James Beard (1)Recensioni

One of oldest cookbooks - now a collection of pages tied with string. I have prob. made the banana bread over 100 times.

I'm always astonished by what this book turns out to have in it that is nowhere else: sweet and sour sturgeon, raw apple cake (the best use ever for slightly aged apples in the fruit bowl), on and on. Plus all the great stories.

I opened this book and scanned the TOC and said, "What? No grouse?"

Well it turns out that the original book, published in 1944 as "Fowl and Game Cookery", included grouse, along with "squirrel, possum, raccoon, skunk and other four-footed game". Grouse and game were dropped for the 1979 edition because they were no longer available to the average person.

So here we come to the problem of reissuing older cookbooks. Do you copy the original book or update it? I bought a book not too long ago that was about a famous food writer post-WW2. The recipes had been updated by a young woman chef whose mother was only a twinkle when the recipes were written. The update was ridiculous and totally unneeded. Anyone who does not know that people cooked differently back then is woefully uninformed.

Here the revisions are not so heavy handed. Beard himself made the first changes in 1979, dropping the mammals and increasing the number of chicken and turkey recipes. The grouse flew away then.

This Open Road edition seems to be from 1999 and I am not sure that it, of all the editions, is the one I would have chosen. In 1999 few people had access to the wealth of hand-reared birds we have today. I am also put off by the 1999 editor's note that butter and cream had been reduced. Phooey on that. I think the 1999 edition was chosen because it has an intro by Julia Child. Younger readers who might not know of James Beard will be attracted by the mention of Julia Child. (It is a bit of a scam that the same intro used in the other books in the 1999 series.) I would rather read about the skunk.

This is not a modern cookbook. It is not chatty. It is not full of recipes from exotic places. It is not bloated with big pictures. Recipes, ma'am, just recipes. Recipes for excellent food in the style of a bygone era of American cooking.

I received a review copy of "Beard on Birds" by James Beard (Open Road Integrated Media) through NetGalley.com. The original book was published in 1944 and has been revised and reissued in 1979, 1989, 1999, and 2001.½

I have been using this, off and on, since the early 1980's, and it entirely deserves its status as a classic.

Best bread recipes around (outside of the ones I learned as a child). Best recipe for cream puffs. Then there's the delightful and simple "Pears poached in red wine" (delicious). Many of the recipes in this book are just simple food, cooked simply.½

There are some unique and elegant menus in here, but there are a greater number of so-so and unappealing menus as well. Some of the menus call for ingredients that are not seasonally compatible. Or, in a menu featuring a variety of fish-on-toast slathered in what is basically a lightened mayonnaise, he suggests shrimp dipped in aoili as a first course. A lot of the menus are like this. Not very well rounded. This is an old cookbook, 1962 or thereabouts. And it is an old American cookbook, so the treatment of vegetables wavers between careless and outright neglectful.

That said, most of the individual recipes--especially the fish recipes--are worth the trip to the library. But this isn't a really necessary edition to your cookbook collection.

A deceptively small paperback hides within over 100 menus for wildly various occasions. The greatest fun. Breakfasts alone include : Four Light Breakfasts, Four Hearty Breakfasts, Mint Julep Breakfast, Champagne Breakfast, White Wine Breakfast, Vodka or Zubrokwka Breakfast, Sherry Breakfast, White Wine and Cassis Breakfast, Bloody Mary Breakfast, Sunday Noon Breakfast, Elegantly Simple Breakfast, Piquant Breakfast, Italian Breakfast and a Special Omelet Breakfast. You get the picture. Couldn't fail to offer inspiration and ideas galore.

Marinated Raw Beef, p. 343, ok. Great if you don't have a heat source.

Bizzare piece of ephemera. 105 1 ply white paper towels, 9x11", American Cookery recipes in blue. Box illustration adapted from the Little Brown & company design of Elna Rapp, illustrations of Mary Purcell.

A good book, and a classic. It is a bit dated and not as detailed as a bread book needs to be since the author cannot be in the kitchen with you. I suggest "Crust and Crumb" for learning to bake...then bring those techniques with you to these recipes.

8th prtg. 1st pub 1941

Possibly published 1943-1954. 12 issues 50-54. Different illustrators, Rudie Hampel, Jim Hirz, Ben Blank. Written for National Premium Pilsener in Baltimore.

1st ed.

Another great Beard book, wonderful explanations of traditional cooking styles with recipes for each.

I never meant to read this, I was just looking for ideas for dinner. In the end, thouigh, I read pretty much the whole thing. Some of the recipes seemed likely, many would require far more time and attention than I'm willing to devote to cooking. I'm quite certain, for instance, that I'll never make my own pasta from scratch, but Spinach-Anchovy Sauce or Pasta Primavera are easily within my means. Beard writes in a friendly, down to earth way that makes the reading enjoyable.½

Part of Scott's Beard collection... he says to give it 5 stars.

A fabulous little baking book, with some great recipes.

I love to bake breads, but I cannot make edible biscuits, with the notable exception of the "cream biscuits" in this cookbook. Delicious.

One would think that a reference book over 30 years old would have lost its usefullness. But I still refer back to this for kitchen tool information, and have found nothing as useful that is more recent. And I owe it a lot for several tools I use constantly, but first learned about here.

Classic style. Every bread cookbook author cites homage to James Beard and this book.

This is a great book with a lot of practical information and some very clever, quirky recipes. All of the recipes tend to run way on the dry side for the dry desert West. I recommend that you weigh the flour in 4.25 oz cups and boost the liquid just a mite. If you want to improvise your own recipes, though, turn instead to the King Arthur 200th annivesary book.

A general overview of standard, American home cooking and as such extremely disappointing. The scope is short, no subject seems adequately covered and there is little general culinary advice. This book sits on my shelf gathering dust while The Joy of Cooking gets used.

A very cheap edition of a good book. The writing is pleasant enough to read for pleasure; the paper it's printed on is not much better than newsprint.

book needs repair; old world - 1950s ish

100. 1st ed. See 'Seasonings' entry for a tile made especially for Simon & Schuster. There are at least two other tiles out there, But I sold them before finding LT.