the basics

Christmas is approaching, time to find presents for your family and friends – and for yourself.

After buying the wonderful Butt Book today I found this really nice cookbook called the basics. It comes in hardcover with golden embossed printing on it. It’s designed in a simple elegant and classic style and illustrated with mouth-watering photographs. The title itself says it all – it seems to be a must for everyone floating between recipe and freestyle cooking. This is what the publisher says, a small company from Belgium called Homarus:

It is a statement: if you want to cook, you cannot do without a solid base. If you want to experiment, you need this base even more. The book contains 150 basic recipes which no amateur chef can do without. There are classic recipes for pea soup and consommé, the best method for preparing mashed potatoes, fries, strawberry jam, puff pastry, sponge cake and sauces such as mayonnaise, pesto, béarnaise and white wine sauce. All conveniently arranged in short chapters. If you want to know the difference between cutting techniques such as brunoise and julienne or find out how to stuff meat so the stuffing doesn’t run out during roasting, THE BASICS will provide all the answers. Furthermore, every recipe or technique, no matter how basic, is illustrated with a true-to-life photograph.

the basics is part of a trilogy and you can get all three books in a nice box. Not all of them are available in all languages (yet?) though.