Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: 0743299787
Manufacturer: Scribner
Average Customer Review: 
(From 17 total reviews)
List Price: $24.00
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Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com:
Amazon Significant Seven, November 2007: Inspired by the Strunk and White classic, Michael Ruhlman’s The Elements of Cooking will quickly prove to be an essential culinary reference for both seasoned cooks and novices who might not know gravlax from gremolata. After a thorough “Notes on Cooking,” Ruhlman, a prolific cookbook author and popular blogger, settles in for an opinionated and informative A-Z roundup (from Acid to Zester) of cooking terms, lessons, and techniques reduced to their essential essence. Even with only one recipe (for veal stock), it’s a must-have for every kitchen library–a book that will help you re-think your approach to food. –Brad Thomas Parsons
Product Description:
Modeled on Strunk and White’s The Elements of Style, The Element of Cooking is an opinionated reference work destined to stand alongside the shelf among the great works of the kitchen: On Food and Cooking by Harold McGee, Escoffier, The Joy of Cooking and the CIA’s The Professsional Chef. Unlike those monoliths of the kitchen, this book is slim, clear and very to the point: here are the things you need to know how to do, here are the words you need to speak the langauage of food, and, most importanly, here are the ways you need to think about an approach food, the absolute essentials that every, not only good but great, cook knows.
Just as Strunk and White sits on the desk of every student and professional who has to write a sentence, The Elements of Cooking is destined to be the go-to book for any amatuer or professional cook. It defines terms, offers the basic ratios of important preparations (sauces, cakes, etc.) so that you will never need a recipe again and provides countless, simple chef’s “secrets” that every home cook should know.
In eight introductory essays, Ruhlman has pared down the essentials of great cooking: understanding how to salt food; making stock; making sauces; using heat properly; working with eggs; having the right tools (there are only 5 essentials); what to read and use as a resource; and lastly, and most importantly, the use of finesse, that extra attention to detail that turns food glorious.
Simply written, this is a book that can be read in an afternoon and it’s lessons be practiced for a lifetime.
Customer Reviews
An excellent primer by International Diva
This is a good primer about the fundamentals (elements) of cooking. It is French biased, definitely. But the essays about the use of salt, heat and stock are invaluable. This is an excellent purchase for more than casual cooks to read through, then keep handy for reference.
Excellent intro for an amateur chef by M. C. McCracken
You have been cooking for a few years but lack a sense of how it fits together. The first section covers the basic ideas around heat, salt, tools, stocks, sauces, eggs, and other items. The rest of the book is a glossary of cooking terms, with substantial discussion of each item.
Having a framework is all important. You can choose the right cooking method for a dish given the principles covered. Salt can be used with confidence and without worrying about going too far since you understand the objective.
If you are a “foodie” then this book can help you enjoy the dishes prepared by others. You will understand why certain dishes are cooked with a given technique, the key role of sauces, and gain new respect for the basics of good stocks.
Buy it, but know its limitations by Shelley Ryan
I agree with many of reviewer Rebecca Huston’s points. I’m posting my own review here anyhow because I think it might be useful to compare this book to others I’ve been reading.
Love love love the way Ruhlman writes about food and chefs overall in his other books, so I was excited to get a copy of “The Elements of Cooking.” Then I found myself a little disappointed with the eight essays at the start. I looked back at my Alton Brown book “I’m Just Here for the Food” (v2) and decided the sections there on stock, salt, tools, etc. were way more useful in Alton’s book. Ruhlman waxes poetic with his opinions… but Alton is vastly more instructive. (Do you want to get truly inspired — and laugh your butt off — about stock? Get Bourdain’s “”Les Halles Cookbook!”)
I did like the A-to-Z part of this for its definitions. However, they weren’t very instructive, either. I can’t fault Ruhlman for that, because he doesn’t claim this is an instructional book. I recently got a copy of James Peterson’s new book “Cooking” which doesn’t cover all the techniques or terms in Ruhlman’s glossary, but it gives step-by-step info and photos on a lot of them.
Bottom line, I suppose, is that there is no perfect book on food, not even McGee’s “On Food and Cooking,” which I also tunneled through. Which book(s) you like depend on your goal — be a better cook at home or be more like a restaurant chef? I’m leaning toward Alton for the former and (maybe) Patterson for the latter. Buy Ruhlman’s “Elements” for the short and clear opinions and definitions that you can learn in-depth elsewhere, not for overnight-success-at-the-stove details. 
An Instant Classic/We Have Two Copies by Stephen Green
“The Elements of Cooking” belongs right next to Julia Child’s classic “Joy of Cooking” on your kitchen bookshelf.
If you have even the slightest curiosity about what makes for good food (or food good!), Ruhlman’s latest is a must. Quite by accident, my wife and I got each other copies for Christmas — and we have no intention of exchanging either one. We’ve been reading our individual copies at the same time, and we’ve both, on average, learned four cool new things per page.
The premise of the book is simple: Distilling everything the professional chef needs to know, into a single, slender volume for the home chef. If that sounds complicated or impossible, please believe me when I say that Ruhlman has done it. He writes with an authoritative-yet-breezy style, and his enthusiasm for food is contagious. And like Child, Ruhlman is unabashedly a fan of eggs and butter and fat. You will be, too, long before you’ve finished reading.
And you’ll gain a new understanding and appreciation of food.
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