How to Cook Like the Pros, Owner's Syndrome and Other Medical Anomalies and Bigfoot Summary and Analysis

Bourdain outlines a few items essential to the home cook who aspires to prepare meals with professional flair: a good chef's knife, flexible boning knife, paring knife, offset serrated knife, plastic squeeze bottle, metal ring, pastry bag, mandoline, stockpots, saucepans, and thick-bottomed sauté pans. The elemental food items include shallots, butter, roasted garlic, chiffonaded parsley, stock, demi-glace, chervil, basil, chives, and mint tops.

According to Bourdain, owning a restaurant feeds an ego as well as customers. Unfortunately, many people enter the restaurant business unprepared for the unexpected financial expenditures that always arise. This is especially true of people who decide to open a restaurant after retiring from another unrelated profession because of compliments received at...