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- Jan 26, 2002
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Munk recently asked about Chinese cookbook reccos. I didn't have one. Here is a second-party one.
Someone just loaned me a copy of a good "general" cookbook and I'm impressed enough with the book to pass on the author's reccomendation for a "The Modern Art of Chinese Cooking" by Barbara Tropp that appeared in an appendix listing 50 cookbooks that described it as "the best contemporary work on the subject--complete, understandable, fresh-flavored and hip". (whew!)
Well I made the mistake of looking for a review of this book on the 'net...and as usual, one thing led to another. So,
This is a pretty good reccomendation:
Cream of the crop
Published in the Asbury Park Press 5/19/04
...The food world's finest are honored by the James Beard FoundationThe hard work of cookbook authors was not overlooked at the Beard Awards. "The King Arthur Flour Baker's Companion" (The Countryman Press) was named cookbook of the year, while the late Barbara Tropp, a former Chinese studies student at Princeton University, had her classic tome, "The Modern Art of Chinese Cooking" (William Morrow), inducted into the cookbook hall of fame...
Don't think that you can go wrong with this one, especially if you are buying sight unseen. It seems to have been recently reprinted.
A couple of reviews.
http://www.tomhull.com/ocston/books/tropp-art.html
http://www.wineskinny.com/past_issues/hot_titles/title000405.htm
http://www.bookhills.com/The_Modern_Art_of_Chinese_Cooking_Techniques_and_Recipes_0688146112.htm
you'll have to move around on this long wide page to find the review, and there are several other Chinese cookbooks here as well. This one sounds good:
http://www.bookhills.com/The_Chines...g_Authority_on_Chinese_Cooking_0688158269.htm
"When Lo talks about ingredients in the "Chinese Larder" chapter, she provides characters in the margin that can be photocopied so you can show them at stores to be sure you get the right ingredients. " Sounds handy.
This book by Irene Kuo seems to get high marks as well:
http://www.bookhills.com/KEY_TO_CHINESE_COOKING_0394496388.htm
Here are a review on this one:
http://www.night.net/rosie/0697-cookbooks.html
Lastly, you likely can't go wrong with a cookbook by Craig Claiborne--
He has written one on Chinese cooking, and it seems some editions may also have Chinese characters for ingredients.
http://www.cookingreviews.com/The_Chinese_Cookbook_0060922613.html
Don't think that you can go wrong with Claiborne's reccomendations either:
Published Tuesday, April 20, 1999, in the San Jose Mercury News
Grace Zia Chu, 99, culinary teacher
BY WILLIAM GRIMES
New York Times
Grace Zia Chu, who introduced a generation of Americans to Chinese cuisine through her cooking classes in Manhattan and her landmark book ``The Pleasures of Chinese Cooking,'' died Thursday at a nursing home in Columbus, Ohio. She was 99...
...Mrs. Chu returned to China after World War II but left in 1950 and took up permanent residence in the United States, becoming a citizen in 1955. By that time she had settled in Manhattan, where she began teaching cooking classes at the China Institute. For the next 30 years, she taught at the institute, the Mandarin House restaurant and at her apartment on West 111th Street.
Her classes resulted in two cookbooks, ``The Pleasures of Chinese Cooking'' (1962) and ``Madame Chu's Chinese Cooking School'' (1975).
In ``The Pleasures of Chinese Cooking,'' Mrs. Chu patiently guided her readers through unfamiliar territory.
She listed and described the basic ingredients of Chinese dishes, and the utensils and techniques used to prepare them.
She showed how to use a Chinese cleaver, how to hold chopsticks, how to grow bean sprouts at home and how to order a proper Chinese meal in a restaurant.
``The book may well be the finest, most lucid volume on Chinese cooking ever written,'' Craig Claiborne wrote in the New York Times in 1962. To a generation of Americans familiar with the distinctions among Sichuan, Hunan and Cantonese cooking styles, ``The Pleasures of Chinese Cooking'' reads like a period piece, but in the early 1960s it was a badly needed instruction manual. It is telling that in his review of the book, Claiborne had to explain to readers that a wok was ``a Chinese cooking utensil.''
Here's a link on where to buy older chinese cookbooks online:
http://chinesefood.about.com/library/weekly/aa041901a.htm
Probably a little searching will turn up some inexpensive used copies at prices low enough to purchase more than one book. It seem's that Chu's first book was the first to popularize Chinese cooking in the US, and was printed in 1969 in paperback copy that sold for $0.75--It might be found in a pile of used paperbacks most anywhere, as it seems to have been "the" Chinese cookbook for a quite a while. It may even be the book that Munk "loaned" out(away).
Since I'm a nice guy (well, actually got sort of interested in the story of the first popular (in US) Chinese cookbook, and these popped up, so what the heck), for example:
http://www.quiknet.com/~piercebk/cookbook.html
019600 ...., CHU,Grace Zia .., PLEASURES OF CHINESE COOKING, Gd+Cond,very lite wear, MILLER,Grambs Illust, Cornerstone Lib Publisher, NY, 1962,1967, Rept, 5x8", Paper Covers, 192pg, unique treasury of Chinese cooking methods & menus,recipes grouped according to difficulty & availability of ingredients, cooking; cookbook; china; asia;, cooking, ..(..ALSO..Another copy..4x7"..Pocket bks ed..1969..gd+..4d..).., 10.00
http://www.biblio.com/details.php?dcx=15449880&curr=1
Chu, Grace Zia: *Pleasures of Chinese cooking
trade pb, good. (Inventory #339125)
$ 2.50
http://www.wantedbooks.com/booklist.asp?searchtype=keyindex&searchstring=537
Chu, Grace Zia* Pleasures of Chinese Cooking******* $3.30*USD
'Twere me, I'd get a copy of Tropp's book and try to snag one of the cheap paperback editions of Chu's first book, or perhaps see if an inexpensive copy of Claiborne's book is around. But if is difficult or impossible to visit a real chinese store, the older books by Chu or Claiborne may have more recipes that don't call for "unusual" ingredients or more ideas for substitutions--though one can mail-order just about any dry-good like spices or rice noodles nowadays--it's mainly the fresh or frozen ingredients that are really not available everywhere.
Anyway, Munk, now you have some suggestions.
Lastly, for those interested here is a link to what I find to be be a fair review of the "general" cookbook.
http://www.epicurious.com/e_eating/e06_cookbook/bittman/bittman.html
I'd likely snag a used copy of this book if I saw one, though the paperback isn't real expensive new. It's kind of a "hip" Fanny Farmer or "Joy of Cooking" I guess--covers basics like cooking eggs but also has recipes using and some information on a lot of "ethnic" ingredients that are now available, though one should look elsewhere for serious authentic "ethnic" recipes. For a basic reference cookbook, not a bad choice, IMO. Note that the author has several books out with very similar titles...
Someone just loaned me a copy of a good "general" cookbook and I'm impressed enough with the book to pass on the author's reccomendation for a "The Modern Art of Chinese Cooking" by Barbara Tropp that appeared in an appendix listing 50 cookbooks that described it as "the best contemporary work on the subject--complete, understandable, fresh-flavored and hip". (whew!)
Well I made the mistake of looking for a review of this book on the 'net...and as usual, one thing led to another. So,
This is a pretty good reccomendation:
Cream of the crop
Published in the Asbury Park Press 5/19/04
...The food world's finest are honored by the James Beard FoundationThe hard work of cookbook authors was not overlooked at the Beard Awards. "The King Arthur Flour Baker's Companion" (The Countryman Press) was named cookbook of the year, while the late Barbara Tropp, a former Chinese studies student at Princeton University, had her classic tome, "The Modern Art of Chinese Cooking" (William Morrow), inducted into the cookbook hall of fame...
Don't think that you can go wrong with this one, especially if you are buying sight unseen. It seems to have been recently reprinted.
A couple of reviews.
http://www.tomhull.com/ocston/books/tropp-art.html
http://www.wineskinny.com/past_issues/hot_titles/title000405.htm
http://www.bookhills.com/The_Modern_Art_of_Chinese_Cooking_Techniques_and_Recipes_0688146112.htm
you'll have to move around on this long wide page to find the review, and there are several other Chinese cookbooks here as well. This one sounds good:
http://www.bookhills.com/The_Chines...g_Authority_on_Chinese_Cooking_0688158269.htm
"When Lo talks about ingredients in the "Chinese Larder" chapter, she provides characters in the margin that can be photocopied so you can show them at stores to be sure you get the right ingredients. " Sounds handy.
This book by Irene Kuo seems to get high marks as well:
http://www.bookhills.com/KEY_TO_CHINESE_COOKING_0394496388.htm
Here are a review on this one:
http://www.night.net/rosie/0697-cookbooks.html
Lastly, you likely can't go wrong with a cookbook by Craig Claiborne--
He has written one on Chinese cooking, and it seems some editions may also have Chinese characters for ingredients.
http://www.cookingreviews.com/The_Chinese_Cookbook_0060922613.html
Don't think that you can go wrong with Claiborne's reccomendations either:
Published Tuesday, April 20, 1999, in the San Jose Mercury News
Grace Zia Chu, 99, culinary teacher
BY WILLIAM GRIMES
New York Times
Grace Zia Chu, who introduced a generation of Americans to Chinese cuisine through her cooking classes in Manhattan and her landmark book ``The Pleasures of Chinese Cooking,'' died Thursday at a nursing home in Columbus, Ohio. She was 99...
...Mrs. Chu returned to China after World War II but left in 1950 and took up permanent residence in the United States, becoming a citizen in 1955. By that time she had settled in Manhattan, where she began teaching cooking classes at the China Institute. For the next 30 years, she taught at the institute, the Mandarin House restaurant and at her apartment on West 111th Street.
Her classes resulted in two cookbooks, ``The Pleasures of Chinese Cooking'' (1962) and ``Madame Chu's Chinese Cooking School'' (1975).
In ``The Pleasures of Chinese Cooking,'' Mrs. Chu patiently guided her readers through unfamiliar territory.
She listed and described the basic ingredients of Chinese dishes, and the utensils and techniques used to prepare them.
She showed how to use a Chinese cleaver, how to hold chopsticks, how to grow bean sprouts at home and how to order a proper Chinese meal in a restaurant.
``The book may well be the finest, most lucid volume on Chinese cooking ever written,'' Craig Claiborne wrote in the New York Times in 1962. To a generation of Americans familiar with the distinctions among Sichuan, Hunan and Cantonese cooking styles, ``The Pleasures of Chinese Cooking'' reads like a period piece, but in the early 1960s it was a badly needed instruction manual. It is telling that in his review of the book, Claiborne had to explain to readers that a wok was ``a Chinese cooking utensil.''
Here's a link on where to buy older chinese cookbooks online:
http://chinesefood.about.com/library/weekly/aa041901a.htm
Probably a little searching will turn up some inexpensive used copies at prices low enough to purchase more than one book. It seem's that Chu's first book was the first to popularize Chinese cooking in the US, and was printed in 1969 in paperback copy that sold for $0.75--It might be found in a pile of used paperbacks most anywhere, as it seems to have been "the" Chinese cookbook for a quite a while. It may even be the book that Munk "loaned" out(away).
Since I'm a nice guy (well, actually got sort of interested in the story of the first popular (in US) Chinese cookbook, and these popped up, so what the heck), for example:
http://www.quiknet.com/~piercebk/cookbook.html
019600 ...., CHU,Grace Zia .., PLEASURES OF CHINESE COOKING, Gd+Cond,very lite wear, MILLER,Grambs Illust, Cornerstone Lib Publisher, NY, 1962,1967, Rept, 5x8", Paper Covers, 192pg, unique treasury of Chinese cooking methods & menus,recipes grouped according to difficulty & availability of ingredients, cooking; cookbook; china; asia;, cooking, ..(..ALSO..Another copy..4x7"..Pocket bks ed..1969..gd+..4d..).., 10.00
http://www.biblio.com/details.php?dcx=15449880&curr=1
Chu, Grace Zia: *Pleasures of Chinese cooking
trade pb, good. (Inventory #339125)
$ 2.50
http://www.wantedbooks.com/booklist.asp?searchtype=keyindex&searchstring=537
Chu, Grace Zia* Pleasures of Chinese Cooking******* $3.30*USD
'Twere me, I'd get a copy of Tropp's book and try to snag one of the cheap paperback editions of Chu's first book, or perhaps see if an inexpensive copy of Claiborne's book is around. But if is difficult or impossible to visit a real chinese store, the older books by Chu or Claiborne may have more recipes that don't call for "unusual" ingredients or more ideas for substitutions--though one can mail-order just about any dry-good like spices or rice noodles nowadays--it's mainly the fresh or frozen ingredients that are really not available everywhere.
Anyway, Munk, now you have some suggestions.
Lastly, for those interested here is a link to what I find to be be a fair review of the "general" cookbook.
http://www.epicurious.com/e_eating/e06_cookbook/bittman/bittman.html
I'd likely snag a used copy of this book if I saw one, though the paperback isn't real expensive new. It's kind of a "hip" Fanny Farmer or "Joy of Cooking" I guess--covers basics like cooking eggs but also has recipes using and some information on a lot of "ethnic" ingredients that are now available, though one should look elsewhere for serious authentic "ethnic" recipes. For a basic reference cookbook, not a bad choice, IMO. Note that the author has several books out with very similar titles...