David Chang (1) (1977–)

I love to cook, and I am a reasonably good home cook, possibly better than that. I rarely use recipes, though if I am cooking something traditional or belonging to a cuisine with which I am unfamiliar I often cook it from the recipe the first time or two, and then start riffing. I do sometimes read cookbooks to get ideas of what things go together and I use that as a foundation -- I recently started working on my iteration of chicken adobo, but Filipino flavors are new to me so I read about a dozen recipes and had a lengthy chat with one of the cooks at a favorite Filipino restaurant and started cooking and success was mine. This cookbook is written for home cooks like me. There are no real recipes, everything can be switched out for other things you happen to have in your fridge and pantry, and food science is explained so the cook can use that to make substitutions. There are lots of knobs of butter and glugs of oil and "when you touch it it will do this when ready" kinds of instructions. I got some good ideas especially for soups and stews, and completely changed my dal recipe for the better. Chang also convinced me to use more traditionally Asian flavoring agents in Western food. I have been deploying fish sauce a lot more in the week since I finished this, and he is right, a dash changed my puttanesca for the better and really amped up and deepened the flavor of my braising liquid for poultry.

All this said, a lot of his methods are not to my taste at all -- so much boiling -- and every recipe has rice and/or noodles, which are not every day foods for me. I get that his tradition is Korean and much of his training is Japanese, and this is his comfort food, it just doesn't work for me personally. (I like David Chang, but in all truth I do not love Momofuku or Ssam -- both are fine, but I can get iterations of their signature dishes I like better at many other restaurants with more comfortable seating.) Still, full of great ideas for the home cook without weird ingredients, or tons of ingredients, and with no difficult techniques. Very worthwhile for cooks who understand basic techniques and who have a basic idea of how flavor works.… (altro)

I was visiting a little bookstore in a neighboring town, trying to decide on a book to buy when I saw this. The hosts of Book Riot Podcast have mentioned this SO MANY TIMES that I thought it was probably time to read it.

I probably should have skipped it. Look, the main problem is, I had no idea who Chang was when I started this, and had never heard of his restaurants. I got the feeling I was supposed to be super impressed by him, and I just wasn't. In fact, the lasting impression I had of this book after finishing it was that I wished Chang had taken better ownership of his anger issues.

I've already given my copy away to someone who does know who he is, so hopefully they may enjoy it better.… (altro)

I loved the honesty in this book and appreciate the author putting himself out there. Mental illness is a tough thing and I whole heartedly agree that this is something that needs to be talked about more openly. He has some very good analogies regarding how it should be viewed and handled. I think the book hopped around a little more than I would have liked so it was hard to look forward to reading the next chapter. I also think I was hoping he would go into a little bit more detail about the food but that may be something he touched in in his other books.… (altro)