Les Grandes Livres d'Alain Ducasse

[pedro]

My curiosity for these books increased as of reading Spoon Cook Book in depth, eGullet's new feature. I know the Grandes Livres have been around for some time now, and I wondered if anyone has read them and what's your opinion about them.

I'm specially interested on the book covering bistrots.

[BDWiener]

Pedro-

I perused them in a bookstore in Paris last month and came to the conclusion that it was unlikely I would cook even a mere fraction of what was in them. But that wouldn't make them much different from half the other cookbooks I buy.

I didn't buy them in Paris because they weigh a ton and I already had enough to lug home.

If you're interested in the English translation of the Grand Livre, it was supposed to be published June 15th, but I just heard it will be delayed several months.

Ben

[Louisa Chu]

I've looked through both books pretty thoroughly and plan on buying my own eventually. They're really professional books - but breathtakingly beautiful too. I have cooked from them in the sense in that we continued to make some of the dishes and absolutely quite a few of the components of the various dishes at the Plaza - and it's still mind-boggling. The level of detail and amount of work borders on the insane. Most of us who have cooked in those kitchens acquire them as a document to part of our professional lives - a really crazy kind of thing if you think about it too much. I did not know about the English translations - maybe they will give these volumes the spotlight they deserve.

Edited June 12, 2004 by LKL Chu (log)

[Fat Guy]

I too am really looking forward to the English versions. They have all these books in a little library in the "aquarium" room off the kitchen at ADNY so I've had the opportunity to flip through them there, and I can sort of muscle through the recipes in French (though I could never do three quarters of the mise), but it's so inefficient for me that I'll never be motivated to read them as thoroughly as I would otherwise. To me these books are the closest things we have to modern day equivalents of Le Guide Culinaire, so I would like to be very familiar with them -- I consider them required reading. I assume the pastry book is years away from coming out in English, but when the savory one becomes available, if I have the time, I'll try to write something about it. Although I'm looking forward to the pastry book as much or more -- the French version I was looking through is awe inspiring, especially in the way the desserts are plated.

[fresh_a]

I find La Grande Livre tremendously interesting especially from an academic level, but in actual practice, pretty daunting! Even the simplest of dishes have a multitude of different ingredients and difficult cooking techniques, and, as I haven't my own personal kitchen team of 60, haven't tried any of the recipes out yet. It is inspiring, though.

[Fat Guy]

I own a few cookbooks that present recipes at that level of complexity, and I rarely cook from them. On the rare occasion that I do, I'm most likely to cook one component of a dish, like just the sauce.

For me, as someone who writes about food and particularly restaurants, the reason the Grand Livres are so essential is that they do so much to represent highly evolved contemporary French cuisine as practiced at the Michelin three-star level. I think if people simply read some of those recipes, without even understanding them, they'd get a much better idea of why it costs $165 to eat a meal at ADNY. Christian Delouvrier told me -- and mind you this guy is a French chef trained in the Michelin system and with four New York Times stars on his resume -- that when he first accepted the job at ADNY he decided that he was going to figure out a way to cut the prices back a little. But after a month in Paris and Monaco at Ducasse's restaurants, he came back saying he can't imagine doing cuisine at that level for a penny less than what they charge. It doesn't take long with either Grand Livre to start to see the rationale for that kind of thinking.

I also think examining these books is helpful in terms of defining the outer limits of technique, plating, and the other technical aspects of cooking. This knowledge can serve us well as non-professional consumers. When we amateur cooks visit restaurants that fall far short of that standard, even though we can't ourselves cook to that standard, we can nonetheless have a better idea of how they fall short. And when we go to places like the Tasting Room and Blue Hill in New York, or to the corresponding new wave bistros in Paris, where every once in awhile you see bits and pieces of Grand Livre-level technique in a 19 Euro dish, we can say, "Bravo!"

[paulbrussel]

My curiosity for these books increased as of reading Spoon Cook Book in depth, eGullet's new feature. I know the Grandes Livres have been around for some time now, and I wondered if anyone has read them and what's your opinion about them.

A few weeks ago I posted a request for info on the big, numbered, bilingual edition of Spoon. But those Spoon editions are much different compared to the more encyclopedic works as the "Grand Livres de Ducasse" are.

In a few weeks I will receive the original edition of his first Grand Livre de Cuisine. As the recipes of Ferran Adrià in his book are quite complex, as are those in the book of Marc Veyrat, I think these of Ducasse won't be easy either.

Nevertheless I think these three books in his series "Grand Livres" are the best to get an idea of his cooking, and I will certainly try to cook a few times from his recipes.

(I know these books are very expensive, but I will buy the book at the FNAC here, and they have regularly special actions, and now all cook books you can buy at the FNAC with a 20 % discount, which means that this Grand Livre costs about 160 € instead of 200 €.)

[Boris_A]

In February 2002, I had a financially good month and decided to buy the Grand Livre at 200 € after I read a review. The frist edition was sold out, so I had to wait 3 months.

There are mostly pretty complicated recipes on about 1000 pages. It's a huge recipe collection aiming at professionals working in the haute cuisine metier.

But ... within many recipes, there are sub-recipes for sauces, jus, extracts, garniture, whatever. These numerous sub-recipes have been very interesting wrt. my limited possibilities. From time to time, I scan this behemoth of cookbooks, choose one ot two of those sub-recipes and try to incorporate it in a composition of my own. Alain, forgive!

For sure, it's not the cookbook I can't live wihtout. But I wouldn't give it away now it found a place on my (reenforced) kitchen bookshelf.

[Gary Marshall]

sure i saw this in smaller paperback form in FNAC a few months ago, think it was about E60.

gary

[pedro]

There are mostly pretty complicated recipes on about 1000 pages. It's a huge recipe collection aiming at professionals working in the haute cuisine metier.

I've to admit that the one Grand Livre that attracts me the most it the one on "bistrots, brasseries et restaurants de tradition". Boris, do you think the statement I quoted is also applicable to this book? how is it organized? I would expect a collection of recipes of this kind of restaurants, capturing a fair amount of traditional cooking, rather than Ducasse's.

As always, any info will be appreciated.

[Jon Tseng]

sure i saw this in smaller paperback form in FNAC a few months ago, think it was about E60.

gary

have the paperback one (its the non-bistro one). Think it was E80-ish

Well worth getting

Staggering not only the quality of the recipes and detail, but also the sheer volume of recipes (calculated there were about 10x the no. of fully composed dishes compared to ur avg celeb-chef-coffee-table-book), and also the brilliant photography which shows exactly how each dish is plated - remarkably useful compared to the usual soft-focus gastro-porn shots you get.

cheerio

J

[Boris_A]

I've to admit that the one Grand Livre that attracts me the most it the one on "bistrots, brasseries et restaurants de tradition".  Boris, do you think the statement I quoted is also applicable to this book? how is it organized? I would expect a collection of recipes of this kind of restaurants, capturing a fair amount of traditional cooking, rather than Ducasse's.

There is a bistro version of the "Grand Livre"? Man, the guy is really prolific.

I think this one is definitely haute cuisine only. Of course, there are the useful sub-recipes I mentioned, but it's not bistro at all.

I didnt' know that when I bought it (and I didn't know that there's going to be a 80 E paperback version), so I'm not among the true target customers. In that respect, it's rather useless for me expect the inspirations. But now I have it and I'm going to keep it.

[pedro]

AFAIK, there are three Grandes Livres, the one you've got and two more:

Le Grand Livre de cuisine d'Alain Ducasse : Desserts et Pâtisserie

Le Grand Livre de cuisine d'Alain Ducasse : Bistrots, brasseries et restaurants de tradition