Ratio: The Simple Codes Behind the Craft of Everyday Cooking

I've been cooking without recipes for 20 years now, pretty much since I could reach the counter, and I thought I had a pretty good grasp of the fundamentals of home cooking. Still, there are certain things that remained mystical. For some reason, we think of dough as something only a baker can make. It's not. It's 5 parts flour and 3 parts water. Home-made pies are too much trouble, right? Wrong. I can make a pie dough in less time than a typical TV commercial break (and now I know where the term 'easy as pie' came from). Homemade mayo is great, everyone knows that, but emulsions are hard to make and easy to break, right? Wrong. Just make sure you have the proper ratio of water to oil and you'll be fine (and you can easily re-emulsify if it does break). If you're a novice in the kitchen, this book is going to really do a lot for you. You'll walk past the cake mixes and straight to the bags of flour. You'll find yourself never throwing leftovers away because leftovers+stock=fantastic soup. You'll transcend simple bread baking (which is still quite enjoyable) and discover the splendor of choux paste. More importantly however, if you're very comfortable in the kitchen as I was, but still see a division between home cooking and fine cuisine, this is even more so the book for you. It will help bring things to your plate that you thought were reserved for the outer world. The best bread is the bread you bake. The best sauce is the sauce you dream up. The best soup is the one you made from scraps. Of special note is the very important fact that everything in this book is not just possible, but it's easy as well. I am a big Alton Brown fan, and his endorsement of this book played a big part in my purchasing it, but ironically it was Alton himself that gave rise to much of my fear of trying to make certain types of food. As much as I love him, sometimes Alton makes things sound more complicated and delicate than they are. Ruhlman does the exact opposite and makes you realize just how simple most things are (or the foundations of those things at least). I've made some pretty bad stuff in my experiments so far, but the important thing is I know what made them bad and how to correct next time. I also understand how to manipulate ingredients to vary the results of the finished food (even when baking), which is priceless. The bottom line is this: whether you're an experienced home cook or a slave to box mixes, you will learn a lot from Ratio and will be rewarded constantly. There hasn't been a Sunday morning since this book hit my door that hasn't been spent enjoying fresh, hot biscuits (3 parts flour, 1 part fat, 2 parts liquid; 5 minutes from brain to oven). Enjoy.

This book makes so much sense! The section on stock alone is worth the price of the book. I'm encouraged me to make my own without having to contemplate hours and hours of careful tending. And I love being given the tools to be creative with doughs and batters without having to continually refer to a recipe.

I grew up thinking that cooking was about recipes. My grandmother had to be using recipes, but when asked for one it might include instructions such as a couple of pinches of salt or a spoon of bacon grease. I assumed that she had a recipe. I suspect now that a lifetime of cooking had taught her instinctively to use ratios. This presented me with quite a conundrum. When I started to make cornbread she was no longer around. How did she make it? My mom had some approximation, I could find a bazillion recipes. But how much flower to cornmeal? Milk, buttermilk, no milk? Eggs? Oil? My options became more confusing as I watched Alton Brown and I learned about substitutions. Eggs and avocados are compositionally very similar, they can be substituted for each other in some preparations. What!?! How can I ever make sense of this? "Ratio" is a large piece of the solution to this part of the cooking puzzle. Michael Ruhlman in his latest book has taken much of the mystery of the why out of cooking. Cornbread, pancakes, or cookies are what they are because of the proportions of flour/cornmeal to fat to egg to liquid to sugar. So cornbread is cornbread whether it uses 1/2 C of flour and 1 1/2 of cornmeal or one of each. It is up to me to find the right flavors of the end result, but using the right ratios I should end up with cornbread. Mr. Ruhlman is technically a good writer. But he is also interesting and engaging. Far too often technical books become dry recitations of recipes, techniques, and procedures. This is not the case with "Ratio". Some of the material that is presented may be repetitive, but that is what is necessary in a book like this. It is a book that you will read through once. But then you will want to keep it close for reference. When you do pick it up to look up how to make corned beef you do not want to have to go back and look at the canadian bacon section to determine what the purpose of sodium nitrate is. There are many recipes presented, but they are just places to start. Included with the recipes are numerous variations designed to get the cook to think beyond the ratio and imagine what they could do to make the basic food into something different and extraordinary. For me this book has opened up a new way of thinking about food. I am inspired and excited about and not quite as intimidated by things I have not tried because of it. It has expanded my cooking horizons and made me think. That is the best recommendation I can make for any book. It is very accessible and you will not be disappointed by it.

I don't claim to be a chef, I wouldn't even go so far as to call myself a cook. I rarely venture outside the comfort zone of a microwave or a toaster oven. However, between Ruhlman's incredibly engaging writing style and exceptional mastery of the information, I found myself drawn to experiment. Recipes certainly have their place and can be useful tools. I've begun to discover, however, that only using recipes put me into a position of not ever learning anything and falling continuously into the "I can't cook" mantra. Learning the ratios and the ideas behind them left me feeling that not only might I be able to accomplish something (and the results are certainly tasty), but gave me an understanding and appreciation for why people might enjoy cooking. In short, you don't need to be an expert to get a lot out of this book, although I suspect even the most talented among us would learn something. Ratio definitely belongs on the shelf next to all the recipe books you'll end up not using.

Ever since Ruhlman first started pondering this book on his blog years ago, I've been eagerly anticipating its arrival, and it has not disappointed. The theory of ratio and its present and historical value are engagingly presented, and the book quickly ushers openminded readers to the kitchen to see these things at work themselves. So far I have baked two "experiments" I would never have had the bravery to tackle without this knowledge, and both have been educational and delicious accomplishments! This is not a cookbook -- indeed, it is an anti-cookbook. Those expecting complex recipes, or the "best" way to make something, will be dissatisfied. This is a manual for real cooks who want to understand the fundamental underpinnings of what makes food FOOD in order to play, tweak, recontextualize, and personalize their methods in infinite variations. It's a book for culinary explorers who don't wish to be, pardon the pun, spoon-fed. As always, Ruhlman's fresh, engaging, personal writing style leaves this an entertaining read even if you're not stopping every few pages to try your hand at the techniques. (If telling you it was a real page-turner while I was awaiting jury duty doesn't convince you, I don't know what will!)