Best Home Cooks of All Time (American)

July 22, 2017 7:54 AM

How these cooks changed the way we cook and eat.
posted by MovableBookLady (35 comments total)

It should be enough for anyone that he's #1 on the list, but in case you need convincing: Kenji Lopez-Alt's The Food Lab is one of the greatest things that's ever happened to my cooking. It's not just a cookbook, it's a cooking *textbook* that helped me understand what I was doing on a scientific level while I was in the kitchen. And it has great recipes.
posted by BuddhaInABucket at 8:15 AM on July 22, 2017 [18 favorites]

Vincent Price absolutely deserves to be on this list. I recently served his guacamole recipe to great success.
posted by J.K. Seazer at 8:30 AM on July 22, 2017 [9 favorites]

That Marion Burros plum torte was a total staple of my childhood. It was the thing my mom made when she needed something easy yet fancy. I'm actually pretty excited to see the recipe, because I suspect it's going to make me really nostalgic.
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 8:35 AM on July 22, 2017

I can understand leaving Jeff Smith off the list, he's been shoved into history's dustbin. But no Jacques Pepin, no Graham Kerr, no Alton Brown, and includes Rachel Ray? I expect better from Epicurious.

At least they included Julia Child.
posted by Frayed Knot at 9:15 AM on July 22, 2017 [13 favorites]

I garontee that list is not complete without Justin Wilson.
(Wait, no Paul Prudhomme either? This list is garbage.)
posted by sexyrobot at 9:17 AM on July 22, 2017 [8 favorites]

Also MIA: Molly Katzen.

And I was a little puzzled by the omission of Madhur Jaffery, from whose books I learned the fundamentals of Indian cooking. Has she passed into obscurity?
posted by Insert Clever Name Here at 9:30 AM on July 22, 2017 [5 favorites]

(Not to dis the list which I found very interesting and educational.)
posted by Insert Clever Name Here at 9:31 AM on July 22, 2017

I'm not sure that I understand their definition of "home cook," and the list definitely has a presentist bias. (I like many of the bloggers whom they included, but I'm not sure they're among the greatest of *all time*.) But it's a fun list nonetheless.
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 9:39 AM on July 22, 2017 [1 favorite]

I end up adding a dash of Martin Yan in just about everything I cook.
posted by humboldt32 at 10:05 AM on July 22, 2017 [4 favorites]

Hadn't heard of Kenji Lopez-Alt so headed over to the Serious Eats blog, and quickly stumbled upon the chicken stock in a pressure cooker write-up. Y'all. When I discovered how good (and fast) chicken stock made in a pressure cooker is it changed my life. Going to have fun poking around that site.
posted by antinomia at 10:36 AM on July 22, 2017 [5 favorites]

I've never had one of Kenji's recipes turn out bad. His foolproof hollandaise recipe and poached egg method have changed Sunday breakfasts for me. The Food Lab book is excellent.

I also adore every recipe from Stella Parks on Serious Eats. I actually like her pie crust a little bit better than Kenji's!
posted by lovecrafty at 12:54 PM on July 22, 2017

I enjoyed it, and appreciated that it wasn't numbered. So was J Lopez Kenji-Alt #1 or #100? Maybe it's random? Anyway, no comment on a list isn't complete without listing omissions. I would suggest Brillat-Savarin, and the nameless person in the Rift Valley who first accidentally dropped a raw wildebeest haunch into the fire.
posted by TedW at 1:51 PM on July 22, 2017 [3 favorites]

I'm planning on making Kenji's prime rib with red wine au jus tomorrow, for the second time. First time was the best steak I've ever had, and this time I've got a dry aged cut salted and air drying in the fridge. My mouth is very excited!

I've also not had anything from serious eats turn out poorly. I make the "Quick and Easy Italian-American Red Sauce" regularly and it's always great. All of the pressure cooker recipes on there make me want one!
posted by flaterik at 2:51 PM on July 22, 2017

...includes Rachel Ray?

Indeed. When I used to watch her show it seemed to be all about opening cans and mixing prepared foods. Maybe she's changed? I don't know, nor do I care, at this late date.
posted by Splunge at 2:53 PM on July 22, 2017 [2 favorites]

Rach gets in for popularizing the garbage bowl on the counter during prep. Didn't invent it, but I've heard TONS of people cite her as the reason they use one.
posted by Caxton1476 at 3:01 PM on July 22, 2017 [4 favorites]

Yay, Rose Levy Beranbaum!

YAY x1000 for Vertamae Smart-Grosvener!!!

There are so many great stories here. Yes, some omissions sting - Justin Wilson! - but man, this is like reading about dear old friends.
posted by Caxton1476 at 3:18 PM on July 22, 2017 [2 favorites]

When I used to watch her show it seemed to be all about opening cans and mixing prepared foods.

Your point being? That's how a lot of people cook. (That's particularly how a lot of women cook, because a lot of women cook because the cooking needs to be done, not as a hobby or form of self-expression.) There is room in the culinary world for all sorts of home cooks, including ones who use canned and other prepared foods.
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 3:42 PM on July 22, 2017 [17 favorites]

I remember in law school how shocked my roommate was when I made some convenience food--I don't even remember what it was. But I fried some onions and garlic in butter first before making the boxed dinner and he was blown away by how much better it tasted and how little effort it was. He'd grown up with convenience foods (canned beans, packets of flavored rice or whatever) but not around anyone who cooked or who thought about things like adding aromatics to the box of beans and rice or adding sausage to the jarred spaghetti sauce.

Rachel Ray is that introduction for many people to the idea that just because you don't have time or don't want to "really" cook, you can make the jarred pasta sauce taste really good or look like a nice meal with only a little extra effort. And you're worth that.
posted by crush at 5:20 PM on July 22, 2017 [5 favorites]

A lot of Lopez-Alt's lust for umami is lost on me (not everything needs fish sauce), and his meatloaf recipe didn't work for me at all, either time I've tried it, but largely Serious Eats is my go to for "how do I make that?"
posted by Bulgaroktonos at 6:13 PM on July 22, 2017

I was pleased to see Nathalie Dupree on the list, but I wasn't sure if it would be valid until I found the Rombauers.
posted by ob1quixote at 7:27 PM on July 22, 2017 [1 favorite]

"Kenji Lopez-Alt's The Food Lab is one of the greatest things that's ever happened to my cooking. It's not just a cookbook, it's a cooking *textbook* that helped me understand what I was doing on a scientific level"

you have sold me!
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 7:41 PM on July 22, 2017 [1 favorite]

I understand that "home cook" here means "never actually worked as a chef, sous chef or line cook" but it seems weird seeing names here from people who were formally trained in some pretty pricey culinary schools. Though it makes me happy to imagine Chris Kimball's irritation at being called a "home cook".
posted by middleclasstool at 7:52 PM on July 22, 2017 [6 favorites]

I work and I have a family. I get home around 6. I need to have dinner on the table by 6:45 at the very latest. I don't use any particular Rachel Ray recipe, but she taught me 100 tricks for making sure that happens with good tasting reasonably healthy food. And because of Kenji Lopez-Alt, I can treat my family to weeknight oyakodon from time to time, and experiment with deeper flavors on the weekends. But Deb Perelman of Smitten Kitchen is my hero, because whatever she says in her experiential recipes is exactly the truth. When she apologizes that a dough will "stick perilously " or a sauce will "start with an ominous color" - they do indeed. And since I expect such worrisome moments, I can be fearless enough to trust the recipe and push forward. Also, the foolproof meal of salad, bread, and her buttermilk chicken recipe has saved me during many of my worst work sprints.
posted by BlueBlueElectricBlue at 9:49 PM on July 22, 2017 [14 favorites]

A lot of Lopez-Alt's lust for umami is lost on me (not everything needs fish sauce),

His bolognaise sauce in a dutch oven is amazing EXCEPT for the fish sauce...
posted by mikelieman at 10:27 PM on July 22, 2017

What I wanted to write here was to join the praise for Kenji Lopez-Alt and the Serious Eats team. It's a daily resource for me. I put anchovy paste in almost everything, and nobody ever notices, maybe its the amounts?

The whole feature is really interesting, I learnt a lot from reading through it.
posted by mumimor at 3:50 AM on July 23, 2017

I do Kenji's all-day '80s style red sauce (well, I do the pressure cooker version now) and the fish sauce makes it better. You fish sauce haters can go find other sauces not made from rotting fish water and leave the rest of us the hell alone!
posted by middleclasstool at 5:01 AM on July 23, 2017 [2 favorites]

maybe its the amounts?

I used the amount specified in the recipe. Maybe cut it by 1/2?
posted by mikelieman at 5:23 AM on July 23, 2017

I like fish sauce, just not in everything.

I also thought Lopez-Alt had worked in restaurant kitchens pretty extensively, he definitely mentions doing so in Food Lab. I'm not sure what the definition of home cook here is exactly.
posted by Bulgaroktonos at 5:37 AM on July 23, 2017

I was first introduced to Kenji Lopez Alt's food writing through his DIY cup of noodles article, which I found to be ingenious and interesting but a little gimmicky and contingent on some specific equipment. I still find that to be the through line for a lot of Serious Eats articles -- bit showy, occasionally veers into Sport Cooking, often relies on specific gear, but solid ideas.

I use his two minute mayonnaise all the time, but I am lucky to have an immersion blender. There are a bunch of Serious Eats recipes that I skip for want of an InstaPot or sous vide. That's fine, but it usually discourages me from using the site as a go to reference. I do love that he once wrote for Cooks Illustrated and a lot of the Serious Eats recipes are basically the same iteratively/scientific approach but applied to tonkatsu or pozole.

All the same, it was Marcella Hazan who taught me how to make tomato sauce and the quote of her weaving magic from a few tomatoes, an onion, and a knob of butter are spot on. Sometimes you don't need something that takes hours and needs dozens of ingredients. Everyday cooking is just as much about what you have on hand and how much time is available in a given day, and it's worthwhile to have references that are just as much about getting something on the table in less than an hour as they are about treating every meal as a project.
posted by bl1nk at 5:52 AM on July 23, 2017 [3 favorites]

Also this list has Alice Waters, because "she opened her restaurant in a house". That's pretty much when I closed the tab. Didn't even finish the sentence.
posted by bl1nk at 5:55 AM on July 23, 2017 [1 favorite]

I use Serious Eats as a resource for sous vide, but haven't tended to use it for other things, where I do better googling and creating a hybrid approach out of what I find.

I liked that I didn't know many (or even most) of the people on the list, even if I agree that the definition of "home cook" seems a bit flexible.
posted by Dip Flash at 6:14 AM on July 23, 2017

I want to hug everyone on this list. Until I saw them all assembled together, I didn't realize what a big impact they have had on my life. I think about Tamar Adler's book every time I look into my fridge. I keep the Food Lab on my counter. I have Hazan recipes memorized as my go-to Italian recipes. I gift Small Victories whenever I can. I sorely miss Justin Wilson though, the first cooking show I watched on tv.
posted by tofu_crouton at 7:40 AM on July 23, 2017 [3 favorites]

There are a bunch of Serious Eats recipes that I skip for want of an InstaPot or sous vide. That's fine, but it usually discourages me from using the site as a go to reference.

Same. Sometimes I don't want the Best Ever of something, just a good recipe that tells me what exactly to expect. I know everyone here loves Kenji, but Smitten Kitchen is my go-to.
posted by misskaz at 12:43 PM on July 23, 2017 [4 favorites]

I've found that Smitten Kitchen is totally reliable for baked goods and somewhat less reliable for other recipes. But my go-to is Budget Bytes, so I think I'm a different kind of cook than most people who comment on cooking threads.
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 3:06 PM on July 23, 2017

Happy that Serious Eats & Smitten Kitchen are on it, only AmazingRibs is missing ;) (although to be honest it's not ground breaking, but it explains BBQ in a really clear way, I used to think BBQ was grilling).

Around here you ask that question and Ricardo is that name that'll pop-up now. Easy and usually tasty no fuss recipes.
posted by WaterAndPixels at 8:26 PM on July 23, 2017