JadeVibe

Essential Cuisine

By Michel Bras (out of print).

If you want this book, be prepared to dig deep: it sells for about US$250 on the rare occasions it's listed on eBay. (We got ours a few years ago, at the Michel Bras restaurant in Toya, Japan). Bras is a Michelin three star chef with a restaurant near Laguiole, a French village famous for its beautiful knives. Essential Cuisine is an aspirational cookbook; the recipes aren't necessarily difficult but they require a lot of commitment on the part of the cook, with each dish requiring many elements. Shellfish-stuffed pumpkin, for instance, calls for cooked shellfish, several types of basil 'with different colours and scents', fried bread, bouillon made from leeks, shallots and garlic, and an olive oil emulsion. A dessert requires peanut pate sable, nougatine, creme fromagere, toasted peanut infusion and ras-al-hanout (spice mix) coulis. Presentations are simply gorgeous: spare, whimsical, modern and - most importantly - appetising.

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