Alton Brown's Gear for Your Kitchen
by Alton Brown
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Book Reviews of Alton Brown's Gear for Your Kitchen
Book Review: Intro alone worth the price
Summary: 5 Stars
Read the Introduction alone to help you trim down your kitchen gadgets to a useful number. After having accumulated WAY too many kitchen gadgets, it was with great delight that I read and applied Alton's procedure for paring down the clutter in my kitchen cabinets. I now have a pile of gadgets that I can give away, sell at the next garage sale or just throw away (which pains me to no end).
After that, he gives the best advice I have ever seen for every utensil in the kitchen. The best thing he does is look at things from angles that most people don't when recommending products. One of the best peices of advice that he gives is to buy quality products, which usually (not ALWAYS) means spending more than I would like. Sometimes, he even recommends products for your kitchen that may come from some unlikely places, like your garage or workshop.
The other great thing about this book is, like his TV show, he explains how things work, albeit without most of the details.
Finally, it's a fun book to read.
Book Review: Great help for the registering bride!
Summary: 5 Stars
I'm a huge fan of Alton's show and an pretty good amateur chef if I do say so myself. I've decided to hold off on buying any cooking supplies recently since I am getting married in May and can register for most of what I want. Alton's book has been a great companion in helping me decide what I'll need. I made a list of everything I want based on his recommendations and, armed with my trusty registry gun, can register for everything without getting overwhelmed by all the other options in the store. I really feel confident that I'm going to get great stuff, now all I have to do is wait for it...AAHHHH!Book Review: Good addition to any kitchen library
Summary: 4 Stars
This book is a big help to any fledgling foodie, especially those who don't have Food Network and can't watch "Good Eats". Alton covers all manner of tools and gear, giving examples of what each is good for, what they're not good for, and recipes that make use of them. He can help you decide what you really need for your style of cooking and level of expertise.
For example, he tells you what to look for when buying knives, blenders, baking dishes, etc. He's not shy about telling you which brands and models of products he likes and uses, although they tend to be top-end, expensive ones. But he gives you enough information that if you buy a less expensive product, you get good quality, and your money's worth.
As with any Alton Brown project, this book has science, lots of humor, and funky diagrams and pictures. It's an enjoyable read, and a book you'll find yourself thumbing through whenever you think you need to buy another gadget or two from Amazon.
Book Review: Can a Kitchen Implement Book Be Interesting? YES!
Summary: 4 Stars
How interesting can a book on kitchen implements be? I have always loved kitchen gadgets and machines, and although I'm the one who drags my wife through the kitchenware sections of stores, I still asked this question about this book. Well, it is a very interesting book, and I wish I had read this before buying most of what's in my kitchen.
Alton Brown is the host of the Food Network show GOOD EATS. The show was first brought to my attention by a local radio morning show DJ. Alton is a sort of combination of Julia Childs and Mr. Wizard with a little wackiness of Jeff Corwin thrown in. After quickly getting addicted to the show, I wondered if Alton had any books, and my search led me to GEAR FOR YOUR KITCHEN.
In the short time I've been watching the show, he's twice lifted his fire extinguisher and said, "This is the only unitasker in my kitchen." That philosophy permeates this book. You will also find that he will often use non-kitchen tools if he feels they perform the task better. He serves pie with a masonry trowel and scapes dough with a drywall taping knife.
He's not afraid to name names, which is extremely beneficial and not often seen in books (Don't want to upset potential advertisers!). So instead of just describing what to look for in an item, he tells you what item(s) meets those requirements. Of course, this risks making the book quickly dated. He is also not afraid to say what items he's abandoned when they were poorly "updated," such as now recommending the Kitchenaid food processor over his once-favorite Cuisinart because Cuisinart changed the toggle switch to a membrane switch. Hopefully, some of the revelation will guide the manufacturers to provide better products.
The book is very easy to read, and reads like listening to the author on his show. The layout is very attractive. The book is punctuated with interesting sidebars giving historical information on the materials and products. There are actually a handful of recipes using the tools described in that section. For example, the section on food processors includes a recipe for Hummus. The book is full of photos of recommended items. There is a several-page table on cooking utensil materials: what they are, what they're good for, and what they're not. Some of these sidebars and tables are very appealing to an engineer like me (Alton Brown, in general, probably appeals to engineers like me), but may be boring to others. You can skip many of them without much damage.
Chapters are Pots and Pans, Sharp Things (knives and slicers), Small Things with Plugs (electric countertop kitchen appliances), Kitchen Tools Unplugged (pretty much any tool that doesn't fall into the other categories), Storage and Containment, and a potentially ho-hum chapter on Safety and Sanitation, which wasn't so bad. I could probably benefit from this last chapter, although (famous last words) I've never gotten sick from anything I made in my kitchen. It's harder explaining to my wife why I'm buying spray bottles and squeegees.
I can offer a few suggestions for improvements. Mainly, additional illustrations are needed to help describe differences in some items. He could use diagrams to describe different kinds of pots and pans, different turners and spatulas, and the different whisks. He does this very thing describing different kinds of knives and the parts of the knives, but falls down on the job in the other sections. There are text descriptions like "straight sides," "curved sides," "flared sides," "sides that curve outward," "they all have an offset angle built into them either at the tip or in the handle," and others. It can be hard to conceive in your mind (or maybe it's really simple, and I'm just messed up because I'm an engineer and he's not describing what plane he's working in, what line he's referring the angle to, etc.) By "straight sides" does he mean "vertical?"
And p. 192 confuses me. Alton insists there is a difference between turners and spatulas, but under "Wide, Solid Turner," he describes a particular product he owns, and there is a photo of it with a caption that clearly describes it as the same item, but calls it a "spatula." Furthermore, the next section, "Cake Spatulas," the first describing spatulas, refers to "the spatula described above." Ugh. Which is it? Are spatulas and turners the same or not?
OK. Minor point.
Mr. Brown does concedes that there may be a few good unitaskers, and admits to owning a few, but only if they do a job you need a done a lot, and it does it very well. Oh...and he does discuss fire extinguishers.
I don't think I'll personally purchase this book since it is in the my local library, and it's not something I think I'll have to refer to frequently. However, if you don't have access to it, or want to keep it around for the recipes (or have an unlimited book budget and bookcase space), I'd highly recommend purchasing GEAR FOR YOUR KITCHEN.
Book Review: A very helpful and easy to read book.
Summary: 5 Stars
I bought this books several months ago because I was planning on reequipping my kitichen. I found Mr. Brown's advice to be sound and easy to follow. After having followed several of his suggestions on both what to and not to buy as far as kitichen equipment goes, I have found that it is easier to make great food at home. His advice about the diffent types and qualities of all sorts of kitichen equipment has saved me money already and will continue to save me money in the long run by directing me towards the right tools for the right purposes, and by directing me towards tools of good quality. Mr. Brown backs up his advice with sound and times somewhat scientific explinations.
Though the subject of this book might not be interesting all people, it is indeed easy to read. I found myself just sitting down and reading through large chunks of this book thanks to Mr. Brown's approchable, often amusing, and very pleasent writing style.