Customer Reviews

Alan Wong's New Wave Luau: Recipes from Honolulu's Award-Winning Chef

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

There are very few cookbooks worth paying full price for -- this one is worth double the full price! Alan Wong has been WOW-ing local residents and visitors to Hawaii for years and now with this book he will "WOW" you! Chef Wong is of Japanese-Chinese-Hawaiian ancestry and uses this to build on his classical french training (under Andre Soltner at Lutece). His recipes produce foods that "explode" and excite the palate, oft-times blending complex flavors and other times producing multi-waves of flavors. This is food the way it is meant to be and taste! And for those not familiar with Chef Wong's accomplishments, he began his career at Kapiolani Community College in Honolulu, (where he later returned to instruct) did his apprenticeship at the prestigious Greenbrier Resort (West Virginia), worked at Lutece in New York, then returned to the Big Island of Hawaii where he was a former Chef of the five diamond Mauna Lani Bay Resort on the Big Island of Hawaii. Alan is now owner of his own restaurant, Alan Wong's Restaurant, where he showcases local talent and pays tribute to his heritage. Aloha & Mahalo Chef on a much awaited and fabulous cookbook. I miss cooking with you and eating your food !!

Sometimes there are cookbooks that you can taste and then there are the ones that prefer a more clinical approach to cooking . Alan Wong's New Wave Luau is a very good exposition of Pacific Rim Cuisine. This book along with Sam Choy and Roy Yamaguchi give the cook/reader a flavorful and expansive overview of what is the cuisine of the islands and the Pacific Rim. The recipes explore Hawaii's culinary influences and then creates a few influences of his own.
The book is not for beginners. For those who are interested in learning more about contemporary cuisine this is a great read. The ingredients can now be found in most international markets, and if not then with a little research you can find just about everything through an online retailer.
The recipes do work if you follow the directions. There is much to learn from New Wave Luau and all you have to do is read, study the photos, learn about how the flavors interact and then cook your way through them. It's a lot of fun.
I have had the book for several years now and still return to it every now and then for a few inspirations and guides when researching new foods that I am interested in. This is a book for the serious cook. And then, once you get past the hard stuff it is all fun and adventure, really. Hawaiian cuisine is a marvel of color, flavor and aroma. Of course seafood is king in any book of island recipes, and it should be. Alan Wong's New Wave Luau just jumps off of the page inviting the reader into the grocery store and the kitchen, and sometimes into the fishing boat.
What is New Wave Luau? Well, go to page 86 and cook the Steamed Opakapaka and Gingered Vegetables in Truffle Broth, and there you have it. Bringing Japan, Thailand, Hawaii and France together in one recipe without disturbing the wonderful quality and design of the food itself.

The cookbooks of the three great Hawaiian writer/chefs are excellent examples that we must live to eat, not eat to live.
I recommend this book to anyone interested in understanding what makes the foods of the 21st century so in love with life and flavor. What is more important to food than advancing ideas of unity to the table so that others may learn to do the same? Alan Wong's New Wave Luau along with the writings of Sam Choy and Roy Yamaguichi do just that.

Alan Wong does a great service to all of the culinary professionals out there such as myself by nearly creating a cuisine. His interpretations of hawaiian regional cuisine meld flavors together like no other....each recipe is described for the layperson and the pictures of the final products make one's mouth water. BUY-THIS-BOOK!

Good selection of Hawaiian food. Some ingredients hard to find outside of Hawaiian/Asian areas.

i love this book, very inspirational. i recommend this book if you would like to add an asian flair to your cuisine. i dont recommend it if you plan on gathering the ingredients from a grocery store like safeway or fred meyer. it will get very expensive! to a certain extent, you probably wont even be able to find the ingredients like poi(taro). Best if you have a china town near you. he uses many local ingredients, so you will have to draw the chef out of yourself and adjust with your local ingredients. this book is not made for the easy way out home cook. it will take time to pull off these recipes. i recommend using this book as a guide not to replicate unless youre an experience chef or the experience home cook that can find most of these ingredients at a cheap local asian store. based off this book, i would buy all of his collections if he had written more.

This beautiful book is loaded with exciting recipes that will make you famous at your next dinner party.

The best recipe book I've ever bought. You'll be more than satisfied with this creation. If only everyone could cook like Alan Wong. Here's your chance!

ALL RECIPES VERY HARD TO MAKE. TOO MANY STEPS & EXOTIC INGRIDIENTS.

Beautiful pictures, but the dishes were nearly impossible to replicate and some were overly arranged. Food as art. Some of the ingredients are unavailable or overly expensive. But the pictures in the book are fabulous!

I actually purchased this book. The recipes are not practical if you do not live in Hawaii. Unless you are a chef, the directions are difficult to execute. He lists no alternative ingredients for mainlanders like myself.

If you want a picture book to stick on your coffee table, this might work. Otherwise I would rather pass. I will be selling this book on Amazon shortly.

I received this book as a gift. I found that it was not very practical. Ingredients I could not get. Instructions were too difficult. I'd recommend getting a different Hawaiian cook book.