Justin Wilson Cook Book (Plastic Comb)

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Editorial Reviews

Product Description

Who is Justin Wilson? That’s a pretty silly question for anyone in Louisiana to ask. Perhaps no public figure is better known or loved during recent times in the Pelican State than Justin Wilson. Curiously enough, Wilson got his start as an industry safety engineer, a highly valued and respected one too, instructing oil refinery workers, dockworkers, and law enforcement officers all over the South.

It was this line of work that inspired the Cajun storyteller in Wilson, judging from what Wilson himself has to say: "Way back when I first started as a safety engineer, I took myself pretty seriously. And I found I was putting audiences to sleep. So, having lived all my life among the Cajuns of Louisiana, and having a memory for the patois and the type of humor Cajuns go for, I started interspersing my talks on safety with Cajun humor. And you know what? My audiences stayed awake."

Not only did they stay awake, they chuckled, laughed and roared—and learned their safety lessons. For nearly two decades, Wilson was in heavy demand as master of ceremonies for everything from a supermarket opening to a Miss Texas contest.

He recorded an album, The Humorous World of Justin Wilson, which broke all album sales records in Texas’ recording history. After that he made four more(all successful), appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show, MC’d conventions, parties, political rallies, christenings, and you name it.

Although he’d accomplished all that, Justin Wilson still wasn’t satisfied—he decided to expand his range of expertise to include the culinary arts, and has enjoyed lots of success in that arena, beginning it all with The Justin Wilson Cookbook. When it was first published by Pelican in1965, it was a cookbook like no other—a Cajun cookbook—and it still stands alone as a masterpiece of Cajun cooking and of culinary expertise in general.

Readers will be glad to know that "The Justin Wilson Cookbook' reflects the Justin Wilson personality—entertaining and authentic. And the meals you cook from this book will go down in your gastronomical memory as the most exciting and interesting ever

About the Author

Justin Wilson wears many hats in addition to his chef’s hat. In fact, he doesn’t even wear a chef’s hat because he doesn’t consider himself a chef. He is the first to say that he is Cajun cook—not a chef. He is a humorist—not a comedian—who has appeared on television programs across the country, including The Tonight Show.

When not cooking, Justin may wear a hard hat, since for many years he worked as a safety engineer. He also wears the hat of a storyteller and weaves his stories into his books and his cooking shows aired on Public Broadcasting Systems throughout the country. Justin also wears the hats of raconteur extraordinaire and goodwill ambassador of the Cajun people of Louisiana.

Justin Wilson learned much of what he knows about cooking from his mother. He took that knowledge, developed his personal cooking style, and helped to pioneer the Cajun cuisine that caught the country by storm when he appeared at the ABA in 1974.

Product Details

• Plastic Comb: 89 pages
• Publisher: Pelican Publishing Company (October 1973)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0882890190
• ISBN-13: 978-0882890197
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 7.4 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #353,806 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

26 of 26 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Excellent, I garontee!!, January 3, 2001

By	MarvelousMarla "MarvyM" (Way down in Dixie) - See all my reviews

This book a primer on New Orleans cuisine ala Justin Wilson. I remember his cooking show and always got a kick out of how he would pour a little wine in his pots and drink the rest. You could see that this man enjoyed food, and this translates into his book. I credit Mr. Wilson with teaching me how to make a decent roux because before I read his recipe, I always used butter or vegetable oil. Hey, I'm from Brooklyn, what did I know from a roux? The olive oil made a huge difference in my gumbo. I was even inspired to try jambalaya -- it was yummy!!

On a past trip to New Orleans, I purchased one of the Junior League Cookbooks which has an abundance of recipes and tips. However, the other book relies on a lot of processed and prepared ingredients. Those recipes are also a lot fussier. I prefer Wilson's cookbook for its simplicity. He also includes plenty of local color and anecdotes.

17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Good food & a Good Sense of Humor, July 6, 2000

By	C. Joseph (San Diego, CA) - See all my reviews

His successful television show on PBS was just a sampling of his gift for food prepreation & for making people laugh, with fans internationally, this book is a perfect example of what DELICIOUS is! If the recipes are followed correctly, the result is outstanding, if the recipes are not followed correctly, then it is not the fault of Mr. Wilson :-)

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Very nice for the price. Not the BEST Cajun Recipe Source., February 5, 2007

By	B. Marold "Bruce W. Marold" (Bethlehem, PA United States) - See all my reviews (TOP 50 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

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`The Top 100 Cajun Recipes of All Time' from the editors of `acadiana profile' and `The Justin Wilson Cookbook' are two excellent little sources for Cajun (Arcadian) recipes. Their primary value lies in both their relative authenticity and in their low cost. For a more complete source of `relatively authentic' Cajun recipes at a slightly higher cost for over twice as many recipes, I suggest `Cajun Cuisine' from the Beau Bayou Publishing Company.

It's interesting that all these books come from very local sources. In this regard, they share a characteristic of some of the best Pennsylvania Dutch cookbooks. This is easily understandable, as unlike `Southern' cooking and `Tex-Mex' cooking, Cajun and Pennsylvania Dutch cooking both come from just a few counties in just one state (Louisiana and Pennsylvania respectively).

While both of these books are inexpensive and `kitchen friendly' (will lie flat on the kitchen table while you cook), there are some important differences. The `Top 100' book is simply recipes and nothing but recipes. Justin Wilson's book has fewer recipes (and NO INDEX!) but lots of homey observations so familiar to anyone who saw him on his PBS cooking shows. Another big difference is that in spite of the fact that Wilson was an `amateur' cook, he was an `amateur' in much the same way as Julia Child was an `amateur', in that they did not cook in professional (restaurant) kitchens, but they knew a whole lot about cooking technique and their technique did show a lot of professional touches. To be sure, Child was a much more accomplished teacher and literally a more accomplished researcher into her chosen field than Wilson, whose primary attraction was not `technique', but `bon hommine' (sic).

Two things which set Wilson apart from `The Top 100' is his use of stocks and his cooking with wine. Wine certainly appears in some `Top 100' recipes, but it appears in almost half of Wilson's recipes and many recipes are named for their use of wine (even the French have just a few recipes named for their use of wine).

The biggest question I have about `The Top 100' is whether this means the best recipes of the 100, or the 100 most distinctively Cajun recipes. Since the latter is much less subjective, it would be much more valuable than the former, as one can always use the book to find the most distinctively Cajun recipes and feel free to improve on them. The introduction suggests that the editors had both objectives in mind. I will concede to them the claim that these are the 100 most typical Cajun recipes, as no one should be in a better position to know than a local publisher of local recipes which has been in the business for many years.

On the question of quality, I remain agnostic, but I will do a little survey on my favorite recipe, the turtle soup, to see if there is a chance that `The Top 100' does have `the best recipe'. First, a look at the recipe itself reveals that it is truly a recipe for the amateur cook, as it does not use a prepared stock, unlike both Justin Wilson, Emeril Lagasse (see `Emeril's Delmonico'), and Paul Prudhomme (see `Chef Paul Prudhomme's Louisiana Kitchen'). Thus, it reflects a home kitchen that does not have the resources to prepare stock in advance or a nearby supermarket with ample supplies of chicken stock. It's interesting to see the progression of complexity from the home recipes to Lagasse to Prudhomme to the ultimate classic French recipe in `The Escoffier Cookbook'. On the basis of this little survey, I have to believe that one should qualify the book's title to be `The Best 100 HOME Cooked Cajun Recipes of All Time'. This is evident from the fact that almost all recipes have a source of a local Louisiana home cook! It's also interesting to see the progression in this series from no stock to chicken stock (Wilson and Lagasse) to combination of chicken and turtle stock (Prudhomme) to pure turtle stock (Escoffier).

One thing I notice in both books which simply has never come up in all the hours I have spent watching Emeril on the Food Network. This is the common use of `oil' rather than either butter or pork fat in many recipes. Wilson goes further to specify olive oil, and this is well before we all became familiar with how good olive oil and the whole `Mediterranean diet' was for us. It would be the ultimate irony to find that Justin Wilson's red wine and olive oil recipes were `healthy'.

To make up for this, there is also a fairly common use of `prepared' staples here, such as `American cheese', Worchestershire sauce and Lea and Perrins sauce. (What is surprising is to see Emeril use `A1' sauce also in his Turtle Soup). `The Top 100' uses a bit less of the prepared stuff, but does use `oleo' more often. Please replace `oleo' with real butter. It's actually better for you.

Both books fully embody everything I ever heard about `Cajun' cooking, most especially the use of the trinity of onions, celery and sweet peppers (replacing the French carrots in the classic mirepoix). Even where the three are not used together, celery and sweet peppers seem to find their way into just about everything, especially given the high number of braised and casseroled dishes using lots of aromatics.

I confess that like Jean Shepherd's writing, Justin Wilson's Cajun accent and wry expressions simply don't come across as well in print as they do on the screen, so the extras in his book have limited value.

For the price, I recommend both; however, `The Top 100' may have a longer shelf life.