Garde Manger: The Art and Craft of the Cold Kitchen

Garde manger refers to the restaurant kitchen area where cold dishes, including soups, salads, sandwiches, sauces, cheeses, sausages, and pâtés, as well as hors d'oeuvres and the condiments used to garnish them, are prepared. The book Garde Manger is a teaching text for food professionals, updated from a 1973 edition by a team of chefs from the Culinary Institute of America. Home cooks, as well as students and professional cooks, will enjoy the chapters on preparing dressings, cold soups, salads, and sandwiches in this clearly, concisely written book, which is illustrated with hundreds of color photos. More serious home cooks will also appreciate the chapters that delve into making sausages, smoked foods, terrines, and other charcuterie. Here you'll learn to prepare and smoke old-fashioned, lusty French Garlic Sausage or a Pheasant Galantine enriched with pork fat and Madeira.

Intermediate cooks comfortable with terms such as chiffonade (leafy vegetables cut into very thin strips) will appreciate composed salads like simple Italian Shaved Fennel with Parmesan and heat-spiked Buffalo Chicken Salad, in addition to such soups as Cold Carrot Bisque sparked with ginger, tangy orange juice, and yogurt.

Noncooks interested in food will find Garde Manger fascinating too. How better to appreciate the Roasted Vegetable Terrine, layered with eggplant, squash, mushrooms, and goat cheese and served at your favorite restaurant, than by understanding how it is made? Home cooks who entertain will appreciate Garde Manger's recipes, as they produce quarts of sauce, gallons of soup, and canapés by the dozen. For the rest, when you can't modify the recipe, there is always the freezer. --Dana Jacobi