Yesterday, I did some bragging about how I have the ability to recreate restaurant recipes in my home with just a few easy tricks. I get most of my dinner ideas from restaurant menus, they’re the ones always coming up with new creations.
On any given night of the week, I can duplicate a casual restaurant meal by:
1) Getting ingredient clues from the menu description
2) Examining the item for the METHOD used to cook it
3) Scrutenizing the sauce for it’s components and the way it was created
4) Tasting for seasonings to mimic the flavor profile
That method usually works for everyday meals, but has let me down often when I try to duplicate fine dining restaurant meals. A fine restaurant has a creative and progressive chef who is experimenting with flavors and textures. I want to copy what he’s doing to create very special meals in my own kitchen.
Let’s say it’s a special occasion, I go to an upscale restaurant, pay $200, and have one of the best meals I’ve ever eaten. I know that if I could recreate the meal, it would cost me less than $20 for the ingredients.
Those types of restaurants are at a much higher skill level, they have very tricky ways of fooling your palate, of creating amazing combinations of flavors that you wouldn’t think of and couldn’t be identified by the most sensitive of taste buds.
That’s why I was so excited when Ron Douglas, author of America’s Secret Recipes told me about his new book. “5 star restaurant secrets”. He’s taken it to the next level by revealing the recipes of some of the world’s best restaurants.
You’ve heard me bash recipes before, and say you don’t need them for everyday cooking. I own this book, and I don’t consider them recipes. I consider them treasures and insights into where food is headed. These are the world’s best chefs, with their signature dishes, sharing them with Ron Douglas.
When I need an inspiration for a really nice meal, when I’m trying to impress, or just break away from the everyday, this is one book that I refer to all the time.