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(More customer reviews)`How To Break An Egg' is a collection of `1,453 Kitchen Tips, Food Fixes, Emergency Substitutions, and Handy Techniques' by the Editors, Contributors, and Readers of `Fine Cooking' magazine. One of the first things this means is that if you are a dedicated subscriber to `Fine Cooking' magazine and have every issue going back about ten (10) years, you already have most of what is in this book.
This volume belongs to one of the three general classes of books which focus much more on why and how to do things in general rather than on specific recipes. The first of these classes is represented by Shirley Corriher's `Cookwise' which has many recipes, but whose real purpose is to demonstrate why things work the way they do. The second of these three groups is represented by the Williams-Sonoma `Kitchen Companion' and Christopher Kimball's `The Cook's Bible'. These two books deal less with science and more with technique, and are typically organized like an encyclopedia. The third class, to which this book belongs, is a collection of individual tips and suggestions from many different sources. The other most recent entry into this category was `Chef's Secrets' collected by Francine Maroukian'. This `Chef's Secrets' was not entirely up to the standard represented by the reputations of the contributors (see my review of this book).
`How To Break An Egg' has some of the weaknesses of `Chef's Secrets' in that a few may simply be wrong or at least unnecessary, but the very large number of suggestions and the diligence of the `Fine Cooking' editors has kept the chaff to a minimum. It is also important to note that many of these suggestions come from several culinary heavyweights such as Bruce Aidells, John Ash, Rose Levy Beranbaum, and Shirley Corriher. And, I can see that the suggestions from these authorities are uniformly better than those submitted by `Fine Cooking' readers.
Many of the suggestions are probably common knowledge to most amatuer cooks who spend a lot of time reading these authors, `Fine Cooking', `Saveur', and `Cooks Illustrated Magazines', and spend time watching the Food Network, especially Alton Brown's `Good Eats' show. Thus, the book's value drops off if you are an experienced foodie own a sizeable culinary library.
On the other hand, the average level of the suggestions is really pretty good. I suspect there may be a fair amount of friendly copying, as I recognize many suggestions from other sources, especially, Alton Brown and the baking Gurus such as Beranbaum and Flo Brakker. The suggestions fall into several different categories.
First, there are the amateur techniques to make up for the lack of technique typically gained through practice. Many of the baking tips fall into this category such as the technique for draping a pizza dough over an overturned bowl to spread it out in place of the usual method of stretching it on your knuckles. These are often revealed by caveats saying that `the usual method of doing this only works if you have a very sharp knive...'. Well, I see no excuse for not having very sharp knives, so these suggestions are often moot. Most amateur suggestions are in this category and they are easily recognized as things which a professional will typically not do, because they have all the right equipment and knowledge for doing things quickly and correctly.
Second, there are sanitation tips, which I recommend we all commit to memory and follow, such as the tip to wash the handles on your water faucets after washing your hands.
Third, there are tricks to do things which become harder if you have either a lot more than usual or a lot less than usual.
Fourth, there are reminders about common baking problems, especially with cookies, pastry doughs, and cake batters, and alternative ways to avoid them. I really like most of these, especially the one which says that it may simply not be a good time to make a pie crust if the humidity and temperature is high.
Fifth is the color section which contains an entirely different kind of material, that being color photographic tutorials on how to do various techniques. I am certain these are all done by `Fine Cooking' staff writers and photographers and they are all of a high quality. Unless you own James Peterson's `Essentials of Cooking' or Jacques Pepin's `Complete Techniques', this section alone may be worth the price of the book.
Sixth is a set of tables to help you diagnose problems especially in common baking tasks. This, together with the color section makes this book well worth the investment. These may be less valuable if you happen to already have thoroughly digested Shirley Corriher's `Cookwise' or other superior reference on baking techniques.
Seventh is a table of EMERGENCY SUBSTITUTIONS. I emphasize this because the authors are clear on this point that these are not perfect replacements. This section has just about all the most useful cases I can think of, especially for buttermilk, bread crumbs, crème fraiche, fish sauce, lemongrass, mascarpone, pancetta, and shallots. In other words, common ingredients which, however, you may not stock. Two examples should illustrate how these are not perfect substitutions. I would not typically prefer substituting white wine vinegar for sherry vinegar rather than their suggested balsamic vinegar. And, I would typically prefer to substitute finely diced white or yellow onions for shallots rather than scallions.
This book is great fun to read for any culinary amateur. I recommend it for that reason alone, but it is also a useful reference if you have no other books on cooking or baking technique. Oddly enough, I could find no suggestion anywhere in the book for an answer to the title question, the preferred way to break an egg.
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How To Break An Egg: 1,453 Kitchen Tips, Food Fixes, Emergency Substitutions and Handy Techniques
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