America's Best Chefs Cook with Jeremiah Tower

Book excerpt: Jeremiah Tower, James Beard Award–winning chef and pioneer of American regional cuisine, cooks with a "who′s who" of some of the nation′s top chefs in their home kitchens Companion to the PBS television series, America′s Best Chefs In the early 1970s, Chef Jeremiah Tower′s revolutionary ethos of fresh ingredients, simply prepared and presented, shook up the national culinary scene. The successes that followed are legendary, from his trail–blazing Santa Fe Bar and Grill in Berkeley to the acclaimed Stars restaurant in San Francisco. Now, in this companion to the landmark twenty–six–part PBS series, America′s Best Chefs, Jeremiah Tower visits 13 James Beard Award–winning chefs and cooks with them in their home kitchens. More than 100 recipes, accompanied by full–color photographs, show home cooks how to make the dishes featured on the show as well as a number of Jeremiah′s own creations. The book includes contributions from New York′s Michael Romano (Union Square Cafe) and Alain Ducasse (Ducasse), Los Angeles′ Mark Peel and Nancy Silverton (Campanile and La Brea Bakery), San Francisco′s Nancy Oakes (Boulevard), Chicago′s Charlie Trotter (Charlie Trotter′s) and Gale Gand (Tru), Philadelphia′s Jean–Louis Lacroix (Rittenhouse Hotel), Boston′s Ken Oringer (Clio), Arizona′s Robert McGrath (Roaring Fork in Scottsdale), Wisconsin′s Odessa Piper (L′Etoile in Madison), Alabama′s Frank Stitt (Highlands Bar & Grill in Birmingham), Oregon′s Philippe Boulot (The Heathman Bar and Grill in Portland), and Virginia′s Patrick O′Connell (The Inn at Little Washington). Jeremiah Tower (New York, NY) received the James Beard Foundation′s Outstanding Chef Award in 1996 and is the author of the James Beard Award–winning New American Classics as well as Jeremiah Tower Cooks.