200 Skills Every Cook Must Have: The Step-by-Step Methods That Will Turn a Good Cook into a Great Cook - Hardcover

Think of this book as cooking skills for dummies ratcheted up to a higher level.... Two British chefs export their ways and wisdom to teach, update, and demystify novices as well as experienced cooks about critical kitchen skills. Along the way, when recipes are offered, so much the better. Their basics cover literally anything necessary to start cooking, from the rudiments of fashioning a tomato sauce to advice for soaking saffron. Therefore, such advanced skills as crafting croissants or building a fancy cake don't qualify. Many of the 200 techniques feature color photographs; all include ingredients, directions, expert tips, and, occasionally, recommended variations (for instance, foodstuffs to fold into couscous). It's the tips, though, that readers will savor... Well organized and explained.--Barbara Jacobs"Booklist" (12/01/2013)

This would be a great book for someone starting out in the kitchen or who has been cooking for just a few years.--Nancy J. Stohs"Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel" (01/08/2014)

The book, a fine choice for cooking novices and those unsure of how to make Pavlova, provides kitchen building blocks ranging from cracking an egg to flambeing, with step-by-step images, expert tips plus charts on meat cuts and equipment.--Bill Daley, Judy Hevrdejs and Joe Gray"Hartford Courant" (12/12/2013)

200 Skills Every Cook Must Have is an illustrated guide to the most important tips and techniques that are the key to cooking with confidence and consistency. The book explains and illustrates every important technique, from impressive knife skills to perfect pastry, and gives cooks a new level of comfort with tricky dishes like lobster and soufflé.

A simple step-by-step format with full-color photography and clear, easy-to-follow instructions takes kitchen work to the next level. The book is organized like a cooking masterclass that readers can follow in order or flip to a particular skill that needs perfecting.

Ten chapters describe essential tools and equipment, and explain tried-and-tested procedures for consistently preparing a wide range of items perfectly:

• Basics covers how to use and care for basic equipment and knives
• Sauces and Dressings has recipes and methods for key sauces such as classic vinaigrette, mayonnaise, hollandaise and custard
• Preparing and Cooking Fruits and Vegetables covers charring and peeling peppers, caramelizing onions, peeling tomatoes, peeling garlic, grating ginger, salting eggplant, chopping chilies and more
• Preparing and Cooking Meat explains how to cook a steak, carve a chicken, joint a chicken, prep a rack of lamb, and other key skills
• Basic Fish Skills includes opening oysters, poaching, papillote, prepping shrimp, boning and filleting, steaming and cooking lobster
• Pastry and Baking Skills includes cracking and separating eggs, making a soufflé, blind baking, melting chocolate and glazing
• Pasta, Bread, Rice & Noodles includes boiling pasta, rolling fresh pasta dough, basic bread tips, making perfect rice and easy risotto
• Presentation and Plating includes plating tools, decorative plating techniques, slicing and placing, and piping
• Preserving and Storing includes quick pickling, salting, flavored oils, syrups, skimming, and desalting
• Tips for Entertaining covers table-laying, planning, timing and more helpful advice.

For the culinary novice or the experienced amateur, 200 Skills Every Cook Must Have shows how to stew, steam and sauté to success every time. It is the secret ingredient that turns a good cook into a great one.