Anthony Bourdain's Les Halles Cookbook

I've been watching Tony for a while on FoodTV and I gotta say that he's probably got one of the best foodie jobs in the world. He travels, eats, travels some more, eats some more... I mean can it really be that rough? Sure, in his "A Cook's Tour" book he complains sometimes but the moral of the story is, eating food for a living isn't that bad.

All that rambling leads me to the Les Halles Cookbook which I picked up recently. Having only cooked the soupe au vin thus far, I can't comment on the majority of the recipes but the soup was fantastic.

Other recipes that have been piquing my interest are the moules a la basquaise, the blanquette de homard, and quenelles de brochet. For the most part, these and the other recipes are fairly easy to prepare as long as you're comfortable making some stocks and demi-glace and getting your meeeeez in place (mise-en-place). And as usual each chapter and each recipe feature Tony's visceral, unedited, and rather amusing writing. I highly recommend this one, even if you're just a rookie chef like myself.