Review of "Taste & Technique: Recipes to Elevate Your Home Cooking" by Naomi Pomeroy

 This is one hefty cook book - not only heavy in weight, but heavy in great techniques and recipes.  Naomi begins by introducing herself and her process of learning these techniques. As a self taught chef she has certainly a wealth of experience in professional cooking, which she draws on throughout this book.  I found it very easy to read.  The recipes are easy to read and follow and are written in the order of preparation - which is helpful.  All of the recipes have photos - which I love! Photos for me are so inspiring and motivating in cookbooks.

After reading through the whole cookbook my observations of the recipes are that they have a lot of ingredients in them -- in general.  There are the odd recipes with only a few ingredients such as sauces etc.  I made a list of all the ingredients throughout the recipes, that I, personally, was not familiar with. I would have to google and find out where to get them from if I was to tackle those recipes.  To be honest I probably won't.  I don't tend to go out and buy special things that are just for one dish.

These are the ingredients that are unusual to me from some of the recipes:

caraway seeds,  puy lentils, duck confit, allspice berries, cassis, kumquats, fennel pollen, brown mustard seeds, armagnac, sweet masala, espelette pepper, sherry vinegar, sheeps milk ricotta, juniper berries, aquavit/gin, calvados, tawny port, bourbon, rendered duck fat, champagne vinegar, persian cucumbers, nasturtium petals, chervil leaves, marcon almonds, verjus, morels.

 So far I have made the 'Celery Veloute with Bacon-Brioche Croutons' - which was delicious.  It took me around two hours to make and about five minutes to eat.  I cheated and didn't use brioche - as I didn't have another few hours to make that first.  I used bread and it still tasted delicious.  I will attach a photo of my soup.  I didn't strain the parsley which is why my has more texture - also I don't have a high powered blender to get it really smooth like her image was.

My overall feeling? While I enjoyed the process, it isn't something I will probably make again - just because of the time to make it.  The family all liked it - so it was a hit.  It doesn't taste like celery either for those of you who hate celery. My husband hates celery so I didn't tell him the name of it and waited till he'd eaten his plus two extra helpings. He couldn't believe it. Celery changes though when it is cooked.   I am going to try some more recipes when I have the time and can get all the ingredients.  Like I mentioned above the steps were very clear, easy to follow and everything turned out as expected. I like that in a cookbook.

The contents of this are: Sauces, Starters, Soups, Salads, Vegetables, Eggs, Seafood, Poultry, Pork, Beef, Lamb, Desserts and Pastry, Pantry.  The pantry section is one of my favorite parts of the book as she has recipes for things like: homemade stock, creme fraiche, pate brisee (savory pastry) and pate sucre (sweet pastry), bread crumbs, homemade ritz crackers(I plan to try making these!) etc.
I also want to try her puff pastry - as I love making puff pastry from scratch and am interested to try her recipe. It does use pastry flour - so that will definitely hold me up from making it as I don't have that.

I would recommend this book if you are someone that likes trying new things and doesn't mind

recipes that are more time consuming and ingredient heavy.  

Please note that I was sent this book in exchange for my review however the opinions expressed are my own.