Even if Kimball knew a lot, in this day and age I just do not find his approach to food appealing in the least. The world has discovered Bhut Jolokia, and he recoils at banana peppers. I was born in Boston. My brother still lives in Somerville. My brother’s food is literally all over the map, save maybe Antarctica. Even New England has moved on. When I go up there to see him the food is certainly less spicy than I like, but it sure isn’t brown bread, thin steak, and baked beans at Durgin Park.
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I enjoyed watching Nosrat’s episodes and I think we bought her book, but she does not seem to be particularly skilled in the kitchen.
Her tahdig on the show was a fail. I’m glad you’re happy with her recipe though.
I also like her personality on the show and agree she seems huggable.
But I think she is an example of a celebrity chef who might not be much of a chef. She seems more like a culinary reporter, if there was such a thing.
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Her personality absolutely sparkles, but her book is all about balancing flavors much more than technique. It actually is not that different from Alice Waters’ approach to food, which makes sense given her ties to Chez Panisse. Her words on salt are the best thing in the book. Even if you do not buy into her approach on salt, it is worth trying, especially as regards meat.
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This is the book
The contents
And two of the recipes I often refer to
I’m going to try to make BBQ spice mix from these
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The combination of cumin, chile powder, and a good seasoning salt can works wonders in so many applications.m
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I have older hard copies of that book; the most recent one I bought was through an e-publishing apparatus called Inkling. Inkling showed promise years ago when it started because you had the ability to purchase single chapters of books (which was great for profs and students). The app I use is now called ebooks by Inkling , kind of a graveyard for the Professional Chef and my copy of Modernist Cuisine. It’s now a company that does interactive content. Behold my captive library ( I think the camera book and the marketing book were freebies).
The in app bookstore is completely dead. All the other books I originally purchased as stand-alone apps, including Modernist Cuisine; they migrated themselves to Inkling - the original apps are dead and no longer available.
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Wow! How did you happen to find that?
I was driving through western Maryland to West Virginia in 2011. 
seriously. And listening to a CNBC show on Sirius/XM. And they were talking about this company called Inkling and what they were doing with textbooks. So when I got home, I went straight to my iPad (which I’d just gotten - that’s an even better story) and there was the app! It was a great idea at the time; evidently the business model wasn’t.
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