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Ratio: The Simple Codes Behind the Craft of Everyday Cooking (1) (Ruhlman's Ratios) Paperback – September 7, 2010
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When you know a culinary ratio, it’s not like knowing a single recipe, it’s instantly knowing a thousand.
Why spend time sorting through the millions of cookie recipes available in books, magazines, and on the Internet? Isn’t it easier just to remember 1-2-3? That’s the ratio of ingredients that always make a basic, delicious cookie dough: 1 part sugar, 2 parts fat, and 3 parts flour. From there, add anything you want—chocolate, lemon and orange zest, nuts, poppy seeds, cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, almond extract, or peanut butter, to name a few favorite additions. Replace white sugar with brown for a darker, chewier cookie. Add baking powder and/or eggs for a lighter, airier texture.
Ratios are the starting point from which a thousand variations begin.
Ratios are the simple proportions of one ingredient to another. Biscuit dough is 3:1:2—or 3 parts flour, 1 part fat, and 2 parts liquid. This ratio is the beginning of many variations, and because the biscuit takes sweet and savory flavors with equal grace, you can top it with whipped cream and strawberries or sausage gravy. Vinaigrette is 3:1, or 3 parts oil to 1 part vinegar, and is one of the most useful sauces imaginable, giving everything from grilled meats and fish to steamed vegetables or lettuces intense flavor.
Cooking with ratios will unchain you from recipes and set you free. With thirty-three ratios and suggestions for enticing variations, Ratio is the truth of cooking: basic preparations that teach us how the fundamental ingredients of the kitchen—water, flour, butter and oils, milk and cream, and eggs—work. Change the ratio and bread dough becomes pasta dough, cakes become muffins become popovers become crepes.
As the culinary world fills up with overly complicated recipes and never-ending ingredient lists, Michael Ruhlman blasts through the surplus of information and delivers this innovative, straightforward book that cuts to the core of cooking. Ratio provides one of the greatest kitchen lessons there is—and it makes the cooking easier and more satisfying than ever.
- Print length272 pages
- LanguageEnglish
- Publication dateSeptember 7, 2010
- Dimensions5.5 x 0.7 x 8.44 inches
- ISBN-109781416571728
- ISBN-13978-1416571728
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- ASIN : 1416571728
- Publisher : Scribner; Reprint edition (September 7, 2010)
- Language : English
- Paperback : 272 pages
- ISBN-10 : 9781416571728
- ISBN-13 : 978-1416571728
- Item Weight : 2.31 pounds
- Dimensions : 5.5 x 0.7 x 8.44 inches
- Best Sellers Rank: #18,307 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- Customer Reviews:
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Meet Michael Ruhlman
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About the author

Michael Ruhlman is the author or co-author of more than 25 books—non-fiction, fiction, and memoir—the majority of which are on food and cooking, including the bestselling "The Soul of a Chef," "The French Laundry Cookbook" with Thomas Keller, "Charcuterie" with Brian Polcyn, "Ruhlman's Twenty," which won both James Beard and IACP awards, and most recently, "Grocery: The Buying and Selling of Food in America." He lives in New York City.
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Customers find the book provides some common cooking and baking techniques. They also say the drily humorous style is wonderful to read, easy to follow, and interesting spins on the basics. Readers also appreciate the ratios as great knowledge to have and easy to remember.
AI-generated from the text of customer reviews
Customers find the book's content useful and useful for cooking and baking. They say it provides some common cooking and Baking techniques into each of the ratios. They also say it's very useful and recommend the book. Customers also say the book explains the most important ratios and provides recipes.
"...The ganache was good though pretty much how I always made it, the accidental caramel sauce was wonderful...." Read more
"...I made some Creme Anglaise (4:1:1 milk/cream:egg yolk:sugar), also very tasty and very easy...." Read more
"...I read this cover-to-cover, and it works well that way...." Read more
"...It includes basic ratios of many common foods. Including bread dough (such as cookies, breads, pastas, and even pates), batter for cakes and crepes...." Read more
Customers find the book wonderful to read, well explained, and clearly written. They also say it's a super fun way to bring math, food, and a bit of science to young readers. Customers also mention that the author, Michael Ruhlman, explains the most important concepts with wit and grace.
"...reading it a bit I realized the ratios are really laid out and explained well and I could actually follow the explanations!..." Read more
"...Anglaise (4:1:1 milk/cream:egg yolk:sugar), also very tasty and very easy...." Read more
"...For the more experienced: there are some interesting spins on the basics, some tweaks here and there...." Read more
"...With these ratios, it's now easier to quickly check a recipe for reasonable variations before baking it...." Read more
Customers find the ratios in the book great knowledge to have. They also say the ratio system is easy to follow and the scale is a help. Readers mention that appropriate ratios make substitution easier and the results more successful. They appreciate the ratio charts and say the information is relative.
"...After reading it a bit I realized the ratios are really laid out and explained well and I could actually follow the explanations!..." Read more
"...The ratios do work, just be aware that different ingredients will necessarily change the flavor and texture of the end result...." Read more
"Very informative about cooking measurements. Handy to have around in any kitchen." Read more
"I LOVE this book, the ratios work! I haven't been able to put it down since I downloaded it to my Kindle...." Read more
Customers have mixed opinions about the writing quality of the book. Some find the description accurate, well organized, and useful, while others say the intro text before part 1 is poorly written and poorly presented.
"...It's small and well organized...." Read more
"The intro text before part 1 is poorly written but the rest is good..." Read more
"...is more helpful to the way I cook now-- simpler, more streamlined, more precise." Read more
"Quick delivery, books in excellent, description was very accurate. Very satisfied with my purchase" Read more
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Fast forward to watching Anna and Kristina cook from it on the "grocery bags." Frankly, I feel if they can have success with a book I can too. It got me interested enough to check Ratio from the library. After reading it a bit I realized the ratios are really laid out and explained well and I could actually follow the explanations! Me- math backward woman!
The first thing to call out to me was the banana split, I made the ice cream, the butterscotch sauce and the chocolate ganache. I also made the caramel sauce by accident, I started following the wrong recipe, which is a major gripe of mine, why can't cookbook publishers put the recipe on the same page, or at least facing pages? I hate having to go back and forth flipping pages while covered in ingredients with messy fingers! ugh! *pets peeve* Anyway...
The ice cream was amazing. My entire family gulped it down, declaring it the best ice cream I ever made. The butterscotch, it took me back to my youth when my grandma made butterscotch. When Ruhlman says you can't get butterscotch like this without making it, he is right. It was lush and silky and beautiful and I would wanted to dive in it headfirst. The ganache was good though pretty much how I always made it, the accidental caramel sauce was wonderful.
I bought the book for the butterscotch recipe alone. Now, I call myself the aioli breaker. I cannot make homemade mayo to save my life. Blender, mixer, food processor, by hand, it breaks. recipes from Julia Child to Bourdain to David Liebowitz, it breaks. I have a freezer full of egg whites and a kitchen full of broken mayo. So I tried ratio's recipe. First I made a big beautiful angel food cake with all the egg whites. It turned out gorgeous! then I tried his immersion blender technique for mayo. I knew it would fail, I could make an angel food cake from my failures, do you know how many egg whites that is from broken yolks and broken mayo? But I tried, and darned if I do not have a bowl of perfect mayo, white, creamy, not an egg yolk floating in curdled oil but real mayo.
I know this is a long review but honestly, this book deserves it and more. It's absolutely amazing- don't let the word ratio keep you from this book the way I did for to long. It deserves to be a cherished part of any cooks collection.
Reviewed in the United States on July 22, 2011
Fast forward to watching Anna and Kristina cook from it on the "grocery bags." Frankly, I feel if they can have success with a book I can too. It got me interested enough to check Ratio from the library. After reading it a bit I realized the ratios are really laid out and explained well and I could actually follow the explanations! Me- math backward woman!
The first thing to call out to me was the banana split, I made the ice cream, the butterscotch sauce and the chocolate ganache. I also made the caramel sauce by accident, I started following the wrong recipe, which is a major gripe of mine, why can't cookbook publishers put the recipe on the same page, or at least facing pages? I hate having to go back and forth flipping pages while covered in ingredients with messy fingers! ugh! *pets peeve* Anyway...
The ice cream was amazing. My entire family gulped it down, declaring it the best ice cream I ever made. The butterscotch, it took me back to my youth when my grandma made butterscotch. When Ruhlman says you can't get butterscotch like this without making it, he is right. It was lush and silky and beautiful and I would wanted to dive in it headfirst. The ganache was good though pretty much how I always made it, the accidental caramel sauce was wonderful.
I bought the book for the butterscotch recipe alone. Now, I call myself the aioli breaker. I cannot make homemade mayo to save my life. Blender, mixer, food processor, by hand, it breaks. recipes from Julia Child to Bourdain to David Liebowitz, it breaks. I have a freezer full of egg whites and a kitchen full of broken mayo. So I tried ratio's recipe. First I made a big beautiful angel food cake with all the egg whites. It turned out gorgeous! then I tried his immersion blender technique for mayo. I knew it would fail, I could make an angel food cake from my failures, do you know how many egg whites that is from broken yolks and broken mayo? But I tried, and darned if I do not have a bowl of perfect mayo, white, creamy, not an egg yolk floating in curdled oil but real mayo.
I know this is a long review but honestly, this book deserves it and more. It's absolutely amazing- don't let the word ratio keep you from this book the way I did for to long. It deserves to be a cherished part of any cooks collection.
It is reminiscent of when I discovered Raymond Sokolov's SAUCIER'S APPRENTICE. Like that book, Ruhlman shows you a system of how it all fits together and gives you the Aha! Experience of viewing the whole playing field from above, not just the recipe in front of you.
I started off making pie dough with just the ratio for guidance (3:2:1 flour:fat:liquid), no recipe. Very easy to remember and very easy to do. 12 minutes tops.
The next day, looking for something to do with the pie dough, I made a ham and goat cheese quiche the size of a curling stone (RATIO, p. 201).
The quiche needed to mature in the fridge for a day, so for something to eat in the meantime I made an Idiot Chocolate Cake, which is really a gateau, from a link on Ruhlman's website. Easy and great. [...]
To go with the chocolate cake, I made some Creme Anglaise (4:1:1 milk/cream:egg yolk:sugar), also very tasty and very easy.
Then since I didn't want an exclusive cake and quiche diet, I made some bread dough (5:3 flour:liquid) with some sourdough starter I've been nursing back to health. I let it rise overnight in the fridge.
The following day, I baked the bread, which turned out great. I'm not buying any more bread as long as I can remember that 5:3 ratio. Homemade sourdough is the best .
Then, since the oven was already hot from baking the bread, and since I had some egg whites left over from the Chocolate Cake (which used only yolks), I made some Chocolate Meringue cookies which are like biting into little chocolate-flavored pieces of cloud. (I'm having one or two as I type.)
So, to recap, in a period of about 48 hours or so, I made:
4 lb. Quiche
2 lb. Sourdough Bread
1 Chocolate Gateau
2 cups Creme Anglaise
3 doz. Chocolate Meringue cookies
And, friends, I'm telling you it was effortless.
Today, whole pork loins went on sale at the grocery next door for $1.99 a pound, so over the weekend I'm going to make (cure) 8 1/2 pounds of Canadian Bacon (RATIO, p. 158). That stuff costs $12 a pound retail. I mean $95 of bacon for under $20? Who wouldn't?
I got some sausage casings the other day, and if I can just get my hands on some lard, I'll make sausages (4:1 meat:fat) in the next week or so.
Even as I write, I am searching for excuses to make creme patisserie (4:1:1 milk/cream:egg yolk:sugar, plus some cornstarch and butter), lemon curd (4:4:3:1 lemon juice:sugar:yolks:butter), or chocolate ganache (1:1 cream:chocolate). And wondering where I can find that lard for the sausages?
Can't recommend this book enough.
And check out his blog: [...]
I read this cover-to-cover, and it works well that way. However, for the more experienced home cook (or for someone with culinary training), using it as a recipe guide works well - reading only the chapter relevant to what you're wanting to make. The straight through read can get a little repetitive and irksome at times.
For the less experienced cook: a great introduction into how simply cooking really can be. master these basics, and you'll have the tools to start learning to experiment.
For the more experienced: there are some interesting spins on the basics, some tweaks here and there. full of encouragement to not be scared of trying to scale up or scale down recipes, even to the point of a single serving.













