The French Laundry Cookbook, One Recipe at a Time

Unable to get a reservation at Thomas Keller's French Laundry, Carol decided to make her way through his French Laundry Cookbook instead, one recipe at a time. She's blogging it, of course—complete with photos of the process from mise en place to finished product—so you can follow her escapades at French Laundry at Home.

The project is a lovely idea, but the thing that really makes it work is that Carol is a fantastic writer with a great sense of humor and is unafraid of sharing her frustrations when things go awry. Last week she made the candied apple dessert from the book, which turned out to be a success taste-wise, but found the experience of making it so tedious that she warns, "Do NOT try this dish if you are busy. Or not busy. Or have a life. Oh yes, you may look at the recipe, scrutinize the three pages it takes up in the book, and think, 'Well of course I can do this over three days, with just doing a little bit here and there like the book suggests.' Yeah, I dare you. Call me if you can do it and not be annoyed." [via The Grinder]