Full Moon Soup Review

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(More customer reviews)As a second grade teacher, I see a few books read to tatters year after year. This book is among the absolute favorites in my classroom. Although it has no words, it has thousands of stories unfolding over the pages, getting more silly in each scene. I find this book wonderful for reluctant readers, as they feel successful and start seeing books as cool and fun. I'm going to need more copies to keep up with demand. An original and entertaining book.

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Botticelli's Bed & Breakfast Review

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(More customer reviews)A delightful foldout book of art masterpieces exhibited in an entertaining and tongue-in-check layout.

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The Fat Duck Cookbook Review

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(More customer reviews)Heston has an (scientific) obsession for making the best tasting and best looking food possible. This obsession is likely to make him legendary.
This is a cookbook for a small minority of customers. You must have an interest in molecular gastronomy methods. You must have a budget that allows you to eat at expensive restaurants. You must like odd people that don't conform to all the norms of society.
Other reviewers have pointed out the recipes are extremely complicated. A lot of details are given, but you should be prepared to shell out a couple of thousands of dollars on (used) equipment before you can get started. The book has some pictures of the dishes, but could do with more descriptive pictures.
However, this is just not a glossy book to boost the ego of its author. I find the discussion around taste, chemistry and visuals relating to each recipe very interesting. You really get a look into Heston's thought process. I don't think Heston has used a ghost writer. I would imagine this can inspire both professional chefs as well as amateur cooks, if so inclined. One place to start experimenting might be with the whisky gums, which don't require any expensive equipment.
Heston's general approach is to perfect a dish. You can set out to do something similar given your budget constraint. If you don't have a professional vacuum sealer maybe try with cheap 100 dollar device, and see what happens. Or my might use a vacuum cleaner to suck out the air of the bag. The only thing you need is time!
There is one other audience for this book and that is people interested in the creative process in general. The long biographical essay describes an obsessive person setting out to do something creative. It is written in a fascinating manner, if and only if you are interested in the creative process. Actually this section could serve as ispiration for some young people to follow their intuition rather than go for a very safe career. For this type of reader, I can also recommend Adria's "A day at Elbulli".
I would recommend this edition of the book. It is a normal hardcover edition. There is also a superexpensive big edition. I would not recommend that unless you want to have a thick tome to impress. The cheaper edition is hardcover too, so more than enough for most people.

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Back by popular demand, a lower-priced version of the must-have book from the genius behind the Fat Duck, the restaurant named best in the world by Restaurant magazine. The cookbook hailed by the Los Angeles Times as a "showstopper” and by Jeffrey Steingarten of Vogue as "the most glorious spectacle of the season…like no other book I have seen in the past twenty years” is now available in a reduced-price edition. With a reduced trim size but an identical interior, this lavishly illustrated, stunningly designed, and gorgeously photographed masterpiece takes you inside the head of maverick restaurateur Heston Blumenthal. Separated into three sections (History; Recipes; Science), the book chronicles Blumenthal’s improbable rise to fame and, for the first time, offers a mouth-watering and eye-popping selection of recipes from his award-winning restaurant. He also explains the science behind his culinary masterpieces, the technology and implements that make his alchemical dishes come to life. Designed by acclaimed artist Dave McKean—and filled with photographs by Dominic Davies—this artfully rendered celebration of one of the world’s most innovative and renowned chefs is a foodie’s dream.

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Hotel Insomnia Review

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(More customer reviews)Charles Simic, Hotel Insomnia (Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1992)
If I ever meet Charles Simic, I am likely to ask that one question every author really hates: "Where do you get your ideas?"
It's not that the overarching, grand design of Simic's work is incomprehensible or anything. In fact, in Hotel Insomnia, if anything, it's more noticeable than ever; for once, the book's title really does tie into almost everything in the book. Insomnia is a major theme in these poems, and it runs throughout like a bad infomercial on late-night TV in the background, bleary-eyed, beer in hand, in its boxer shorts, and yet strangely appealing.
No, it's not that. It's in the details, those damnable little snippets of poetry that make Charles Simic's poems little gems of wide-eyed brilliance:
"There's a painting over the cash register:
Of a stiff Quaker couple dressed in black.
They hold a cat under each arm.
One is a tiger, the other is Siamese.
The eyes are closed because it's very late,
And because cats see better with their eyes closed."
(--"Caged Fortuneteller")
This is a guy who knows something about you. No matter who you are. And in every book he releases, he will reveal a little of it, until you're paranoid, hiding in a darkened room, peeking out of the blinds, unable to sleep, just waiting for Charles Simic to come knocking on your door, because you're convinced he's coming for you.
And isn't that what it's all about? **** ½

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