Taste: One Palate's Journey Through the World's Greatest Dishes

Do you want to make spice-rubbed ribs the way they're made by the best barbecue cooks in Memphis? Crispy soft-shell crabs that taste like they're right out of Chesapeake Bay? Refreshing Thai salad just as it's made in Bangkok? A moussaka that could be the star of a great taverna in Greece? A bisteeya that will transport you to Morocco? Catalan lobster soup, Vietnamese summer rolls, proper Dover sole, a real tiramisù? A golden, buttery tarte Tatin?

David Rosengarten will show you how.

The New York Times has said that David Rosengarten's hit show, Taste, on Food Network "reconceived the idea of what a cooking show could be. . . . He explores his subjects so thor-oughly and thoughtfully that he makes instant experts of his viewers." Now Rosengarten has reconceived the idea of what a cookbook can be. Taste gives you a chance to experiment with some of the world's greatest dishes with the world's best cooking teacher at your side.

Each recipe is accompanied by a set of criteria--letting you know exactly what experts mean when they say a risotto is good, a gazpacho is excellent, or a chocolate chip cookie is perfect. Now you'll know how to make it--and what to look for along the way. Rosengarten tells you exactly what to shop for: the bottled hot sauce from the West Indies that makes the best ceviche, the brand of chocolate that produces the deepest-tasting molten chocolate cake. He's similarly candid about equipment, detailing everything from a handy smoker that's indispensable in the preparation of jerk chicken to the best heat source for a homemade crème brulee.

The chapter on wine is itself an education. You'll find everything you need to know to match wine with food--including a list of twelve inexpensive wines that will never let you down. With his characteristic candor, Rosengarten pricks the bubble of wine pretension--exploding many of America's most fervently held myths.

David Rosengarten is a great teacher, with an irrepressible enthusiasm that comes through as vividly in this book as it does on the screen. Beginners will learn the basics from this book. For those who know their way around the kitchen, Rosengarten's in-depth culinary information will be a revelation. A cookbook teaches you how to cook. Taste teaches you how to taste. You'll never want to cook again without it.