Allen, with his impressive history of food writing, culinary reference books, and food history books for general audiences, has outdone himself with a compact, highly useful book about sauces for foodies, students, researchers, and culinary professionals . Unlike James Peterson's classic tome Sauces: Classical and Contemporary Saucemaking (1991)and Raymond Sokolov's The Saucier's Apprentice (1976),which focus mainly on production of classic European sauces, Allen dives into the origin of sauces from early medieval recipes to the evolution of classical French cuisine, to major sauces from other significant culinary traditions. Allen also goes one step further in his sauce book to include what would be defined as sauces in molecular gastronomy: solutions, suspensions, gels, composites, and foams. The book includes clearly written sauce recipes that anyone can make, black-and-white photographs of popular sauce brands, and eleven pages of notes and references citing primary source material, classic culinary reference books and food history books, and articles from well-regarded culinary publications. This volume belongs in large public and academic libraries with culinary collections and in community college libraries that support culinary arts programs.ial, classic culinary reference books and food history books, and articles from well-regarded culinary publications. This volume belongs in large public and academic libraries with culinary collections and in community college libraries that support culinary arts programs.ial, classic culinary reference books and food history books, and articles from well-regarded culinary publications.

This volume belongs in large public and academic libraries with culinary collections and in community college libraries that support culinary arts programs.ial, classic culinary reference books and food history books, and articles from well-regarded culinary publications. This volume belongs in large public and academic libraries with culinary collections and in community college libraries that support culinary arts programs.