Molecular Gastronomy: Exploring the Science of Flavor (Arts and Traditions of the Table: Perspectives on Culinary History)

For the casual or unprofessional reader a title like Molucular Gastronomy has the allure of eating a bowl of stewed prunes. It sounds like a drudge, but physical chemist author Hervé This on the staff of the Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique in Paris, applies science to questions of food, cooking and eating and keeps it fascinating. He applies science to questions of why does a tannic wine taste awful when paired with a salad tossed with an acidic dressing, does beef marinade better in a white or red wine, and the best ways to soften lentils. He breaks his book up into four parts. Part one covers kitchen issues and he dissects many old saws of cooking either explaining why the actually work or showing why they don’t. Part two looks at flavor and how it works. In part three he applies science to issues such as bread baking, lumps in food, foams, Spanish Hams and foie gras. Part 4 addresses how the scince of gastronomy will impact the cuisine of tomorrow. He breaks the book up into digestible little bits – the 361 page book contains 101 subparts and subtracting out the introductions, the subparts run a page or two. Here and there they get a little technical but the majority are accessible to nontechnical reader while still of interest to the technical. Anyone interested in food, cooking or eating should find this book a fun read.

After reading the Italian translation a coupe of years ago, I was so much hoping for an English translation, and here it is; and it's brilliant! It's quite one thing to follow recipes and follow instructions, and quite another to understand at a physico-chemical level WHY you need to do things in a certain way. As a scientisty person- really, just as a curious person- you want to know what's happening to the meat that makes it tender and flavorful, or the cake just that right consistency. I guess the philosophy that best suits me is to understand the science so well that the art is set free to explore. If you understand WHY, you can also figure out HOW to change it. And more importantly for someone like me, you also know WHAT to do when you make mistakes ;) What makes the book particularly worth the $$ is the extent of the science- right down to the molecular basis of taste. If I had a complaint, it would be that the articles are WAY too short. This book seems like the summary of what would be the Vedas of food science.

Is very theorical for my taste but contains important information and tips to cook. Could use some pictures and images to make it more practical, idk.

A wonderful collection of answers to esoteric questions, some of which I had received from my children when they began cooking in their early years, (4-9 years old) and I have to admit that I did not know a lot of the correct answers. I wish that I had deard of this book, or that it was even available 40 years ago. The explanations are in relatively basic English, aside from the proper names of nerves and chemical compounds. I would not recommend this book for anyone looking for simplistic half-answers. The explanations do require some education in several areas of science, as well as Senior high-school English. I heartily recommend it to anyone who has a serious curiosity about why foods smell, feel, and/or taste good, bad, or indifferent.

This book is one of many that points to the relationship between science and the culinary arts: to the physical and chemical magician behind the curtain of delight. A book that attempts to do that has certain responsibilities and the greatest of these may be accuracy. I lost count of the mistakes, but some of the simplest are the temperature conversions from celcius to fahrenheit. The cook attempting any of the procedures in the book should double-check the temperatures recommended and the fahrenheit-based cook should just beware. The other important duty of such a book is clarity. Molecular Gastronomy isn't so much translated from the French as it transcribed by machine. Very often it's impossible to figure out through the haze of translation what the author is actually recommending. On a lesser level, one could ask for a bit of originality and this book does have a bit. The level of ambition is also lamentably low: does anyone really think that putting a spoon in a champagne bottle delays the decarbonation? Are blowing and stirring the only methods of cooling over-hot coffee? How concerned are you that the yolk of your hard-boiled egg be centered in the white? For most readers, Harold McGee's splendid On Food and Cooking: The Science and Lore of the Kitchen is vastly superior.

I don't know what I can say about Herve This's work that hasn't already been said by a thousand other people. This book may not give you all the time-tested techniques for making traditional dishes, but it will cut through the BS of common kitchen myths by showing you how This has tested various cooking processes in an attempt to nail down what's happening when we prepare food and how to figure out objectively better methods.

As a cook I'm always looking to learn, this book is great and I got a quality used copy from half price book. I trust I will get good products from them.

This book is a collaboration between cooking knowledge and its science. I have work for more than 15 yrs in the food and beverage industry and have refined my skills in an attempt to become the best chef I can be. Instead of paying and arm and a leg in schools, I dare you to read this book, not only to learn the secret behind the closed doors of the kitchen but to also know the extent of the workings and dealing behind the Chefs that produce your delicious meals!!

Important book for anyone who wants to get into food science

good quality book

Ampliamente recomendable. Muy buen libro!

Diciamo che è un libro in cui si fa debunking ovvero si sbugiardano diverse regole dettate dal passato e dicerie sulla cucina, ma si presentano anche nuove conoscenze da cui si può trarre molto per migliorare nella preparazioni di piatti noti e non solo. Interessante come si parli anche della fisiologia del sapore e di come il cervello ci faccia percepire il gusto dei vari cibi. Portare gli strumenti e le tecniche di un laboratorio di chimica in cucina penso sia la cosa di cui ogni cuoco, chef e scienziato debba fare. Perché tutto è Chimica. Ed è fantastico.

This is very interesting book covering a wide range of topics on the subject of flavour, taste and smell perception as well as the application of basic science to food and drink technology. I was particularly interested in the recent research into the physiology of taste perception, which until recently was the poor cousin of that of the sense of smell. There is a fair bit of chemistry, biochemistry and physics to take in to get full value from the book so I think this book would appeal most to those not only interested in food and cooking but also with some scientific knowledge. The last section of the book focuses on how the physico-chemical properties of ingredients like eggs or fats can be manipulated into creating novel recipes for foods. One can see where the likes of the innovative chef Heston Blumenthal got his inspiration.