Tyler Florence's Real Kitchen: An Indespensible Guide for Anybody Who Likes to Cook

Simply put, this book is the reason I enjoy cooking today. Other reviewers have claimed, correctly, that the ingredients may be difficult to find for certain recipes, or that the instructions may occasionally be complicated, even confusing. These claims are true, but I want to say as respectfully and humbly as I possibly can that these reviewers may be missing the point of Tyler's cooking, which is to create a child-like (and I mean that in a very positive way) curiosity and passion for food, and to make meals that are so delicious that you'll forget your own name while savoring the flavors. Tyler cooks for excellence. He doesn't want to make just pork chops; he wants to make the best pork chops you've ever had in your life. And the recipe in this book, "Thick Pork Chops with Spiced Apples and Raisins," will make the best pork chops you've ever had in your life, guaranteed. The recipes are hard but far from impossible; some of them are time-consuming, but over time they get easier and easier. I don't even need to look at the recipe for the pork chops any more, and considering how many ingredients there are, that's an accomplishment. But that's the beauty of these recipes - they're so consistently excellent that you'll keep coming back for more, and as you do, you'll start picking up the little things that make up each flavor, and before you even realize it, you'll find yourself a better cook than you ever were before, excited about food rather than just stuffing something down your throat three times a day. Before I read this book, I couldn't tell the difference between thyme and sage, or anything else leafy and green. Now I don't even have to look; my nose can tell the difference immediately. Again, I don't mean any disrespect to the other reviewers who didn't care for this book, because it isn't for everybody. But if you want to be genuinely excited about dinner again, or if you want to inspire a really healthy love for food amongst your friends and family, then I recommend this book. Tyler loves food because he loves life, and it shows.

I've taken up cooking as a hobby for about 1 ½ years now, and judge a cookbook on how well it improves my overall cooking ability. Based on that score, this is easily one of the best cookbooks I have in my small cooking library of about 15 books. This book even improved my preparation of seemingly mundane items such a scrambled eggs and green beans.I like the fact that Florence presents a number of traditional recipes that are flavorful, without hitting you over the head with a bunch of spices, and reasonably sophisticated, without requiring long hours in the kitchen. That can be a fine line, and this book walks it well. And like his FoodNetwork show, Food 911, he presents techniques with the recipes, which can make quite a difference. Fans of his Food 911 show will recognize some of the recipes.Specifically, the scone recipe produced some of the best scones I've ever had, and I had no prior experience with baking scones. I didn't follow Tyler's advice very carefully on the Stir Fried Beef and Green Beans dish, a screwed up the steps to fry tangerines and beef. It still tasted pretty good! The New York Cheesecake was addictive, and the simple green bean side dish with walnuts, shallots, and lemon juice was very easy to make, yet had an excellent and unique flavor. Other main courses in this book turned out excellent and are going to be served in my house for years to come. I'm eager to try many of the others I haven't gotten to yet.I would caution that the one downside to the book is that a few times, I found the preparation time for a step in the recipe would take a significantly different time than what the recipe called for. For example, Tyler suggested wilting the spinach for the pan-fried tofu for thirty seconds. In practice, this took 2-3 minutes. I had a similar experience with another reviewer with the baked salmon. (I just left it in the oven longer.) The picture in the book with the scones recipe caused me a double take, before I realized they probably used a stock photo, instead of one of the actual recipe. For these reasons, I recommend any cook using the recipes here to be careful, because it does throw a few small curves at you. For complete beginners, I would not recommend it for this reason.Forgive the cliché, but if I could only have one cookbook, this would be it. It really improved my performance in the kitchen and presents a great range of recipes.

Tyler writes in his preface: "I hope you have as much fun tearing through this cookbook as my team and I did creating it."Goal reached, Tyler! This cookbook is Tyler! His laid back, easy going, fun loving spirit exudes forth in this recipe collection. Not pretentious food, just good, solid cusine of all types and for all occassions. From sophisticated to the simple, for one or two, to a block party, they're all covered in slightly over 300 pages with four-color, sharp bright energetic photos, and great commentary running: e.g. one of my favs: "Behind every great culture there is a kitchen." Multiple cultures are well represented here, Eastern, Mexican, tropical, Italian, etc.This is well balanced, creative and unique in its style and wide variety of cuisine, with such sections as "Table For Two" "One Pot Wonders".

I have owned this cookbook for exactly one week and I have already used four of the recipes (successfully!)--and I hardly ever used a cookbook in the past. I have volumes of cookbooks on the shelves in my kitchen, but I purchased most of them because they had pretty pictures. Often I find that the beautiful cookbooks supply recipes that are too complicated for the novice cook (like me)and require ingredients that are difficult to find. Like his TV show (Food 911), the recipes in "Real Kitchen" are unfussy to prepare, the ingredients are readily available at most grocery stores, and the results are so elegantly satisfying. He puts interesting,innovative twists on old favorites, like roasted chicken with Moroccan spices and crepes with figs and ricotta. The recipes I have tried thus far are the blueberry scones with lemon glaze--to which my English husband gave high praise, horseradish burgers with Havarti and tomato remoulade--a real hit at our barbecue, cold fried chicken--just like my grandma's since you soak it in buttermilk, and a blueberry-lemon tart--delectable. I highly recommend this cookbook to any kitchen novice. The text is witty, the layout is easy on the eyes, and yes--the photos are fabulous.

Okay, so I have a huge crush on Tyler like any other woman who has seen him on Food 911. That said, this is still the best cookbook I have bought in a long time. Although most of the recipes involve simple ingredients and are accessible even to those with only a basic culinary skills, the result is full-flavored and elegant food. While I love to cook, I have resisted investing in cookbooks. I found it wasteful to only make a few special recipes from a book. With Tyler's book, you get a glipmse of cuisine from a wide variety of cultures. At the same time, most recipes don't require exotic ingredients that may be hard to come by. This book is true to Tyler's show. His goal is to get people who love cooking to try anything and be successful at it. Like it says in title this is truly "an indispenable book for anybody who likes to cook". Thanks Tyler, I have been waiting for this one.