Cooked A Natural History of Transformation

he has done it again! this book follows the same format as his others, and explores cooking through the lens of the four elements, and I just thoroughly enjoyed each part. I think each part stands on its own as a solid good piece of writing, and then together they really make the book compelling. my favorite part was the air part on bread!

This will be saved as one of my favorite books of all time. Which is saying a lot because I hate cooking with a passion, but he addresses the reason why and so many other people in this age hate cooking. He makes me want to drive to North Carolina and have some whole hog BBQ, and has given me an appreciation for all the types of food in this book are Slow Food. Not only is his journey learning to cook these dishes great but just the general info about food and culture and society is great as well. I am going to try my hand at live yeast culture artisan bread this next month and after we have our own garden established we will be canning and fermenting our goods! I recommend everyone read this book!

Talking about the anthropology and science of foods using the 4 main elements (fire, water, air and earth), Pollan gives quite an interesting lesson about food through his journey and discovery in shadowing various chefs, pit masters, cheese nuns and brewers. Prior to this book, I would say the only things I cooked were stories. Reading "Cooked" has made me take a greater interest in cooking. The first thing I tried was making an Apple Granola Oat. While that is not exactly cooking (well, I did bake it in the oven), it is my mini step in the right direction. Pollan sums up the purpose of this book best in this quote: "Cooked is an invitation to alter, however slightly, the ratio between production and consumption in your life."

This book is what a Michael Pollan book should be. (See my review of "Botany of Desire.") While Pollan, as usual, gets up on his moral high horse off and on throughout the book, I really enjoyed learning about the different methods of cooking. Although a bit pretentious, Pollan has a way of motivating/convicting the reader to look into getting back into the kitchen and eating better, more natural foods. I have no idea how anyone could read any of his books, this one included, and go back to eating processed crap. Since finishing this book I have been taking a serious look at my own pantry/fridge/diet to see just how much processed food I partake of and what I can reasonably do to cut down on that and eat more naturally. (without breaking the bank of course...I'm still a frugal weirdo.) I definitely recommend this book.

This book is about the philosophy of cooking and how cooking shaped us into the humans that we are today. However, Pollan's main argument is that even though the advent of such things as fire and fermentation are the bedrock of our modern society, we've lost touch with the self-sufficient parts of us that made us into the culture we are today. I have to say that by the end of each section - Fire, Water, Air, and Earth - I was a bit bored with the concept of our culture and cooking, because he does tend to ramble on about it. However, for the bulk of each section I was enthralled with his discussions and insight on how we've taken basic concepts of nature and used them to transform our food. I am a home cook and baker, so I very much enjoyed the actual science talk behind the cooking processes discussed in the book (roasted meat, braising, baking bread, and fermenting just about anything). I think the book was organized nicely - where one concept informed the next - but I did feel a little bogged down by the details at times. Sometimes the overwhelming amount of details made it read more like a textbook, but for the most part the personal stories and biographies of those he met along the way were enough to keep me interested. Overall it was a good read, albeit a bit long. I would definitely recommend this to anyone interested in cooking or improving their home cooking, but it's not for someone looking for recipes or a how-to. Though there are elements of both those things in the book, it's certainly not something a novice would be able to garner much from.

If you care about what you eat, you should read this book. If you don't care about what you eat, you should read this book and start to care.