Most cookbooks age poorly as tastes change, but Sauces Reconsidered evades this fate because the structure of sauces is not dependent on fashion. By exploring the fundamental physical and cultural characteristics of hundreds of sauces, we see the connections between, and the distinguishing features of, sauces from any cuisine around the world.

Sauces Reconsidered: Après Escoffier replaces the traditional French hierarchy of sauces with a modern version based on the sauces’ physical properties. While itis not a traditional cookbook, it does include many recipes. Cooks need not slavishly follow them, however, as the recipes illustrate their underlying functions, helping cooks to successfully create their own sauces based on their newfound understanding of sauces’ intrinsic properties. Gary Allen explores what makes a sauce the type of sauce it is, how it works, why it is specific to a particular cuisine, and how cooks can make it their own through an understanding of how the ingredients work together to create a sauce that enriches a dish and tantalizes the taste buds.