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Monday, May 9, 2011

The extensive list of corrections and clarifications for the book The Modernist Cuisine


I've come across this article about mistakes in books, but not any book, it is about the 2400 pages The Modernist Cuisine, and the list is astonishing. Worst of all, all recipes should be strictly followed up, as they are talking about molecular cuisine. Here is an excerpt from the article by Alison Flood for Guardian.co.uk:





"I dread to think what readers of Modernist Cuisine who haven't checked the book's extensive list of corrections and clarifications are creating in their kitchens.
Take a look: it's ridiculously long, exhaustively thorough and has me, at least, giggling like a schoolchild. I think my favourite is "in the top left paragraph, 'tories' should read 'laboratories'" – but I'm also fond of "'Normal Rockwell' should read 'Norman Rockwell'", "'your own spirts' should read 'your own spirits'" and "'Dripping' should read 'Dipping'." "Causal", the corrections tell us firmly, elsewhere, "should read 'casual' and 'desert' should read 'dessert'." 
Who knows, meanwhile, what would have been cooked up if readers had followed the original instructions here? "In the recipe for Compressed Tomato, an additional step should be taken before step one: 'Remove the cores'."
Or here? "In the recipe for Goulash broth, steps three and seven should be omitted."
Or here? "In the note in the margin, '192.2 °C' should read '192.2 °F'."
"Why do you need a copyeditor? Because you don't want to have to make these kinds of corrections in your second edition," writes editor Erin Brenner, who tweeted about the corrections extravaganza yesterday.
They're certainly bad, but not as embarrassing as – in another cookbook cock-up, strangely enough - Penguin Australia's misprint, which suggested that a recipe for tagliatelle with sardines and prosciutto should include "salt and freshly ground black people", rather than pepper.
Read more inside the book
Pictures from the Modernist Cuisine blog:

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