A Chef S Tale

Originally published: New York: A.A. Knopf: Distributed by Random House, Inc., 1994.

Niki Nakayama: A Chef's Tale in 13 Bites is a picture book biography that tells the story of the powerhouse female Japanese-American chef and her rise to fame As a child and adult, Niki faced many naysayers in her pursuit of haute cuisine. Using the structure of a traditional kaiseki meal, the authors Debbi Michiko Florence and Jamie Michalak playfully detail Niki's hunger for success in thirteen "bites" — from wonton wrappers she used to make pizza as a kid to yuzu-tomatillo sauce in her own upscale Los Angeles Michelin-starred restaurant, n/naka. To anyone who tells her a woman can't be a master chef, Niki lets her food do the talking. And oh, does it talk. Niki was featured on the first season of Netflix's culinary documentary series Chef's Table. And Chrissy Teigen proclaimed that Niki's restaurant was one of her absolute favorites. She's currently a featured teacher on MasterClass. A smart, strong woman with starpower, Niki is only just getting started — like the young readers who will devour this book, featuring illustrations by Yuko Jones!

This book is about the creative work of chefs at top restaurants in New York and San Francisco. Based on interviews with chefs and observation in restaurant kitchens, the book explores the question of how and why chefs make choices about the dishes they put on their menus. It answers this question by examining a whole range of areas, including chefs' careers, restaurant ratings and reviews, social networks, how chefs think about food and go about creating new dishes, and how status influences their work and careers. Chefs at top restaurants face competing pressures to deliver complex and creative dishes, and navigate market forces to run a profitable business in an industry with exceptionally high costs and low profit margins. Creating a distinctive and original culinary style allows them to stand out in the market, but making the familiar food that many customers want ensures that they can stay in business. Chefs must make choices between these competing pressures. In explaining how they do so, this book uses the case study of high cuisine to analyze, more generally, how people in creative occupations navigate a context that is rife with uncertainty, high pressures, and contradicting forces.

An award-winning chef describes how he lost his sense of taste to cancer, a setback that prompted him to discover alternate cooking methods and create his celebrated progressive cuisine.

Celebrating Seattle’s best restaurants and eateries with recipes and photographs Hot chefs are setting the Seattle restaurant scene ablaze. With innovative ideas and culinary surprises, the city’s most heralded restaurants and eateries continue adding spark to an already sizzling food scene. From James Beard winners Holly Smith and Maria Hines to Chris Mills, who competed on the original Japanese Iron Chef in Tokyo, and restaurants like Volterra, which Rachael Ray named one of her “favorite restaurants in the world,” the Emerald City is filled with celebrity chefs, heralded restaurants, and Food Network star eateries that serve up delicious cuisine to locals and tourists. Seattle Chef’s Table is the first cookbook to gather Seattle’s best chefs and restaurants under one cover. Profiling signature “at home” recipes from almost fifty legendary dining establishments, the book is also a celebration of the growing sustainable food movement in the Pacific Northwest. With full-color photos throughout highlighting fabulous dishes, famous chefs, and Seattle landmarks, it is the ideal ode to the city’s coveted food culture and atmosphere.

A little girl prepares to make her grandmother’s favorite meal in Matt Stine's and Elisabeth Weinberg's Little Chef, an energetic picture book illustrated by Paige Kaiser... "Making excellent use of white space, Keiser employs what looks like watercolor and pen and ink to portray Lizzie in perpetual motion as she demonstrates her culinary prowess. With amazing curly hair that sometimes appears almost as big as she is, Lizzie could be a biracial child given her dad's brown skin and her mom's lighter complexion. The recipe in the backmatter will inspire young readers to follow Lizzie's fearless lead."--Kirkus, starred review

Very few areas in the world offer more diversity than the San Francisco Bay Area, a place that is without a doubt, “foodie central.” One reason for the major influx of the finest chefs and their restaurants here is perhaps twofold. First, the resident foodies love to eat out, not to mention the 16 million tourists that also visit here with food at the top of their to-do list. The second reason is perhaps the fact that the Bay Area offers chefs an incomparable proximity to fresh, local, and organic ingredients with which to cook, which anyone who cooks can tell you make all of the difference in the end result. With recipes for the home cook from over 50 of the area's most celebrated eateries and showcasing over 200 full-color photos featuring mouth-watering dishes, famous chefs, and lots of local flavor, San Francisco Chef's Table is the ultimate gift and keepsake cookbook for both tourists and locals alike.

In Washington, DC, political rivals disagree on just about everything, but there is widespread bi-partisan support for the city's restaurant scene. The nation's capital and neighboring suburbs boast premier restaurants and inspired chefs who bring even the most hardened adversaries, to the table. Now, everyone, inside and outside the beltway, can savor a taste of the best Washington has to offer. With tantalizing recipes from more than 50 of the capital's most celebrated chefs and 100 beautiful full-color photographs, Washington, DC Chef's Table is a feast for the eyes as well as the palate.