Heat: An Amateur's Adventures as Kitchen Slave, Line Cook, Pasta-Maker, and Apprentice to a...

Heat: An Amateur's Adventures as Kitchen Slave, Line Cook, Pasta-Maker, and Apprentice to a Dante-Quoting ... | Bill Buford | Fabulous Read

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Heat: An Amateur's...

	Heat: An Amateur's Adventures as Kitchen Slave, Line Cook, Pasta-Maker, and Apprentice to a Dante-Quoting ... Bill Buford Vintage, 2007 - 336 pages average customer review:based on 161 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

A taste for the pallete

One of the most important and wonderful books of the year that will leave the taste buds salivating for more. Buford is an amazing author who conjures up the life of the kitchen and makes the reader angry at those who abuse him and joyous over the meals being described. This is both a history of Pasta and a biography of Mario Batali and the story of how to be a chef, and an odyssey all in one. It begins when the author decides to work as a `slave' or intern in the kitchen of one of New York's most famous restaurants under the guise of Mario of the Food Networks `Molto Mario'. He begins cutting up carrots and eventually moves up to grilling and making pasta. He tells the reader all along about what he is learning and one is immediately wanting to run to store to try for himself. The techniques described and the recipes and secrets make any amateur chef want to try, and many of them will work wonders.

Eventually Buford moves up and goes off to Italy to try to learn for himself the way of making Pasta from the Italians and he will eventually end up as an assistant to a butcher. This is such an amazing book that it is hard to put down and is a true inspiration to be a chef or a cook at home.

Seth J. Frantzman

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Fabulous Read

Loved this book. Loved the intensity of Mr. Buford's experience and his writing. I feel like I learned a little of what he set out to know and it has changed the way I work in my own home kitchen. I love this book.

A brilliant wonderful eating extravaganza

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Being a professional chef is tough

The success of the Food Network has shown the affinity Americans have for cooking. It might be more that Americans like to watch others cook, since eating out has never been so popular as it is now. Buford apprentices himself to Mario Batali and an Italian butcher to see whether he can make it in a kitchen.

The most rewarding part of the book was the description of the chefs. We see the naked egos, the infighting, and the jockeying for position. Most of the chefs here have very artistic temparaments, most of all Batali. He has an ego the size of the Empire State Building and the business and skill to back it up. Reading of Buford's toil in the kitchen gives the reader a bit of voyeuristic pleasure. His mishaps and struggles show that an average man cannot cut it in a professional kitchen. Slowly, however, Buford gets better and becomes a contributor. The mark of a good book is when the reader can identify with the author. I was cheering when Buford finally learned how to properly work at the meat station, or when he found that he had become good at chopping vegetables.

Later in the book, Buford goes to Italy to work under a master butcher. This part of the narrative was not infused with the same manic energy as the New York portion. It dragged for me. I also became tired of the constant forays into culinary history and theory.

All in all, this was an interesting read. I would recommend it to cooking enthusiasts and Mario Batali fans.

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