Customer Reviews

Practical Japanese Cooking: Easy and Elegant

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

 

 

P. J. C. expands the novice Japanese cooks horizons from "sushi only" to a more complete Japanese cuisine experience. The recipes are clear and ingredients listed are by and large available. While this is certainly not a Japanese cooking "bible" it certainly serves as an excellent jumping off point for those new to Japanese cooking.

Looking for authentic recipes? Yes, this is the right one and covers a wide range of Japanese cuisine like appretizers, soup, sashimi, yakitori, tempura, tofu, sushi, noodles, pot dishes, and even box meal. All recipes come with detailed and easy-to-follow instructions, large & beautiful photo pictures, and some delightful illustrations for showing the preparation steps. In addition, it covers some tips on using various ingredients like bonito stock, mirin, miso paste, wasabi, and ginger, etc. Very practical. Yet, if you're more interested in cooking methods, secrets, and techniques, you should go for one of the author's book by Shizuo Tsuji, "Japanese Cooking: A Simple Art", which is also the well-known bible in Japanese cooking.

(Reviewed by Otto Yuen, 19-Jan-2006)

Tsuji's Japanese Cooking: A Simple Art is both monumental and seminal. This one, taken from his notes and finished by an assistant after his death, is just average. The first book doesn't have many pictures, though, and this one is full of them.

If you really like pictures, pick it up, but the pictures are the best part of the book. The recipes suffer by comparison. There are other cookbooks that teach the same things and do it better.

I bought it on the strength of his name, and have been vaguely disappointed ever since, though I do page through it for serving ideas because a lot of the pictures are gorgeous.

(Full disclosure: I've semiprofessionally taught Japanese cooking classes.)

"Practical Japanese Cooking" is a sequel of sorts to Shizuo Tsuji's phenomenal cooking bible Japanese Cooking: A Simple Art. Assembled from his notes by an assistant after Tsuji's death, unlike "Japanese Cooking: A Simple Art" this is mainly a recipe book, packed with beautiful photos and all in Tsuji's authentic style. The recipes are in several categories, like "Appetizers," "Fish," "Soup," "Beef and Pork," "Tofu," "Rice" and "Noodles," There are fourteen categories in all, and each category has between three to twenty recipes.

I loved this book, although I feel the name is somewhat misleading. Far from being "Easy and Elegant" most of the recipes in here are very complex, requiring considerable preparation and a variety of techniques. These are the kind of Japanese dishes that look so simple on the plate, but that simplicity is backed by hours of manipulation of ingredients and subtle infusions of flavor. Most of the dishes are small-plate style, like one would find in an upscale Japanese restaurant featuring several servings of a variety of dishes rather than a "main course."

These are authentic recipes, which means that the ingredients are probably not going to be available at your local supermarket. If you don't have mirin, dashi and a few varieties of soy sauce and miso already in your pantry you might want to consider doing some shopping before picking up this book. Many recipes call for "ginger juice," which was a first for me, but Tsuji doesn't leave you stranded and has a short recipe on how to juice ginger. I definitely recommend that you you pick up a few basic Japanese cook books, like Tsuji's first triumph or Japanese Kitchen Knives: Essential Techniques and Recipes before you try these recipes.

If recipes like "Sake-Simmered Lobster" and "Deep Fried and Simmered Acorn Squash" get your mouth drooling, and you don't mind cooking that requires a lot of prep work, than "Practical Japanese Cooking" is going to be a treasure trove for you. Many of the recipe titles are so deceptively simple, like "Sauteed Duck Breast with Sauce," and look so plain on the plate, you will almost feel compelled to explain how much work went into the dish when you are serving it!

On a personal note, "Practical Japanese Cooking" gave me one of my greatest kitchen triumphs. My wife, who is Japanese, was convinced that no American could properly prepare on of her favorite dishes "Simmered Mackerel in Miso" (again, don't be deceived by the simple name of the dish) and challenged me to make it. I have cooked professionally in an izakaya in Japan, but never was faced with those kind of multiple-technique preparation dishes. After working through the recipe a few times, I have proved her wrong and she is still amazed that I can create something that tastes so authentically Japanese. Thanks Shizuo Tsuji!

My wife enjoyed this book. She has collected and used various cookbooks, especially Japanese, over the years. It was a welcome edition.

This book is one of the gens in my collection. The range of dishes it covers is extensive and well laid out and the photography is terrific. I wouldn't say that the actual recipes are particularly better than one can find in other books but I love flipping through this book looking for inspiration and there are plenty of dishes I still look forward to experimenting with in my own kitchen. I should add that this book is probably not for novice cooks looking to learn the basics of Japanese cooking. Many dishes in the book require a fair amount of skill to execute. Beginners may have a frustrating time trying to make their attempts end up looking anywhere like the beautiful photographs that accompany each recipe. I have what I hope are intermediate skills in the kitchen but I have yet to attempt the 'Karei Kara-age' featured on pages 30-31 and I will be very surprised if I manage to pull it off successfully the first time I try.