The Professional Chef - Books Review

Cookbooks today, like cable television and the Internet, reflect narrowcasting in the extreme. However esoteric your tastes, it's likely you can find the right tome to guide you along. So, the typical home cook might question the wisdom of dropping $70 for a 1,200-page culinary textbook that features recipes for ten or more diners and weighs as much as an adolescent Saint Bernard.


Nevertheless, the eighth edition of  The Professional Chef compiled by the staff of the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, New York, has plenty to offer the serious home cook. Like a big box of crayons, the authoritative text contains options that you might never use, but it's nice to know they're there. Though the book is intended as a straightforward driver's manual for the hungry scholars who slice and sear their way through the nation's best-known culinary school, it can also serve as an excellent primer on some of the bedrock principles of preparing, cooking, and serving food for those of us who don't plan to wear the toque.

Seafood Recipes Collection (W)

Weight Watchers Shrimp Fandango

1 tablespoon peanut oil
1/4 cup yellow bell pepper, large dice
1/4 cup red bell pepper, large dice
1 clove garlic, minced
10 ounces large shrimp, shelled and deveined
1/4 cup dry vermouth
1/2 cup Chinese snow peas, steamed until tender crisp
1/2 cup julienne cut carrots, steamed until tender crisp
1/2 cup scallions, sliced
Dash of salt
Dash of hot sauce

Seafood Recipes Collection (T)

Texas Style Skillet Scampi

2 pounds headless shrimp with shells (about 40 medium shrimp)
1/4 cup finely chopped parsley
1 cup melted butter
4 cloves garlic, chopped
1 cup melted butter
4 cloves garlic
1 cup extra virgin olive oil
8 peppercorns
1 teaspoon salt
6 dried chile japones (Japanese peppers)

Rinse the shrimp in cold water and pat them dry with a towel. Combine the parsley, melted butter, and garlic. Set aside.

Seafood Recipes Collection (R)

Red−Eye Shrimp and Grits

1 tablespoon olive oil
4 ounces country ham or other smoked ham, chopped
8 ounces sliced fresh mushrooms
1/2 teaspoon seasoning salt
1/2 teaspoon dried minced thyme
1/2 cup chopped green onions
2 teaspoons minced garlic
1 cup strong coffee
1/4 cup sherry
1 tablespoon cornstarch
1 teaspoon hot pepper sauce, or to taste
1 pound peeled and deveined medium shrimp
Cooked grits or cheese grits

Sauté ham in olive oil in a large saucepan over medium high heat until golden. Add mushrooms, seasoning salt and thyme and sauté until mushrooms are golden, about 3 to 5 minutes. Add green onions and garlic and sauté 3 minutes more.

New England Clambake

New England Clambake

4 small baking potatoes, sweet potatoes or yams
2 dozen clams in the shell (preferably cherry stones)
Cold water
4 ears fresh corn
2 (2 1/2 pound) broiler−fryer chickens, quartered
1/2 pound butter or margarine
2 (1 pound) live Maine lobsters*
4 small onions, peeled
Rock weed or corn husks
Lemon wedges

* NOTE: To prepare lobster before adding to kettle, lay each lobster on wooden board. To sever spinal cord, insert point of knife through back shell where body and tail of lobster come together. Turn lobster over. With sharp knife, split body of lobster down middle, cutting through thin undershell just to back shell and leaving back shell intact. Discard dark intestinal vein running down center of lobster; also discard small sac below head. Crack large claws.