Cooked: A Natural History of Transformation

In "Cooked" Michael Pollan takes a look at the major processes that go into food preparation which he breaks into four categories - fire, water, air and earth. As with other books by Pollan there is a deep message in the writing and an underlying goal of the author to revitalize the reader's interest in our historic food culture and the approachability of it at the individual level in modern society. The book sets the stage in the introduction asking the question of why to cook. He notes that the amount of time spent in the kitchen by people has declined dramatically in the last 50 years and how the argument of division of labour and time optimization might hold partially true- being totally removed from preparing what we consume to survive is much much more complicated than such simple economic logic. The book sets the stage by discussing the BBQ. It is a perfect opening to reinforce the author's introductory criticims of modern food preparation as the social atmosphere defined by BBQs will always be an obvious reminder of the deeply social aspects of certain kinds of food preparation. The author researches heavily and takes the reader with him through his journey of finding the authentic BBQ. In reading the chapter i have a much larger where to eat next list... But the author combines food journalism of BBQ today with a historical account of the roast in our history and discusses some fairly deep concepts about what makes us human. The author introduces the idea that what makes us human is actually the ability to cook as by cooking we reduce the time and energy spent in digestion and allows for people to have evolved much larger brains that require economy of eating time. Not a central thesis of the book by any means, just an illustration that the philosophy of the author and examples all weave together to bring purpose to the writing. The author then goes into water and boiling food. This is less adventurous and seems slightly more introspective. Cooking food by boiling it is a more recent human invention as its dependent on a vessel to boil the water in after one has discovered fire. It is also a more domestic form of food preparation and as a result has more gender role connotations. The atmosphere of the campfire is different from the atmosphere of the person preparing a stew. Nonetheless the author discusses how all cultures boil food in various forms to both cook and improve flavour and at its core is a fairly common practice. The chemistry of what happens is discussed and the lessons learnt in terms of process. The author details how for himself the slow process of the food preparation filtered through to the family time enjoyed while talking and slowly eating the slow cooked meal. The author then moves into air and discusses baking. Baking is a form of food preparation that was subcontracted out of the kitchen hundreds of years ago (compared to roasting and boiling for example). The author gives himself the project of learning how to bake and starts in his home state of California. It is really interesting and it makes me feel like i am bread deprived. The science of breadmaking is really interesting and the industrial process of making the flour has the effect of reducing the nutritional content. The process of recombining nutrients to the bland white breads in modern supermarkets is discussed and shown to be predominantly a failure in terms of achieving nutritional goals. The author starts with a successful baking of a white flour sourdough and eventually works with original wholeweat cultures. I read this chapter and want to try the bread as well as all the bakeries that went into shaping this chapter... The author finally moves into Earth which is really his description for allowing nature and microbiology to take its course on food. In particular fermentation is detailed in two forms. The first is through pickling and the author tries to make sauerkraut, kimchi, and various other pickled foods. This seems the most straightforward to attempt at home as its a very slow process but the nuances are discussed and as with all forms of food preparation the author discusses there is an art to it given the science has its limits given the multitude of processes that are occuring. The author then discusses the art of cheesemaking and discusses the health aspects of the cheesemaking process. The author ends with a discussion of alcohol production and he attempts making beer. Given the beer kits involved are slightly more ready made than kits for other forms of food preparation, the first try for beer seems to turn out quite successfully on a a relative basis. The role of alcohol in social settings, its health contents and issues as well as its historic role througout civilization and consumption in the animal world is all discussed in a lively manner. I have always like Pollan's books. They are entertaining and have humor. Despite the lightheartedness of the writing the deeper message is one that should be considered. Cooking doesnt have to be a chore and the spillover effects of moving from processed food to home cooked are countless. For him with cooking - home atmosphere is better, nutrition is better, value for money is better and his experiences are better all the while his social fabric gets stronger. Obviously the message isnt for everyone to prepare all aspects of their food intake but to shift the balance away from always buying prepared and trying to minimize time cooking is a questionable goal. Despite not being active in the kitchen I feel more invigorated to try after reading this. I learnt quite a bit as well as enjoyed the read.

I read Michael Pollan's masterwork Cooked with great interest. This book takes a simple thing – food and how we prepare it – and delves deep into the underlying science and history of this subject. The book first discusses using fire and water for cooking. It covers topics such as the Maillard reaction, which gives food flavor, and the way a stewpot acts as a second stomach, in a sense, predigesting foods and opening up their nutritional value. I found the final section of the book, on fermentation, the most interesting. Fermentation ("cold fire") uses microorganisms to digest foods partially and to create flavors. The book highlights several key fermented foods – in particular, bread, wine, and cheese – and discusses various aspects of the fermentation process. First, considering bread, fermentation allows us to readily use grasses for food and reclaim much more solar energy. The book suggests that ~90 percent of the energy in food is lost at each step of the food pyramid; thus, being able to eat grass directly is a major triumph of the agricultural revolution. Of course, nowadays, we have taken this fantastic process even further and essentially industrialized grass in the form of white bread -- taking out much of the original nutrients, including fiber, and then putting different nutrients back in. Another exciting aspect of baking bread is what Pollan describes as an emergent phenomenon. Most other forms of cooking, for instance, heating by fire or warming in a pot, involve a simple extrapolation of the preparation conditions. Baking bread is different. It is a "system property," where one combines various ingredients and makes something completely different than the original constituents. Pollan also describes how gluten acts almost like an elastic to create cavities in bread that can fill with gas and facilitate rising. The next fermented food Pollan discusses is wine. To make it clear how easy it is to achieve fermentation, he shares humorous stories from his childhood of fermenting grape juice and having the vessel burst. He also brings up a philosophical question of whether we have domesticated Saccharomyces cerevisiae or whether it has domesticated us: alcohol itself, which is the product of many fermentations, is toxic to most organisms, yet we have evolved enzymes and pathways in our liver to break it down. Pollan also talks about how one can understand the different flavors of wine in terms of the various microorganisms available. Humans, in a sense, have co-evolved with wine and can benefit from having a glass a day based on a variety of health indicators. The final section on fermentation talks about cheese. Cheese represents the product of rotting or decay in its extreme. Pollan describes cheese fermentation as a multistep process where, initially, microorganisms aerobically colonize the center of a bit of milk, digesting it partially and raising its pH, but eventually, the increasing acidity fouls the microbes' nest. Then, there is effectively an ecological succession where other species of bacteria replace the initial microbes; this continues to raise the pH. What I found most interesting is that a secondary fermentation then occurs from the outside of the cheese, where yeasts – which are aerobic – send in their hyphae and partially neutralize the increasing pH. The competition between these different fermentations gives rise to new chemistries, flavors, and compounds. Cheese is also unusual in that it represents the nexus for competition between two current groups of people: the fermentos, those who believe in the importance of microorganisms for health and for giving food its flavors, and the Pasteurians, those who want to purge all foods of microbes. Their differences are evident when choosing a vessel for making cheese: should it be made out of old rotten, moldy wood or modern stainless steel? The overall discussion of fermented foods points to the legacy of the agricultural revolution and the great importance of microbes in day-to-day life. Altogether, I highly recommend this book. I find myself revisiting many of the book's points when I enjoy various meals and purchase things at the grocery store.

In his latest book, Cooked, Michael Pollan serves up another bestseller that looks at the relationships between us and the food we eat. Struck by the realization that "the less cooking we were doing in our own lives, the more that food and its vicarious preparation transfixed us," Pollan sets out to explore the art of cooking for himself. Cooked reads like a how-to book for the uninitiated in the kitchen while still providing plenty of more detailed analysis for seasoned cooks. Divided into chapters based on the four classical elements - Earth, Water, Air and Fire - Pollan personally explores the world of cooking where "the stuff of nature gets transformed into the things we eat and drink." In each chapter, Pollan learns about a corresponding cooking style: in Fire, he gets grilling lessons from a North Carolina barbecue pit master; in Water, he masters braises; in Air, he experiments with bread baking as he seeks to perfect the perfect sourdough loaf; and finally, in Earth, he explores various types of fermentation including pickling, cheese making and home brewing. Along the way, each of his teachers - from "the cheese nun" with a Ph.D. in microbiology to the "most famous fermentor in America" - is whole-heartedly devoted to his or her craft and, in the end, getting a glimpse into their lives and work is half the fun of the book. I've been a Michael Pollan fan since I first cracked the spine of The Botany of Desire more than a decade ago, but even I'll admit, there are a few points in the narrative where even the most devout reader's eyes may start to glaze over... like when Pollan gets mired in the details of the "all-important Lactobacillus sanfranciscensis" microbe. But only briefly. Because along with straight-up cool science, he also mixes into his narrative a bit of history, art and literature along with a dash of religion ("bread... is an everyday proof of the possibility of transcendence" and sex for good measure ("a cheese that stinks - of manure, of sex - offers a relatively safe way for us to flirt with forbidden desires"). As in his previous books, Pollan extolls the ills (literally) of processed foods and cautions against our over-reliance on corporations, "whose `dead food' is damaging our health and `homogenizing' our experience." When asked why we don't spend more time preparing our own meals, apparently most people claim a lack of time. But Pollan points out that, "in the last decade or so, we've all found two hours a day to be on line outside of work." So what gives? Another entire book could be devoted to answering that question, but Pollan doesn't take on that job in Cooked. Instead, he argues that we would all do well to start getting reacquainted with our kitchens because "cooking is one of the most interesting and worthwhile things we humans do." While it may be cheaper and easier to rely on others to provide for our basic needs, "to live that way comes at a price, not least to our sense of competence and independence." We are so disconnected from the makers of our food, Pollan argues, that we stop thinking about what is actually in the food we eat or where it comes from, much less the labor, money or energy it took to get it onto our plate. Worst of all, we forget that "what presents itself to us in the marketplace as a product is in truth a web of relationships between people... and all the other species on which we still depend." (Yes, even bacteria.) In the end, Cooked turns out to be a commentary on the way we live. It's true, as in his past books, that Pollan is critical of capitalism, and in particular consumerism, as the downfall of democracy and independence in its most literal sense. The antidote (or part of it, anyway) that he offers up here is cooking. To cook, he says, is to reclaim a bit of independence, and perhaps a bit of pride as well. It's what separates us from the rest of the natural world and, paradoxically, also what keeps us connected to it. It is also an invitation to modern society (that's you and me) to reconnect with the world. It's true that few of us have the luxury of spending hours in the kitchen making all of our meals from scratch, but even small culinary contributions help us to reconnect with the natural world around us. As Pollan himself admits, "The most important thing I learned ... is how cooking implicates us in a whole web of social and ecological relationships: with plants and animals, with the soil, with farmers, with the microbes both inside and outside our bodies, and, of course, with the people our cooking nourishes and delights." And he invites us "to alter, however slightly, the ratio between production and consumption" in our lives. This, he believes, can make a difference. After trying his hand at home brewing, Pollan says, "The beer in that bottle, I'm reminded as soon as I brew it myself, ultimately comes not from a factory, but from nature - from a field of barley snapping in the wind, from a hops vine clambering over a trellis, from a host of invisible microbes feasting on sugars." So, if preparing our own home-cooked meals makes us think just a little bit more about the world around us and how, ultimately, we all depend on one another to survive, then certainly a little time with a knife and cutting board won't hurt anyone. For novices in the kitchen - or first-time Pollan readers - Cooked is sure to whet your appetite. For the rest of us, it is the continuation of an ongoing commentary on food, nature and modern society that will not fail to satisfy.

It was very interesting to read "Cooked" shortly after writing my own cookbook, The Wholesome Breakfast Cookbook . For just when it is thought that mealtime can't get simpler than microwaving your dinner in the oven or picking up a bagel and coffee for breakfast, Pollan comes along and shows you how such an apparently simple decision can have profound consequences. He brings in religion, gender, sociology, environmentalism, politics, etc. and shows you how complicated such a seemingly mundane decision really is. But maybe that is why our food decisions can have such far reaching effects, because they are decisions that every one of us has to make every day of our lives. After the introduction, "Cooked" is divided into four parts representing grilling over fire, stove top cooking, baking, and fermentation. When I first started reading, I did not expect to be much interested in the earth/fermentation section, but it actually proved to be one of the most interesting and thought-provoking sections of Pollan's book. The whole concept of how our bodies need live-culture foods to be healthy is very interesting. One weakness of the book is that I am not sure how practical his ideas are. I am a person who regularly cooks for my family, but I also have the time as I don't work outside the home. As Pollan repeatedly states a lot of time and patience are required to cook at home. And I completely agree with him. As he says, cooking is not actually that difficult after you have practiced for a while, but it is a very time-consuming process. Pollan is all for the whole family working on the cooking but I am not sure this will really be attainable by many. Yes, there are some men who enjoy cooking, but in general they like the more dramatic cooking as Pollan discusses in the fire section of the book. While I have personally known a couple where the husband and wife, both of whom worked, cooked in a beautifully synchronized manner and served absolutely delicious food; it takes a very strong commitment. They spent hours cooking each evening together and also a lot of preparation time on the weekends. It is great if it works for you, but I don't see it as that practical for many. However this in no way detracts from the value of the book. It is a wonderful work as to be expected of Pollan. It is entertaining, informative, and thought-provoking. If you already cook, this book will affirm you in this choice and show you many benefits to your decision that you might now have been aware of as well as encourage you to branch out a bit more. If you are not cooking much, it is hoped that this book will inspire you to give it a try. As Pollan shows, the choice to cook or not cook has a much greater influence on our lives than most of us think.

This is an important book. It is, more than anything else, a social history of cooking woven together by a personal journey. As Pollan points out, cooking is one of the oldest of human activities. There is evidence, certainly more indicative than definitive, that cooking began with our hominid ancestors, likely homo erectus, mastered fire and started cooking close to two million years ago. By this line of thinking, cooking, which transforms foods into tasty treats from which we can extract far more nutrition, had a lot to do with the journey we have been on to develop larger brains and smaller guts. All of this changed in the last 60 years, as we decided to let corporations cook instead of people and as we confused food for what used to be called field rations. In economic terms, we became consumers rather than producers. Pollan explores this history and the recent changes by structuring the four parts of the book in terms of the four traditional elements, fire, water, air, and earth. In fire, he pursues the art of the traditional souther whole hog barbecue. In water he pursues the tradition of braising. In air he pursues bread baking. In earth he pursues several forms of fermentation, pickling, cheese making and brewing. In each of these parts, he combines a personal journey of education with a well researched and well written piece of the natural history. Much of what he says is quite contentious. The corporate food processors, agribusinesses, marketers and Pasteurians (what a great term) continue to hold sway. What requires an explanation is that a series of diseases that were previously rare (e.g. cancer, hear disease, obesity, diabetes) have become common. While much of the science remains to be done, there is growing weight to the argument that it is the change of our status from producers of food (also known as cooks) to consumers of the output of corporate farms and kitchens that is the most important variable in this change. Personally, I cook both because I can and because the food I cook myself gives me far more pleasure that what I buy. I also feel my change from consumer to producer has made me more healthy. You may not agree with everything Pollan says, but his book is certainly worth the read.

I must admit that Pollan ir preaching to the choir here. I'm a dedicated amateur cook, and almost everything we eat is mostly scratch-cooked. I love experimenting with different techniques and improving my game, and I'm particularly looking forward to using info from the "Air" chapter to improve my "artisan" bread's taste, texture, and nutrition. I've read reviews that say that it's all very well to read about cooking, but it's rather like watching food shows on TV: people do that while eating processed food or take-out, because they think it's inaccessible. What's sad is- it's really not, at least for most people. Home from-scratch cooking is cheaper than eating out if what you buy is of any decent quality, and while Pollan rhapsodizes about mono-tasking in doing this, personally I use timers so I can both cook the onions for a half hour AND catch up online, stirring them once every 5 min or so. They really can amuse themselves most of the time! Similarly with all the other cooking he does- one does NOT have to dedicate 5 hours to brewing beer; one simply has to be around for those 5 hours while the process goes on, and intervene periodically. As with barbecue, and braises, and breads, and cheese, and even more so with wild fermentation of veg. So: I don't think people don't cook because of the crazy amount of hands-on time; hell, I've made Beef Wellington from scratch, including the puff paste, taking no more than around 45 min/day... but PLANNING. There's such an emphasis on getting food on the table in 30 min! 20 min! 15 min! that "slow food"- which doesn't take all that much more time in task, but takes longer elapsed- is scanted. I mean, there's pretty much nothing that I can make in 30 min from start to finish that I'd want to eat. Maybe a grilled cheese sandwich? but that depends on having decent bread, which I make... Anyway. I've done barbecue- at least semi-authentic; many, many braises and stews; a LOT of bread (we never buy bread, though I vary between stuff made in the bread machine and the more artisnal approaches which I am working to improve); and wild fermentation of excellent sauerkraut, kimchee, and various other veg, plus some cheesemaking (nothing aged yet; I don't have a "cave"), and both beer and wine. None are hard or especially complicated, though the cheese, beer, and wine can be a tad fussy, as can sourdoughs. Still: not actually inaccessible for anyone not living in a food desert, or working 3 jobs to try to make ends meet (and even then, if one can get decent veg and meat, a slow cooker will do wonders and needs no babysitting). I also very much appreciated that Pollan put this into a more modern context, rather than blaming women for stopping cooking. My own mother pretty much stopped from-scratch cooking when I was a kid (I'm now in my mid-50s), and relied more and more on stuff like hamburger helper, plus a few "shortcut" meals that were pretty awful. And she was not employed outside the home, so that wasn't the reason; I think it was simply the times, and the advertising. Pollan suggests that men and kids get into the kitchen; I support that! At one point I made a Family Rule: no one got to complain about dinner unless they were cooking 1 meal a week for the family. It worked great! and got my husband and kid into the kitchen. I digress. I really enjoyed this book, and look forward to exploring more about breads in particular. But right now there's a cabbage calling my name that needs to get shredded, salted, and start fermenting.

Cooking is not just an activity that involves you sweating it out in the kitchen, but it is an art in itself. If done correctly and patiently, using the right ingredients and techniques, you don’t just whip up great dishes, but create memories that will linger on in the mind of those who are lucky enough to eat it. In Cooked: A Natural History of Transformation by Michael Pollan, published in 2013, the author explores the impact of four of the most powerful elements of nature – air, water, fire and earth – on the food that we eat. From baking to fermenting, he experiments with some of the best chefs in the world to discover how beautifully these four elements shape and cook the food that we so love to eat. The entire world pauses to read a culinary book that is written by the renowned journalist, Michael Pollan. It is no wonder that after penning down several critically acclaimed non-fiction books based on food and culinary science such as In Defense of Food: An Eater’s Manifesto and The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals, his next piece of work, Cooked: A Natural History of Transformation, has taken the world by storm. It is difficult to find an author as passionate about food and the role it plays in the evolution of mankind as Pollan. So the book certainly deserves your attention if you love food. Readers have loved how the food systematically breaks down into the four sections of fire, air, earth and water giving ample explanation of how each of them shape and cook the food separately in their own unique way. It will take you on a journey starting from the basic techniques of cooking to how they have evolved over the centuries, and how this evolution has shaped our society and inter-personal relationships. The book also makes a point to remind its readers how the modern man is losing his touch with the real methods of cooking. Relying on processed food to take care of our nutritional requirements weakens us and the entire cycle of ecological inter dependence. In fact, the author claims that by adopting a healthier cooking practice, we can fight health issues successfully and go back to restoring our disturbed relationship with nature. In 2016 Pollan and Alex Gibney turned the book into a 4-part documentary series released exclusively on NetFlix which brought stunning visuals to Pollan’s story. This review was originally written for 27Press.com.

There's a war happening in America. Beachheads have been established in Berkeley. Park Slope streets run red with mistrust, neighbors eying one another and asking themselves `Are you one of THEM?' Partisans choose their banners: Gluten-Free for All Mankind, Viva the Vegans!, or We-Only-Eat-Kale-Grown-by-an-Authentic-Native-American-Named-Chief-Bloodhorse. COOKED is another manifesto (holy book?) in our twenty-first century food wars. Michael Pollan is a supremely talented food writer. Very few people in America can write a thirty page bread making scene with the kind of tension that Pollan brings to it. That isn't sarcasm. It's actually engaging. You want to see if he can successfully make bread at home. That's the best part of this book - Pollan makes the reader excited about cooking, and cooking as purely as one can with natural, unadulterated ingredients. After a long session with COOKED, you'll find yourself moseying over to Williams-Sonoma and imagining a more ambitious culinary life. Unfortunately, this is a 450 page book that could have been reduced to five mid-size articles in The New Yorker. The structure is broken down into sections corresponding to the Classical elements - Fire, Water, Air, and Earth. Such a simple plan proves inadequate for the meandering, convoluted theses jammed into the pages. Expect long, ponderous forays into the chemistry of cheese, the chemistry of fermentation, the chemistry of bread. He does a serviceable job of elucidating his gustatory Weltanschauung: processed/store-bought food=bad and local/organic/home-cooked/pseudo-paleo consumption=good. It's impossible not to see his point and agree with it (at least partially). But here's the problem: when you talk about how and what people should eat, you're talking about class and money. Tell a family of six in Arkansas, helmed by overworked parents, that they need to drop the KFC and prepare some bouillabaisse, and you'll probably be the one who ends up in the cauldron. Cooking requires time, money, and serenity - all things that flow abundantly in our coastal enclaves, but are scarce in the rest of the world. We are a fat nation because we eat a lot of food - that it's processed and store-bought is not the main problem. Pollan sees his at-home cooking solution as a national panacea, yet he only obliquely touches on the fundamental issues fueling our ever-expanding middle. This book will speak to the Whole Foodies and the Organic Diehards. It's a beautiful vision, one that certainly influenced me personally, but it rings of the idealistic hobbyist not the true peacemaker who seeks a realistic end to a deadly, mounting scourge.

This is a book about much more than cooking that is so gripping that it's hard to put down: hard to believe, but true. Michael Pollan has a great writing style that moves between the particular of the process he is discussing and the general of how this fits into the world as we know it...and explains how we are as we are. In between he tells great stories with lovely anecdotes that make every page memorable. The concept of 'hand taste', as described by his Korean kimchi-making teacher, which ends the book was the most moving story of all, and really helped me understand why cooking is so important to me. If like me you enjoy cooking and want to understand a bit more about why you like it, this is the book for you. If you like reading about cooking processes without forever having to skip recipes that disrupt the flow then this is for you too (there are four recipes at the end for those who cannot live without some in a book ostensibly on cooking). Finally, this book is most definitely for you if you want to understand how the basic processes that Michael Pollan describes have very much shaped the way our bodies work, and indeed our whole civilisation - it is that far-reaching. When I look back in ten years time I suspect this will remain one of the books that have most influenced my understanding of what it is to be human.

I started reading Cooked because I was watching the show in Netflix. (Same name if you are interested, and wonderfully made.) But I thought I was missing something, after all a book is often better than a show. Its a book with an interesting proposition, which relooks the way we connect with food, which forms the basic part of our existence. Its a critique of industrialization of food production. The disconnect between nature, agriculture and culture which is reflected in the way food in plated in front of us. Wonderful read.

Zu der überschaubaren Anzahl von Fähigkeiten, die den Menschen vom Tier unterscheidet, gehört, dass er seine Nahrung dergestalt modifiziert, dass sie besser schmeckt und vor allem leichter verdaulich ist. Die verschiedenen Formen der Zubereitung lassen sich in vier Methoden unterteilen, die zu sehr unterschiedlichen Zeiten in der Menschheitsgeschichte aufgetaucht sind: Das direkte Rösten über dem Feuer, Kochen mit Wasser, Backen und Fermentieren. Vier Prozesse, die Pollan mit einem leichten Augenzwinkern den vier Elementen des klassischen Altertums zuordnet: Feuer, Wasser, Luft und Erde. Dadurch erhält das Buch seine Struktur und Pollan allerlei Gelegenheiten zu philosophischen Exkursen. Pollan hat nicht nur das Gespräch gesucht mit namhaften Experten für die jeweilige Methode, die jeder für sich darum kämpfen, ihre Kunst auf ihr ursprüngliches Wesen zurückzuführen, sondern probiert auch alles zu Hause aus: Gart ganze Schweine, optimiert seine Fleischtöpfe, backt Brot, braut Bier und macht sein eigenes Sauerkraut - Slow Food in Perfektion. Ein Entwicklungsprozess, der sich über Jahre hingezogen hat und in dem seine Liebe zur Kocherei immer stärker wurde, je tiefer er in die Materie eindrang. Ausführlich erläutert Pollan die Prozesse und ihre kulturgeschichtliche Relevanz, wirft neues Licht auf scheinbar banale Vorgänge, geht auf angeborene und anerzogene Geschmäcker ein, beklagt, wie schon im Omnivorendilemma, wie weit wir uns von den Ursprüngen unserer Nahrung entfernt haben und was das für katastrophale Auswirkungen auf unsere Gesundheit hat (und die der Tiere, die wir essen), wundert sich mit Recht, warum wir wesentlich mehr Zeit mit dem Betrachten von TV-Kochshows verbringen als mit Kochen, bricht zahlreiche Lanzen für die Mikroorganismen, die uns beim Erzeugen und Verdauen unserer Nahrung assistieren und plädiert nicht ohne Humor für einen entspannteren, sprich weniger sterilen Umgang mit denselben. Das Garen von Rigatoni in Wasser wird übrigens im ganzen Buch kein einziges Mal thematisiert. Wie ausgerechnet das zu der Ehre gekommen ist, den Buchdeckel zu zieren, ist mir ein Rätsel.

A great book, and interesting journey through different methods of cooking. I love cooking so I was bound to enjoy this book, I now wish I had more time and mouths to feed to justify all the cooking I’d like to do

印象に残る本との出会いは、それこそご縁であり、人生のある時点での心の状態や興味の有りように、鍵が鍵穴にぴったり入るような、そして心や思考の扉が開かれるような感覚を覚える瞬間を齎してくれる。 Ｃｏｏｋｅｄ はそのような瞬間を齎してくれた。 還暦を少し過ぎ、男ながら料理を週末にチャレンジしだして半年、ふと新聞の書評欄で目に入った。 日本語の本は高いので、原書のペーパーバックを読む事にした。 構成は、火の料理ＢＢＱ，水の料理煮込み料理というか、男の私には色々変身可能な野菜スープの基礎、空気としてパン、そして発酵のサワークラウト。 ＢＢＱは河原でフランクフルトを焼き、焼きそばを作る等と思っては大間違い。 厳選した豚一頭をじっくり火加減に注意しながら丸焼きにするものだと教えられる。 しかも、その行為こそ、人間が生命を犠牲にして生きることの現実を直視し、神への感謝を感じるべき時なのだとも。 料理をしながら、哲学的な思考をし、玉ねぎを刻みながら禅の修行にもなることを学び、最後は自分でキムチをつくろうか、蜂蜜酒を作ろうか等とワクワクさせてくれる。 英語はビジネス書に特化した単語能力では知らない単語が多く、これはkindle で読むべき原書かなとも思った。 いずれにせよ、厨房好きの男性にお薦めの一書。