Customer Reviews

Building a Meal: From Molecular Gastronomy to Culinary Constructivism (Arts and Traditions of the Table: Perspectives on Culinary History)

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

 

 

Being a scientist who loves to cook, I have a deep respect for molecular gastronomy's deconstruction (or reconstruction) of cooking in terms of the simple chemistry and physics of the food. I have read most of the (now numerous) Herve This books in English (and left a number of positive Amazon reviews for them). This book is a rambling mess. Sure, there are some good observations in the book, but much of the raw material appears elsewhere. If you have read a fair amount of molecular gastronomy and are curious about the contents of this book, check it out (briefly) from the library. For everyone else, just skip it.

I recommend the following instead: Kitchen Mysteries: Revealing the Science of Cooking (Arts and Traditions of the Table: Perspectives on Culinary History), Molecular Gastronomy: Exploring the Science of Flavor (Arts and Traditions of the Table: Perspectives on Culinary History), or Cooking: The Quintessential Art (California Studies in Food and Culture), all by Herve This. Or another take on molecular gastronomy, On Food and Cooking: The Science and Lore of the Kitchen. I also appreciate The Science of Cooking and The Science of Good Food: The Ultimate Reference on How Cooking Works. Any of these books would serve you better in my opinion.

I find the science behind why certain techniques produce better results to be fascinating. I found little of that in this book. Instead, I found a rambling series of unrelated stories about the author's personal achievements and excerpts from his interviews. Interspersed between the short tidbits related to acutal cooking, there were numerous black and white photos of food. Yes, black and white! Why bother? With 120 pages, 20 or so covered by mediocre photos, and another 30 or so interview excerpts, one is left with 70 wide spaced pages of actual content, none of which is particularly interesting. I'm tempted to suggest the need for a better editor, but I think a good editor would remove everything herein....

I agree that Herve is a brilliant man, but, for most of the book he was rambling on about his accomplishments. Talk about the food and techniques and stop referencing your accolades. Some good informations roughly 90% garbage.

The translation from French to English may be terrible, but that is surely no excuse for the unorganized rambling mess that is presented. Unreadable.

The quintessential art is much more fun but Building a Meal is Herve's most direct book. Not intended for only the level seven chefs and scientists this book can be enjoyed by anyone interested in the food scene.It is also nice to see his works making it into English in time to still be relevant. As he points out most of his work from 5-10 years ago is already passe.

While this book has an occasional interesting moment or two, it's mostly navel-gazing by This, interspersed with a few dull anecdotes, some self-promotion and the occasional interesting tidbit on food. Save your time and money, look at Harold McGee's On Food or any of the hundreds of other books on molecular gastronomy.

Life isn't perfect (could have been), but please pack it right, coz if this item was new at the beginning, wasn't so much when it gets here, anyway i don't read the cover so it's not so bad.

Bought this as a gift for my BIL who is an exec sous chef at a highly esteemed restaurant in Manhattan. I never personally read or looked at it, but if he was interested and wanted it it is sure to be an excellent read and resource.