The Zuni Cafe Cookbook: A Compendium of Recipes and Cooking Lessons from San Francisco's Beloved Restaurant

It would also help to be a committed foodie. Some key ingredients are hard to find, and usually available only to professional chefs. I live in the San Francisco Bay Area and I shop in the food mecca of Berkeley, and even I would have trouble finding some of the ingredients.

There are reasons why this is restaurant food that people spend big bucks for to go out and eat.

If you have skill in fine cooking, if you love to cook for recreation and for art, and if you like this kind of California Mediterranean food, you would probably enjoy this cookbook. It is extremely well-written and thought out. So far I've tried 16 recipes from this cookbook, with excellent results. (Note: I've taken many cooking classes over the years and I've worked as a prep assistant for some great local chefs, so that's my skill level.) Judy Rodgers and her editor have made every effort to convey her signature recipes and deserve applause for that. I think this a great cookbook, a classic cookbook, but not for everyone.


My Own Fault   December 30, 2002
 32 out of 55 found this review helpful

Alas, it's my own fault for buying a cookbook it turns out I'll probably never use. Seduced by a review in a major publication, I broke my two self-imposed rules about buying cookbooks. Never buy one by a chef and/or restaurant owner and never buy without looking first. But the review was so warm and enthusiastic, I went straight to my computer and ordered it. Would that I had read both the reviewers' and readers' comments first. Then I would have known I would not be at all interested in the first 52 pages. Having cooked simple but good food for almost half a century, there's not much I don't know about kitchen tools and basic techniques. Judy Rodgers is, indeed, a good writer, but if I want to read about one's formative years in the cooking field, I'll look for a memoir. Then, too, there's the early salting recommendation which informs many of the recipes. I strive to reduce sodium in my cooking, not increase it. Perhaps I shall give it to a daughter or daughter-in-law.


I'll Make 10% of These Recipes   December 25, 2002
 72 out of 112 found this review helpful

I received this cookbook as a gift from someone who thought it was about Southwestern cooking (as in Zuni Indians - actually, the food is mostly Mediterranean). I am not in the restaurant or food business, nor am I a personal friend of the author's.
Undoubtedly, Zuni Cafe is a wonderful restaurant experience. But, if like me, you are a home cook with limited access to quail, various imported Italian goodies, and glasswort, etc., etc., etc., forget this book. Much of it is just too dang precious.
Precious also is the language. Like the author, I have spent significant time in France and speak French at near-native level. However, I really question her use of French (sometimes Italian)when English will do - example: "restes" for leftovers. The impression is one of insecurity or a need to elevate herself and her recipes.
The book is a giant step backwards to someone like Narcisse Chamberlain - eurocentric cooking for Americans.


A teaching tool for serious cooks   November 19, 2002
 45 out of 46 found this review helpful

San Francisco chef Rodgers teaches as she cooks and her clear, authoritative voice is an inspiration, reinforced by 24 luscious color photographs and 50 black and white photographs illustrating technique. Emphasizing quality ingredients and constant tasting, she painstakingly explains what to look for and how to taste. More than once she cautions that it may take several tries before a dish sounds that note of perfection on the tongue. Rodgers' style of cooking requires some forethought - all her meat and poultry is lightly salted at least a day before cooking - to "open up" the proteins, and some dishes, like Artichoke Caponata, improve when made ahead.

The book is organized by course and the introductions to each recipe offer tips on ingredients or technique, suggestions for leftovers and sometimes the dish's history in her repertoire, which is French and Italian-influenced. Some dishes are simple - her signature Roast Chicken with Bread Salad is a snap as long as you remember to salt the chicken the day before (it does make a difference). Several soups (Asparagus & Rice with Pancetta & Black Pepper) are quick and easy, as long as you've got the stock on hand - canned stock is beneath mention - and several pickles, condiments and sauces (Preserved Lemons, Roasted Pepper Relish, Sage Pesto) are simple enough to keep on hand, but basically, Rodgers is not about quick and easy. The hamburger that the pickles are served with starts with grinding your own chuck - twice. Pasta with Sardines & Tomato Sauce begins with cleaning, broiling, then filleting the sardines, although the roasted tomato sauce is quick, easy and different. Pot Roast begins with reducing a bottle of red wine to a half cup and four cups of beef stock to two.

There are detailed instructions for cooking omelettes and risotto, making the best stock, braising meats, preparing a cheese tray, making granitas and sorbets. She gives reasons for every step from choosing a pot to skimming fat - or not. The introduction is a fine primer on basic technique (especially "early salting") and equipment and she concludes with "notes on frequently used ingredients and related techniques" and mail order sources. This is a book for aspiring cooks, good cooks looking to be better and armchair cooks.