White Heat 25 A cookbook about a sleep-deprived, nicotine-fueled mad man in the kitchen

See sample pages from this book at Wink.

White Heat has long been my White Whale when searching through used bookstores. Ive wanted this book for going on ten years. The first time I heard the name Marco Pierre White I had been reading a copy of Anthony Bourdains Kitchen Confidential, wondering if I had what it takes to be a professional chef (I did not). Bourdain mentioned Whites book, saying that it was the first time hed seen a real chef in a cookbook, a sleep-deprived, nicotine-fueled, mad man in the kitchen.

I thought that Id finally found my copy when there was a re-release a few years back, but that paperback copy is the TV dinner to this 25th anniversary editions three-course meal. Can a home cook use any of these recipes? Maybe. The recipes are French. Theyre complicated. And the ingredients include things like caviar, lobster, and pig trotter. But, the mistake is to think of this as a straight-up cookbook. You wouldnt flip through a book on Picasso and expect to learn how to paint. This book is evidence in the argument that food can be art.

While you might not find a recipe for something to cook on a Tuesday night, you will find: Beautiful, gritty, black and white photography that makes you feel like youre in the kitchen with this lunatic. A chef doing what chefs do, smoke. The word fuck on more than one page. A fresh-faced Gordon Ramsey before he started calling people donkeys. And a handful of recipes for dishes that allowed White to become the youngest chef to hold three Michelin Stars. White Heat 25 is fitting for any bookshelf, coffee table, or kitchen counter. JP LeRoux

White Heat 25
by Marco Pierre White (author) and Bob Carlos Clarke (photographer)
Mitchell Beazley
2015, 192 pages, 9.9 x 12.5 x 0.8 inches
$34 Buy a copy on Amazon