Customer Reviews

Asian Fusion

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3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

It's not only in the US that ingredients are hard to obtain. Granted all the Asian varieties can be found in Asia but let's be real... where can one find pigeon to cook? From the window sill? The last time I saw morel mushrooms were at Dean and Deluca in NYC's Soho, and ok, maybe this French restaurant in Kuala Lumpur called Frangipani. Not a very practical book for the home kitchen, unless you're trying to impress someone by bending backwards to get the ingredients. It is nonetheless a book of culinary artistry. Beautiful photography with daring concepts. Brugger has an impressive resume, and his creations are quite audacious. He does try (a little too hard I think) and should be commended for just trying, although these days I wonder why people bother with fusion when Asian food is best eaten on it's native plate. I don't think I'd enjoy mixing a feta and olive greek salad and chinese winter melon soup with red dates for starters, indian curry and sushi for main course, and coffee cheesecake topped with red bean paste for dessert without feeling like I want to puke.

This is a coffee table book, with lots of big, full-page color pictures and relatively few recipes. In addition, many of the recipes call for ingredients that are hard to obtain.

I am a very adventurous cook and willing to travel all over town to get ingredients for recipes, but most of the recipes in this book are beyond me. I have never seen some of the ingredients even though I have access to large asian markets. It is possible that you would have better luck with this book in LA or NY. However, you would still have the challenge of carving veggies with an X-Acto knife. For most people this is a coffee table book, full of pretty pictures of exotic curiosities.

We have made a number of the recipes in the bok and have been very pleased with all of the results. While some of the recipes are very difficult, they have all exceeded our expectations which is more than I can say for some of our other cookbooks.