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Morrow Cookbooks
September 1999
On Sale: September 1, 1999
288 pages ISBN: 0060175834 EAN: 9780060175832 Hardcover
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Cookbooks | Non-Fiction Memoir
We hung the walls with old French movie posters
advertising the films of Marcel Pagnol, films that had
already provided us with both a name and an ideal: to create
a community of friends, lovers, and relatives that span
generations and is in tune with the seasons, the land, and
human appetites.
So writes Alice Waters of the opening of Berkeley's Chez
Panisse CafÉ on April Fool's Day, 1980. Located above
the more formal Chez Panisse Restaurant, the CafÉ is a
bustling neighborhood bistro where guests needn't reserve
far in advance and can choose from the ever-changing À la
carte menu. It's the place where Alice Waters's inventive
chefs cook in a more impromptu and earthy vein, drawing on
the healthful, low-tech traditions of the cuisines of such
Mediterranean regions as Catalonia, Campania, and Provence,
while improvising and experimenting with the best products
of Chez Panisse's own regional network of small farms and
producers. In the Chez Panisse CafÉ
Cookbook, the follow-up to the award-winning Chez
Panisse Vegetables, Alice Waters and her team of
talented cooks offer more than 140 of the cafÉ's
best-recipes--some that have been on the menu since the day
cafÉ opened and others freshly reinvented with the honesty
and ingenuity that have made Chez Panisse so famous. In
addition to irresistible recipes, the Chez Panisse CafÉ
Cookbook is filled with chapter-opening essays on the
relationships Alice has cultivated with the farmers,
foragers and purveyors--most of them within an hour's drive
of Berkeley--who make it possible for Chez Panisse to boast
that nearly all food is locally grown, certifiably organic,
and sustainably grown and harvested. Alice encourages
her chefs and cookbook readers alike to decide what to cook
only after visiting the farmer's market or produce stand.
Then we can all fully appreciate the advantages of eating
according to season--fresh spring lamb in late March, ripe
tomato salads in late summer, Comice pear crisps in
autumn. This book begins with a chapter of inspired
vegetable recipes, from a vivid salad of avocados and beets
to elegant Morel Mushroom Toasts to straightforward side
dishes of Spicy Broccoli Raab and Garlicky Kale. The Chapter
on eggs and cheese includes two of the cafÉ's most famous
dishes, a garden lettuce salad with baked goat cheese and
the Crostata di Perrella, the cafÉ's version of a calzone.
Later chapters focus on fish and shellfish, beef, pork,
lamb, and poultry, each offering its share of delightful
dishes. You'll find recipes for curing your own pancetta,
for simple grills and succulent braises, and for the
definitive simple roast chicken--as well as sumptuous
truffed chicken breasts. Finally the pastry cooks of Chez
Panisse serve forth a chapter of uncomplicated sweets,
including Apricot Bread Pudding, Chocolate Almond Cookies,
and Wood Oven-baked Figs with Raspberries. Gorgeously
designed and illustrated throughout with colored block
prints by David Lance Goines, who has eaten at the cafÉ
since the day it opened, Chez Panisse CafÉ Cookbook
is destined to become an indispensable classic. Fans of
Alice Waters's restaurant and cafÉ will be thrilled to
discover the recipes that keep them coming back for more.
Loyal readers of her earlier cookbooks will delight in this
latest collection of time-tested, deceptively simple
recipes. And anyone who loves pure, vibrant, delicious fare
made from the finest ingredients will be honored to add
these new recipes to his or her repertoire.
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