Ratio: The Simple Codes Behind the Craft of Everyday Cooking (Ruhlman's Ratios)

I'm going to start this review by stating what this book is not. This book is not a cookbook, nor is it a techniques book. Some reviewers have found this to be the problem. However, even the author points several times throughout the book that this book is not intended to be a cookbook nor is it intended to be a cooking technique book. If you are looking for either, I suggest you not buying this cookbook. James Peterson writes some great ones on techniques and cooking. Here are three: Cooking, Baking, What's a Cook to Do?: An Illustrated Guide to 484 Essential Tips, Techniques, and TricksNow that is out of the way, let's discuss what this book is about. Like the title states the book is about ratios. For example, how much water to add to 3 cups of flour to make bread dough. This book will not tell you how to make the best bread in the world. But it will tell you the simple ratio to make a bread. It gives you the tools to experiment in the kitchen. The idea is if you know the ratios to breads, cakes, sauces, meat, etc and comfortable with them it will set you free of the shackles of following a recipe. You make your own recipe and the results are excellent. It does have some recipes on how you can improve on the basic product (called variations) and the recipes are good. But, the whole point is that you have the basic ratio and you build on it. It makes you a better cook. After-all, if all I want is recipes, wI could simply go on the internet and do a quick search.He goes on to state that the techniques you use will in fact have a huge affect on the finished product. The more you practice the better you will get. He doesn't attempt to tell you nor teach you the techniques, but states to practice and have patience. After all, the author, Mark Ruhlman, is not a professional chef. He states he has cooked since the fourth grade. Therefore, he grew up learning it himself. He asked the permission of the Culinary Institute of America to enter the classroom in order to write this book. I think he did a superb job.The book is great tool to have in your kitchen library, so much so that I will say it is a must for anyone that wants to learn how to cook without recipes. It includes basic ratios of many common foods. Including bread dough (such as cookies, breads, pastas, and even pates), batter for cakes and crepes. However, it is not all about baking. It also includes ratios for sauces, stocks, sausages, and custards.In the end I found this book to be extraordinary and to the point There are some pictures to use as a guide that are helpful but not necessary. I read it on my kindle and I found it to be great. I also read it on my computer and android phone using the kindle app. I used these to take my notes. If you are serious about cooking, you will be taking notes. So if you dont like taking notes on the kindle or any of its apps, then I suggest you get the actual book. However, if you dont mind taking notes on the kindle or its apps (like me) then get the kindle version. It does the job.

i sent this to my sister for Christmas. She is trying to be gluten free and so this gave her some guidance to adjust recipes, and it also was good for her daughter who is a Home Ec. major. I have not used the book, but foudn the ratios fascinating.

I remember when Ratio first came out, I wasn't interested at all. First, all the ratios seemed "mathy" to me and I am pretty much math phobic. Also, why bother with making my own recipes or knowing the formulas, when hundreds of people a year are doing it for me in cookbooks? No pictures? Math? seriously uninterested.Fast forward to watching Anna and Kristina cook from it on the "grocery bags." Frankly, I feel if they can have success with a book I can too. It got me interested enough to check Ratio from the library. After reading it a bit I realized the ratios are really laid out and explained well and I could actually follow the explanations! Me- math backward woman!The first thing to call out to me was the banana split, I made the ice cream, the butterscotch sauce and the chocolate ganache. I also made the caramel sauce by accident, I started following the wrong recipe, which is a major gripe of mine, why can't cookbook publishers put the recipe on the same page, or at least facing pages? I hate having to go back and forth flipping pages while covered in ingredients with messy fingers! ugh! *pets peeve* Anyway...The ice cream was amazing. My entire family gulped it down, declaring it the best ice cream I ever made. The butterscotch, it took me back to my youth when my grandma made butterscotch. When Ruhlman says you can't get butterscotch like this without making it, he is right. It was lush and silky and beautiful and I would wanted to dive in it headfirst. The ganache was good though pretty much how I always made it, the accidental caramel sauce was wonderful.I bought the book for the butterscotch recipe alone. Now, I call myself the aioli breaker. I cannot make homemade mayo to save my life. Blender, mixer, food processor, by hand, it breaks. recipes from Julia Child to Bourdain to David Liebowitz, it breaks. I have a freezer full of egg whites and a kitchen full of broken mayo. So I tried ratio's recipe. First I made a big beautiful angel food cake with all the egg whites. It turned out gorgeous! then I tried his immersion blender technique for mayo. I knew it would fail, I could make an angel food cake from my failures, do you know how many egg whites that is from broken yolks and broken mayo? But I tried, and darned if I do not have a bowl of perfect mayo, white, creamy, not an egg yolk floating in curdled oil but real mayo.I know this is a long review but honestly, this book deserves it and more. It's absolutely amazing- don't let the word ratio keep you from this book the way I did for to long. It deserves to be a cherished part of any cooks collection.