The Red Rooster Cookbook: The Story of Food and Hustle in Harlem

Product Description Southern comfort food and multicultural recipes from the New York Times best-selling superstar chef Marcus Samuelsson’s iconic Harlem restaurant. When the James Beard Award-winning chef Marcus Samuelsson opened Red Rooster on Malcolm X Boulevard in Harlem, he envisioned more than a restaurant. It would be the heart of his neighborhood and a meet-and-greet for both the downtown and the uptown sets, serving Southern black and cross-cultural food. It would reflect Harlem's history. Ever since the 1930s, Harlem has been a magnet for more than a million African Americans, a melting pot for Spanish, African, and Caribbean immigrants, and a mecca for artists. These traditions converge on Rooster’s menu, with Brown Butter Biscuits, Chicken and Waffle, Killer Collards, and Donuts with Sweet Potato Cream. They’re joined by global-influenced dishes such as Jerk Bacon and Baked Beans, Latino Pork and Plantains, and Chinese Steamed Bass and Fiery Noodles. Samuelsson’s Swedish-Ethiopian background shows in Ethiopian Spice-Crusted Lamb, Slow-Baked Blueberry Bread with Spiced Maple Syrup, and the Green Viking, sprightly Apple Sorbet with Caramel Sauce. Interspersed with lyrical essays that convey the flavor of the place and stunning archival and contemporary photos, The Red Rooster Cookbook is as layered as its inheritance. Review "Samuelsson’s unorthodox Red Rooster Cookbook is a literary love letter to Harlem...he goes beyond recipes to write an ode to the neighborhood—and the people, places, and problems in it—that made him." --VanityFair.com “[T]he Red Rooster Cookbook is more than a collection of recipes and anecdotes from [Samuelsson’s] Harlem restaurant. It is a tribute to this world-renowned New York neighborhood and the people who live and work there — just as Samuelson so proudly and happily does.” —Chicago Tribune "Mr. Samuelsson was born in Ethiopia and raised in Sweden, but he has made Harlem his home, and it’s clear in 'The Red Rooster Cookbook: The Story of Food and Hustle in Harlem' that he has found magic there. The restaurant, which opened in 2010, was a meditation on modern Harlem, an embrace of its past and a vision for its future — vibrantly diverse, effortlessly cool...the book’s real charm lies in what it captures: the spirit of this particular place." —The New York Times "Beloved New York City chef Marcus Samuelsson strikes again with The Red Rooster Cookbook. The chef — who has four other cookbooks, plus a memoir, to his name — presents recipes from his dynamic Harlem restaurant, each reflecting the unique cultural influences of both the place and the man, like Ethiopian spice-crusted lamb and brown butter biscuits. Along with recipes, the book offers essays and vintage photos of Harlem scenes gone by." —Eater "Samuelsson sheds light on what compelled him to leave the world of foie gras and foams to cook, literally and figuratively, closer to home. The result is a restaurant-and now a cookbook-featuring his style of soul food, embracing American, Ethiopian, and Swedish comfort dishes... [M]usic, specifically jazz, informs Samuelsson's neighborhood, his writing, and given its many riffs and collaborations, his cooking style, too." --Fine Cooking “While Harlem has long occupied a mythical place in the American imagination, it is also a place where human beings live, work, raise and educate their children, and eat. The revitalization of Harlem is one of the most important social and economic developments of this generation, and the role of cultural institutions is central to that process. To a list including the Studio Museum and the Schomburg Center, one must add the Red Rooster, which has rapidly become the gathering place for the cultural glitterati, where conversation and music are nourished by Marcus’s sublime cuisine. Who would have thought that Ethiopia and Sweden and the American South would meet on a menu in Harlem?” —Henry Louis Gates Jr., Harvard University “I met Marcus Samuelsson w