I'm Just Here for the Food:
Food + Heat = Cooking

by Alton Brown

If you want recipies, this isn't the book for you. Sure, there are recipies in the book, but the real focus of the book is on learning how to cook.

Early in the book, Alton compares recipies to step-by-step directions to a location. But what do you do if a road is closed, or you can't turn left at a certain corner. If you don't already know the area, what you need is a map. This book is a map.

Cooking is defined as appling heat to food. The organization of the book is around the various methods of heating foods. The central theme is to understand how different kinds of heat affects different kinds of food.

If you love the Food Network's show, Good Eats (host, Alton Brown), you'll enjoy this book. Alton brings the same instructive nature and moves it from film to paper. But don't expect to find any of the recipies from the TV show here. It's all original material. (Okay... There are a couple of paragraphs that have been uttered on the show. But we're not talking recycled material here.)

So, if you want to learn how to cook, this book is for you. If you want a recipe book. Go someplace else, and then come back here when you're ready to learn how to cook!