Customer Reviews

Takashi's Noodles

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

 

 

This wonderful cookbook specializes in Japanese noodles and includes a number of variations for udon, soba, and ramen. It includes detailed descriptions of ingredients and a little bit of background on each style of noodle. Although I haven't made the handmade soba noodles, I have tried the udon recipes and they came out better than most Japanese restaurants. Please do not be put off by the review stating that this is a horrible book because the short ribs are not cooked long enough. The recipe included in this book is for Japanese style beef short ribs which are a half inch thick cut along the bias, as you would see in shabu-shabu or Korean barbeque recipes, and therefore a minute per side is a reasonable estimate.

Takashi did a great job writing a Japanese noodle cookbook using available ingredients found in the western grocery stores. His recipes are not what I call a fusion style of recipes and he stays true to his background by presenting true Japanese noodle recipes.

His Japanese recipes are very solid and traditional recipes with beautiful presentation and photos. Pages 1-94 are Japanese recipes and pages 96-127 delves into other Asian as well as western noodle dishes.

The cold noodle dipping sauces are excellent with some innovative ideas such as tomato dipping sauce which I found very interesting. It does go extremely well with chilled somen noodle.

First off, ignore the one star review. The review bought the wrong type of rib cut and is blaming it on the book. You have to get the across the bone Asian style rib cut..not the between the bone American/European style Rib cut.

Now..onto the review:
This is a excellent book!
Takashi(who is a skilled chef in the Chicago area) has put together simple recipies that taste great and can be be made in a home kitchen without a monster effort. He also gives you a little backround about the noodles and the dishes so you can get a feel on how they are viewed in their native country. There are more than noodle recipies also-he includes recipies for Yakatori, Gyoza/Pot Stickers and many other common Asian Pub/Street food dishes that really fit in with the noodle recipies.

Plus, Takashi is not afraid to throw a Professional type recipie at you for a challenge if you so desire:look for the recipie with foam.

I am a professional chef and I can appreciate the simpliticy and ease of this book. I suggest a large 12+qt pot and a fine strainer or a china cap with cheesecloth to strain the soups as the only real things you need. Also, find where your local well stocked Asian Grocery store is at, as you will need to visit them for a few things that you won't find in a normal grocery store. If you can't find it locally, go online-Asian ingredients can be found online cheaply these days.

Just get this book if you are interested in Asian noodle soups/dishes and want a great, simple starting place Or you don't want to put a full day or three ala Momofuku to make noodle dishes.

Nicely written and illustrated book for the Asian hobby chef. The text is easy to understand and you know what your dish is supposed to look like when served. While not always attainable the presentation of the noodles can be your goal. Many Asian cookbooks either require exotic ingredients not readily available or feature presentations only Iron Chef Morimoto could design. Takashi's Noodles provides recipes that the hobby chef can manage, presentations that can be your goal and a nice variety of noodle dishes.

Good reference book for Japanese noodle lovers. The content and teaching method on "how-to" was clearly guided. Ingredients and preparation methods are easily understandable and clearly stated. You will easily made a bowl of nice Japanese Noodle by referring to this book.

The book may in fact be perfect for American audiences. If America is a place that doesn't really care to get too deep into the history, into all of the details that really come with authenticity but instead wants clear instructions that short-cut real thoughtfulness but provide an easy way to get something "good enough". You can get those short-cuts in this book, but you could also probably just google 'soba' and get more or less the same thing.

If you're after something more, if you want detailed real information on how dishes are made from the 10+ hour process of making a stock, to the addition of sodium carbonate into flour to give noodles that authentic chewy bounce, etc.. then this book is NOT for you. Keep looking.

Looking forward to trying out many of the recipes in this lavishly illustrated volume. As with many oriental recipe books, finding some ingredients will be a challenge, but the recipes are clear, and not very complicated.

The matte, smooth, dense paper quality and beautifully photographed dishes are nice to look at, as a coffee table piece, but this book is not what I had hoped and expected it to be. It's just not practical for one who actually wants to prepare traditional, homemade, made-from-scratch noodles. I was looking for a cookbook with doable recipes I could make with what is readily available at large Asian supermarkets. I am not at all interested in pure eye candy (that is, in a useless book to merely adorn my coffee table with). Unfortunately, this cookbook has been an overpriced waste of money. It is impractical. Besides taking hours (and, sometimes, up to a day or two in advance to prepare), the recipes require cookware and ingredients not readily available in even the largest Asian supermarkets (for example, 99 Ranch Market [a large, very popular chain of Asian grocery stores in California & where I do 99% of my grocery store shopping in L.A.]). In fact, after purchasing this book, two years ago, I have yet to attempt a single dish from it. I sorely regret purchasing it.

I bought the takashi noodles book on a whim and was very disappointed with it. There is nothing on in the book on how to properly prepare a stock. When I watch Japanese tv shows on ramen, some restaurants make their stocks at a super high temperature, some slow cook for 2 day, some prepare their bones by soaking in milk to remove the blood from the meat. Would have been nice to see techniques on making stocks covered in a book focused on Japanese noodles. Also the tare recipes dont seem right.

Upon browsing this book, I find on page 96 Beef Short Ribs with Saifun Bean Threads with a total cooking time for the beef short ribs of two minutes, one minute in a pan on each side of them "until the ribs are cooked through." This extremely tough cut of meat could only be raw and unchewable after only two minutes in a pan. Has anybody responsible for this book actually cooked and eaten this recipe according to directions? Makes me wonder about the creditability of all the recipes in it.