An exceptionally useful cookbook with all types of recipes for an astonishing array of foods.
Title: BAKING WITH STEEL
Subtitle: The Revolutionary New Approach To Perfect Pizza,Bread, and More
Author: Andris Lagsdin With Jessie Oleson Moore
Publisher:Little, Brown, and Company
Type:Recipe Book
Binding: Hardcover, Octavo, 246 pp., illus.
Cost: $30 US
REVIEWED BY: Chris Carlsson, Spirits Review.com
Notes: This book is the companion to the baking steel I reviewed last year and fell in love with. The baking steel is an amazing cooking device, this book helps articulate just how amazing it is and all the new horizons it opens up for cooking all sorts of foods.
Andrsi Lagsdin come from a foodie background but when to work at his famly steel business. Using his restaurant background he achieved a synthesis of these seemingly disparate skill sets with the invention of the baking steel.
Not just for pizza and bread anymore this book outlines a lot more possibilities on what to do with your baking steel to make all manner of goodies, baked, fried or grilled. It is an easy step by step articulation of how to use the steel. With beautiful, inspiring photos and great recipes.
The book covers breakfast,lunch,dinner and even desserts and a almost stunning range of foods of many cultures that you can cook or bake with this steel, with a emphasis on pizzas and breads, but with much more.
The book starts of with the basics- what the steel is, what you can do, and refreshingly detailed instruction on how to use, clean, handle, and season your steel (all very important points presented in sets of easy to understand and follow instructions). It then gets into uses – baking, griddle and grilling functions of course , and including other ideas that may not naturally leap to mind such as using it as a cold plate for ice cream or sushi.
As a final sidebar I leave my steel in the oven as a heat bank/moderator as it helps stabilize the oven temperature by its heat mass – it heats up and stays hot – evening out and maintaining the heat even when I open the door to check something . No need to drag it out of its oven storage
Thoughts: Fascinating!, Delightful, and full of temptation and practical advice. One of the better cookbooks I have read this year !
