The Reach of a Chef

March 27, 2006
There's no rest for the restaurateur in Ruhlman's engaging account of a culinary world that's become even more frenetic in the wake of the Food Network's success and the rise of celebrity chefs desperately clinging to their stars. Ruhlman (The Making of a Chef
; The Soul of a Chef
) revisits some of the people he's worked with in the past and the school where he trained to see how things have changed since "chef branding, with its product lines, multiple name–recognized restaurants, and entertainment venues, has lured the chef out of the kitchen." Ruhlman points out the irony of such chefs as Wolfgang Puck, Emeril Lagasse and Anthony Bourdain becoming so successful that they no longer have time to practice the thing that brought them success in the first place. He solicits opinions on the phenomenon from an array of people in the business and also profiles some of those still shaping American cooking in the kitchen, from Melissa Kelly and her down-to-earth comfort food to Grant Achatz and his avant-garde, technical creations. Ruhlman has a light, unobtrusive style, and he brings considerable knowledge to the table when commenting on either individual dishes or the industry as a whole.

May 1, 2006
Author of "The Making of a Chef", " The Soul of a Chef", and much more, Ruhlman takes readers on another fascinating journey behind the scenes of great kitchens. His latest seeks to put a personal twist on the role of chefs in the age of the Food Network and pop celebrity. Ruhlman uses his easy-flowing style to examine how today's chefs have achieved the notoriety and fame of yesterday's sports stars. He goes on to explain how these chefs aren't in the kitchen preparing meals for their restaurant customers -they are hosting television shows, writing cookbooks, and developing product lines. An excellent companion to Ruhlman's other works and recommended for all libraries." -Lisa A. Ennis, Univ. of Alabama at Birmingham Lib."

Copyright 2006 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

May 15, 2006
Ruhlman continues his meticulous examination of the role of the restaurant chef commenced in his earlier books. As Ruhlman perceives it, the one great advantage to the celebrity chef's media ubiquity is access to a bully pulpit, a forum to help save Americans from total confusion over conflicting information on nutrition and obesity. He revisits the Culinary Institute of America and discerns how the passage of time and its success have changed its curriculum. Ruhlman profiles several chefs, among them Chicago's lionized Grant Achatz, trying to discern what makes his food truly inventive and a meal at his pricey restaurant an experience beyond the ordinary. He takes on the Emeril Lagasse phenomenon, rising to Lagasse's defense while others are apparently bent on dismissing television's most recognizable chef. Visiting Las Vegas, Ruhlman christens it "America's food Gomorrah." Fans of Ruhlman's previous volumes will relish all the insider "dish" here and will have a pleasant experience despite Ruhlman's rambling, confusing, and exhausting parentheses-within-parentheses sentences.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2006, American Library Association.)