It seems that most of the writing that I've been doing is reviews. Fortunately I have plenty of articles to write in my head, but the times that I feel like writing are pretty inopportune (such as my commute.)
So, dear friend, we have another review of an O'Reilly book, and providing full disclosure, I received a free copy of this book in exchange for a review... All integrity accountability in-place, let us begin.
Chapter 1 opens with the headline "We geeks are fascinated by how things work, and most of us eat, too." This book makes it very plain that it is a book for geeks (who want to learn more about the alchemy that is cooking), by geeks (who know some things about said alchemy).
While I already have a basic competency in the kitchen, there was a lot of value for me in this book, even beyond the underlying explanations of "how" and "why".
One of the things that I appreciate most are the quick hacks to improve your life. Probably my favorite is the Pizza Stone tip. The tip is to keep your pizza stone in your oven; it will take longer for your oven to come up to temperature, but the stone will help to keep the temperature more even.
Probably the greatest value from this book is in technique. Rather than just a list of steps, there is a lot of explanation of "how" to do something as well as "why". Even though I have some experience cooking, I do appreciate that the assumption is that the reader is a thorough beginner.
All in all, I found this book to be pretty fun and very informative. I've already recommended it to others, and do so without reservation.
The book's website is http://www.cookingforgeeks.com/, and it can be purchased from Amazon, or from the publisher here.
-Waldo
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