Strunk, White and Ruhlman

This article was originally on a blog post platform and may be missing photos, graphics or links. See About archive blog posts.

With the Food Network going 24/7 and Culinary Chic so widespread that people are quitting real jobs to go to -- gasp -- culinary school (instead of film school or MFA poetry programs, like they used to), there’s a greater need than ever to Define Terms in the food world. Enter Michael Ruhlman, author of ‘The Soul of a Chef’ and coauthor of ‘The French Laundry Cookbook,’ whose latest book, ‘The Elements of Cooking: Translating the Chef’s Craft for Every Kitchen,’ is a reference guide based loosely on Strunk and White’s classic grammar treatise, ‘The Elements of Style.’

Ruhlman’s book (the color of a school-zone pylon, which seems fitting) is a slim, condensed and workmanlike volume. After a 40-plus-page intro that alerts us to foundational kitchen wisdom (the importance of stock, say), the book yields a lovely catalog of culinary terms. It’s far from a comprehensive list, and it’s weighted heavily in favor of classic French cuisine. Ruhlman also has a rather mysterious operating principle: ‘time,’ ‘smell’ and ‘oignon pique’ are among the terms defined; ‘harissa’ and ‘banneton’ are not. Whatever. If you need a more exhaustive reference guide, you’ve probably already got Alan Davidson’s ‘The Oxford Companion to Food’ and ‘Larousse Gastronomique’ weighing down the chaos of paperwork on your desk.

What sets Ruhlman’s book apart, and makes it worth adding to that stack on the desk, is his jaunty tone, the overall happy utility of his project -- and his prose. (You don’t reference Strunk and White if you can’t string together a well-wrought sentence.) What I missed, though, was more of the vehement humor that laces his blog. OK, we (and more specifically, the youthful Emeril-wannabes who populate cooking schools) can all profit by a lecture on the Importance of the Egg and more reminders of Thomas Keller’s brilliance. But what about the grammar of the kitchen? How about the use of an independent clause, with or without a colon, or the use of ‘definite, specific, concrete language’ when your sous chef has lost the shellfish tags or the saucier has broken the beurre blanc? What I really wanted was a section like Chapter 4 in Strunk and White: ‘Words and Expressions Commonly Misused.’

Or maybe Ruhlman -- or Anthony Bourdain, come to think of it -- could just come up with a list like the one my editor once stuck to my computer screen on a yellow Post-it. I’ll never use the word ‘bounty’ again.

The Elements of Cooking, by Michael Ruhlman. (Scribner, 2007.)

-- Amy Scattergood