and made them a seem as pompus as I have heard they are. The book did'nt present the flavor of the Externship very well. Also, Not much sense of campus life (the author lived off campus). Sometimes it's hard to follow. I wish I could recommend another book, but I've never read one similar. So it maybe worth a shot. But not for $20.
Rating: Summary: This book literally changed my life Review: My boyfriend and I fought over who got to read this book first. (I won, but caught him sneaking peeks while I wasn't reading!)After reading this book, I dreamed of being able to quit my job and go to the CIA, knowing full well that it was close to impossible. I happened to be prowling around a few days later on the California Culinary Academy's web site, and noticed that they offered -their- chef's programs on the weekends. Well, now I'm enrolled in Skills I this July. ...And it's all Michael Ruhlman's fault. :)
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