Speaking to The Wall Street Journal , the author said: 'It changes the conventional wisdom about whether people will buy an expensive book if there is value in it. The book was self-published by Mr Myhrvold who financed the entire process himself. It took the team three years to create but he has never revealed how much the visually-striking product cost him to produce. Success: The cookbook set above comes in six parts in total and took 30 people to create. It has been translated in French, German and Spanish and further interpretations are on their way.
He claimed that the project was never intended to make him such a large amount of money. Genius: Nathan Myhrvold, a former chief technologist officer for Microsoft, penned the six-volume book set. It is a prestigious culinary competition that evaluates international chefs. Tom Parker Bowles, a B ritish food writer, said: 'This is not a cook book as such, rather a brilliant, beautiful documentation of one man's obsession with the science of food. It's one of the greatest works on food ever published.
Mr Myrhvold also said he has 12 staff who are continuing research for another cookbook project. Skills: The book set, which also features the above photograph, took three years to produce. Inspired by discussions on sites such as eGullet.
In addition to his long career with Microsoft, and as an independent inventor, Myhrvold has also helped complete Victorian computing pioneer Charles Babbage's Difference Engine, a pioneering mechanical computer designed by Babbage. Argos AO. Privacy Policy Feedback. Share this article Share. Mind you, it isn't just any cookbook, it's Modernist Cuisine , the result of four years of research, experimenting, and writing and it's due out in Decem- nope.
Make that March. Modernist Cuisine , which its authors hope will demystify the science of cooking, as well as the technological advances showcased at noted restaurants such as Spain's El Bulli , is running a little late. Still, that hasn't stopped rampant speculation about the book and what readers can expect to find. Amazon and Borders Books have been accepting preorders since last spring. The book's web site , launched in early August, offers readers a chance to peruse the lengthy table of contents, admire some of the photos, and read about the authors' backgrounds and why Nathan Myhrvold — the book's primary author and funder — felt such a book was even necessary.
Criticisms are already raging. Given what's presented on the web site, that seems a realistic assessment. I witnessed Myhrvold's impatience with old-fashioned ways of thinking when I visited the eccentric millionaire last fall, and so last week's dustup with superstar food writer Michael Ruhlman wasn't unexpected. But it told a lot about how Modernist Cuisine is being misunderstood, and even misrepresented in some ways. To recap: Ruhlman reviewed Myhrvold's magnum opus for the New York Times , and found it "mind-crushingly boring, eye-bulgingly riveting, edifying, infuriating, frustrating, fascinating, all in the same moment.
But Ruhlman, like many traditional cooks, sees it as a playground for chefs and food geeks rather than the revolution Myhrvold had hoped for.
Are we to embrace the ingredients and techniques of modernist cuisine at the very moment industrially processed food is being blamed for many of our national health problems? Alice Waters, always ready to reassert the Naturalist party line, came out against the book months ago , but Ruhlman's review appeared in the Times , and so it has the weight of the official Establishment response behind it.
Myhrvold, not one to take a dismissal lying down, thundered back in a widely quoted post on the popular food forum eGullet.
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