The Joy of Japanese Cooking

Rating:
Summary: easy to read!
Review: I found this cookbook to be easy to read, with plenty of photographs and easily understood. This is not a hardcover book, but I kept it since it has so much valuable information about a cooking forum that I haven't seen much in the midwest. I'm loving trying the new recipes! They are as good as in any Metro Detroit Japanese quality restaurant - even better. I consider myself lucky to have so many markets available to me!

Rating:
Summary: non plus ultra
Review: I live in Japan. My wife is Japanese (but I do most of the cooking at home.) Our son-in-law is a well-known "ita-mae" - Japanese chef at a famous resort hotel. So, I am somewhat familiar with Japanese cuisine... and I get immeasurable pleasure surprising all of my family with delicious dishes prepared under the tutelage of Takahashi-sensei. Her recipes are easy to follow, produce delicious results, and are authentic. The family is still talking about the seafood casserole (nabe) I made for New Year's festivities using this book. My personal favorites are the simmered pork and daikon, the kinpira, the pickled lotus root, ...where do I stop? It's all good. No, it's delicious!

I have several English-language Japanese cookbooks - all quite good, but this is my favorite. It is quite simply "hors concours," the non plus ultra. The only thing you need to supplement this gem is a copy of Richard Hosking's "A Dictionary of Japanese Food, Ingredients and Culture" - and you really don't need it. Takahashi-sensei's glossary and explanations are enough.

If you love or are simply interested in Japanese cuisine and want the very best cookbook available to produce it at home, do whatever necessary - short of physical violence - to get your hands on a copy of Takahashi-sensei's "The Joy of Japanese Cooking." Then, enjoy... and enjoy... and enjoy!

Rating:
Summary: easy to read!
Review: I live in Japan. My wife is Japanese (but I do most of the cooking at home.) Our son-in-law is a well-known "ita-mae" - Japanese chef at a famous resort hotel. So, I am somewhat familiar with Japanese cuisine... and I get immeasurable pleasure surprising all of my family with delicious dishes prepared under the tutelage of Takahashi-sensei. Her recipes are easy to follow, produce delicious results, and are authentic. The family is still talking about the seafood casserole (nabe) I made for New Year's festivities using this book. My personal favorites are the simmered pork and daikon, the kinpira, the pickled lotus root, ...where do I stop? It's all good. No, it's delicious!

I have several English-language Japanese cookbooks - all quite good, but this is my favorite. It is quite simply "hors concours," the non plus ultra. The only thing you need to supplement this gem is a copy of Richard Hosking's "A Dictionary of Japanese Food, Ingredients and Culture" - and you really don't need it. Takahashi-sensei's glossary and explanations are enough.

If you love or are simply interested in Japanese cuisine and want the very best cookbook available to produce it at home, do whatever necessary - short of physical violence - to get your hands on a copy of Takahashi-sensei's "The Joy of Japanese Cooking." Then, enjoy... and enjoy... and enjoy!

Rating:
Summary: The Joy of a Great Cookbook!
Review: This is a wonderful concise Japanese cookbook by an artistic chef, Kuwako Takahashi. It has many color pictures of beautiful presentations, clearly written recipes, and a great variety of classic and and some contemporary dishes.

Having "eaten my way around" at some restaurants in Japan and at many US Japanese restaurants, it's a double pleasure to see presentations I recognize as "classics", and to have the author describe clearly, often with clearly labelled drawings, just how to cut and arrange the component items from vegetables to fish and different types of sushi, and have you proud to serve them in a well presented dish or platter!

Not sure how to serve Japanese dishes...not a problem! The author show how to make tea, serve sake, and even shows the traditional order of courses as suggestions. Nearly all of the ingredients can be obtained at a typical local Asian grocery, with the remaining ones obtainable over the internet.The inari zushi covers or "bags" even come in cans, so that shortcut takes care of a few steps, if one is so inclined.

There are over 17 simple salad dressings, 8 simple ways to prepare tasty attractive rice dishes, and beautiful photos of sukiyaki to sushi, so you know how the item should look. She even has some pages on decorative food cutting. It's petty clear which are simple recipes, and which are more complex by the list of ingredients, so work your way up, from many simple and elegant recipes, to more complex if you desire.

There's a glossary of Japanese ingredients, and their substitutes, when appropriate.

The only "fault" I found is that the classic "shabu-shabu" was not in the index as such, I had to find it under "casseroles", as nabemono (a quick stew) is translated into that in English, and udon noodles are under "noodles"...fair enough!

I have the hardbound 311 page, 1994 4th printing of the 1986 copyright, and this book is preferable over many of the more recent books with it's ease of making simple tasty meals, and overall helpfulness, with pictures and suggestions to make the meals look like artistic gourmet meals, epecially if you have little prior food artistry experience.