Wonderful book - Rated 
I bought this book having eaten at both his restaurants several times. The recipes are graded in three categories, easy, mediam and challenging. The latter category requires a lot of fussing about with the food and some forethought, but the medium and easy recipes are well set out and easy for the domestic cook. There are notes on what can wrong on some of the recipes and how to avoid mistakes which is a useful addition. It provides a good range of different recipes, from bread and cakes to petite fours. Every dish that I have tried from this book has worked and received requests for a repeat cooking - this has to be the measure of a cook book!
A poor book from an excellent chef. - Rated 
A disappointment.
This has the feeling of a heavily ghost-written book (although admittedly there is no collaborator mentioned in the acknowledgement), scattered with banal interpolations. See the page at the start of the seafood section going through fish. Has he got anything more insightful to say than that john dory tastes "sweet"? Clearly not as he repeats the same insight for turbot just down the page. See also the comment on prawns, crabs, lobster - his prawns come from madagascar - so what?
Having dined several times at TA in London the recipes are far less inspiring than the cuisine we know Tom is capable of. There are limited references to Tom's delightfully haphazard plating and approach to food. There is nary a mention of his signature cassonades. The recipes themselves simply do not inspire and are sometimes inconsistent - for example, how do you sear the skin-side of a darne of seabass??? (the skin goes all the way round a darne - there is no skin side!!!).
It's one redeeming feature is a good outline of the process for preparing Joel Robuchon's pomme puree.
If you want an example of a contemporary chefbook I can recommend David Everitt-Matthias "Essence"
A brilliant 'must have' book - Rated 
This is one of the best cook books I've bought and I have loads! Many of the recipes look quite basic at first glance but there's something going on where the whole is definitely greater than the sum of it's parts. The ingredients are mostly easy to get hold of, the techniques and preparations are approachable, the notes & guidance are superb in their simplicity, and I've found that with every recipe so far, I've actually been able to focus on the cooking in a way that makes sense of the processes & ingredients in relation to each other in a way that's not jumped out so much before. As a seriously enthusiastic home cook, I couldn't recommend this book enough.
Cooking Fantastic - Rated 
Great Book. Aikens has an original style, almost messy presentation, which probably comes from the way he develops his recipes and ideas. Very easy to follow and for once the preparation times are realistic. This book is destined to become a firm favourite of mine. Highly recommended.
This Book Is AMAZING!! - Rated 
Before I bought this book, I had only found out who Tom Aikens was a few weeks before, but I have read the book back to front and I can see why he is a michelin star chef twice. His style of cooking is like no other and most of his recipes are amazing. He grades his recipes from easy to challenging which really helps if you only want to make an easy snack or you want to spend a few hours in the kitchen creating a culinary masterpiece. I can really see Tom AIkens becoming Britains top chef in the next few years, and creating a chain of exceptional world renowned restaurants. If you want to learn how to cook like a pro, buy this book!
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