Benu Cookbook

robert.c.brown15

Looking for opinions on the Benu cookbook. Is it possible to cook from it? I've heard sourcing stuff makes it very hard. Is there stuff to learn? Or is it mostly story and recipes?

Thank you!

Find more posts tagged with

Everything Else

Comments

brian_martin2001

I don't know too much about it, so i could be talking out of my ass, but from what I've seen online, and read in excerpts, as long as you have access to a high end restaurant supply store, and you're going to need to frequent specialty ingredient suppliers like modernist kitchen, you should be good to go. a good Asian market would also be very useful. granted, it's unlikely to look like the artwork Corey Lee puts out, but the gist of it should be the same. Anyway, that's my take on it. Good luck. And even if you aren't going to cook from it, it looks like an amazing book to add to ones library.

robert.c.brown15

I'm with you on it looking like an amazing book to add to the library. I'm just trying to not let my library out of control. I like to be able to take each book off my shelf and turn to a recipe I can use or a technique I can use/learn. I live in an area where I can source a lot of ingredients. One thing I want to avoid is a ton of molecular ingredients as I don't see the point in purchasing a bunch of them to cook just one dish. Xanthan gum is useful in a lot of ways, but others are just so unique that I wouldn't use them aside from the one dish. Not exactly worth the money in that way.

I'm really back and worth on it. Same with Le Livre Blanc. That's another one I've put in and out of my shopping cart throughout the past year. Thanks for the input, I appreciate it. I've also probably seen the same stuff online as you have though so hopefully someone else can chime in.

tshewman

I was only able to see a couple of recipes online, but both looked approachable and the biggest hurdle (for me at least) would be acquiring some of the product (e.g. jellyfish). That said, if the book is anything like the receipes I saw and that's the main interest, it's definitely approachable/useable and you can always substitute main proteins 9of he couple that I saw, that would be the only urdle I saw). That said, you can always benefit from the concepts (to me thius is one of the magics of The French Laundry and a few others), they give us templates from which to work. Accept the fact that we might (and will) fall on our face sometimes (or on your back with cake on you like in TFD LOL!), and I would be willing to wager we'll be better for it. The more books I collect, the more I buy them for inspiration to think outside the box for what I have available and for the stories that come with them to see whwre they may draw their inspiration. That is one of the few things missing here at CS and one of the reasons a few of the longr videos (wall of fire etc etc) are so great, it inspires and teaches........without a recipe. If you want the book and can afford it, don't by it just to see if you can cook a receipe in it......perhaps consider buying it to see how you can make that receipe yours. Maybe simpler at first. Maybe just part of it. There's no shame in not cooking exactly as the recipe says.....to the contrary (IMHO). :-)

robert.c.brown15

No Todd, I completely agree with you. I don't buy cook books for how easy it is to do the recipes. I buy them for the techniques and inspiration, however, the final thing I need in a cook book before I buy it is to be able to at least partly reproduce parts of a dish or maybe one full dish. A book like NOMA just doesn't do it for me as no matter what inspiration there may be from the pictures, there really isn't a recipe that I could even bother trying as the ingredients are so crazy. If I want to be inspired by NOMA pictures, I can just google image search them.

I'll probably buy it as it looks like the only way I'll really know how it is will be to buy it. My only other concern is that it is too heavy on molecular ingredients. I don't want to stock a pantry full of them to only use them for one dish. That's a lot of money for 1.5 grams of an ingredient I'll probably only use one time.

robert.c.brown15

Also, TFL was LOADED with techniques and I think it seems to be the exception. Not sure Benu has a comparable amount of techniques to share.

tshewman

I completely understand the apprehension. FWIW (I don't own the book) of the 3 recipes I read, only one use any molecular ingredients (combo of potassium carbonate and sodium bicarbonate/baking soda)..in the Long Bao buns...so if that's any reflection on the book, I suspect it would be the other ingredients (like the jellyfish) that might be more challenging (though unlikely to have leftovers ;-)..). As odd as it sounds, perhaps call the restaurant or email them and ask. Explain the dilemma and your concerns. I would be surprised if they didn't respond candidly. Mugaritz has/did for me on a number of occassions. FWIW

tshewman

It's a different restaurant and will likely have many different prep techniques than TFL. Like how to caramelize eel bones, or a different way to treat creme fraiche (these were a couple I saw that got me thinking). So, TFL is a fantastic book (and inspiring) and we're all fortunate now to have so many others to choose from that are wonderful branches of techniques where we will find similarities and differences. Regardless of what you/we do/choose, it's a heck of allota fun.

robert.c.brown15

That's a good idea.

The book only contains 33 recipes too. Takes you through a tasting menu, which is cool, but I'm spending over a dollar per recipe.

robert.c.brown15

Checked out Benu today at the book store. Glad I didn't order it. Tons of photos. More of a photography book than cook book. Recipes are doable, but only 32 and none really jumped out at me to want to try to make as sourcing is pretty difficult. If I were someone who ate at Benu and had that experience this book would be a really great way to enhance that experience. It wasn't doing it for me as a cookbook.

ttpoker

Benu's owner/chef Corey Lee was the chef at The French Laundry when the TFL book was written. I have the Benu book, I think it's contents will be lost on many readers unless you have eaten the tasting menu first. I haven't opened the book as frequently as I expected to.