The
Two Burner Gourmetby Terry Searfoss
The
Two Burner GourmetReviewed by Gloria Peck
I've been looking for a cookbook that tells me exactly how to prepare for a culinarily organized, safe, and pleasant sailing trip. Terry Searfoss has written it! As a sailor and former ad-man, he knows how to present his book in an organized and eye-appealing way. From cooking for twenty years for hungry crews and writing a food column, he really knows how to cook - on a boat - and to pass this information on to you.! He devotes eight pages to refrigeration on-board. As one who has lost plenty of food to trial and error, I appreciated that chapter. He follows this with a clean-up section (required reading for all crew members) and a long section on compacting garbage. Then he arrives at his great recipes. Each recipe includes a list of prepackaged ingredients that can be measured into a zip-lock bag and packaged with all the other ingredients for that meal's menu. Recipes are organized into sets for two-day, three-day, and five-day cruises. At the end of the book, he provides shopping lists for each set of meals.
In addition to presenting loads of useful information in a very organized manner, Searfoss makes the reader laugh. He starts each menu with a story associated with it: they are often witty and always insightful. Of these stories, he says, “It’s just my attempt to bring a smile to your face, a chuckle to your belly and a friend to your galley.” Searfoss mixes cooking with psychology. “Food not only fuels the body but it lifts the spirit. Over the years I've noticed that during a cruise or race, crews go through emotional high and low cycles that are quite predictable. The right meal at the right time can pull the crew out of the doldrums and snap them back to the fun life.” This blend of wit, philosophy, and useful information makes The Two Burner Gourmet fun reading even when one isn't preparing for a cruise or actually cruising.
After reading this book, I not only feel better prepared for the next cruise, I imagine that cruising with this talented, witty person would be fun.
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