The Kitchen Counter Cooking School – A Book Review

The Kitchen Counter Cooking School is the most delightful book about food that I have come across in a long time. It’s not a cookbook (although it does contain a handful of recipes). It’s a recount of Kathleen Flinn’s efforts to mentor a small group of women through the basics of home cooking.

The story starts with Kathleen meeting a woman at the grocery store who has no idea what she is looking for and is stuffing her shopping cart with processed foods. Having just completed culinary school in Paris, she decides that she can help.

This is a story that most of us can relate to. I not only used to buy a lot of processed food, I actually believed that what I was eating was food. We have all been programmed to believe that real food comes in a box. Kathleen’s objective was to teach this group of women, and now us (via the book) how to cook simply and inexpensively at home. She covers everything from how to use a knife (which, surprisingly, I was doing the proper way) to how to bone a chicken (which I have yet to try).

The lessons in the book really resonated with me as a food allergy Mom. When you can’t rely on frozen chicken fingers and tater tots from the grocery store anymore, the answer is to make your own!

Have you read the book? What did you think?