Good Eats: The Final Years

Good Eats

by Alton Brown

An all-new collection of must-have recipes and surprising food facts from Alton Brown, drawn from the return of the beloved Good Eats television series, including never-before aired materialThis long-anticipated fourth and final volume in the bestselling Good Eats series of cookbooks draws on two reboots of the beloved television show by the inimitable Alton Brown—Good Eats Reloaded and Good Eats: The Return. With more than 175 new and improved recipes for everything from chicken parm to bibimbap and cold brew to corn dogs, accompanied by mouthwatering original photography, The Final Years is the most sumptuous and satisfying of the Good Eats books yet.

Brown’s surefire recipes are temptation enough: the headnotes, tips, and sidebars that support them make each recipe a journey into culinary technique, flavor exploration, and edible history. Striking photography showcases finished dishes and highlights key ingredients, and handwritten notes on the pages capture Brown’s unique mix of madcap and methodical. The distinctive high-energy and information-intensive dynamic of Good Eats comes to life on every page, making this a must-have cookbook for die-hard fans and newcomers alike.

Genres: Cookbooks, Cooking, Food, Nonfiction, Reference, Culinary, Science

432 pages, Hardcover

First published April 26, 2022

About the author

Alton Brown is an American food personality, cinematographer, author, and actor. He is the creator and host of the Food Network television show Good Eats, the miniseries Feasting on Asphalt and the main commentator on Iron Chef America.
Brown received a degree in drama from the University of Georgia. He first worked in cinematography and film production, and was the director of photography on the music video for R.E.M.'s "The One I Love". He also worked as a steadicam operator on the Spike Lee film School Daze.

At some point, he noticed that he was very dissatisfied with the quality of cooking shows then airing on American television, so he set out to produce his own show. Not possessing the requisite knowledge, he enrolled in the New England Culinary Institute, from which he graduated in 1997. Brown states that he had been a poor science student in high school and college, so he began to study the subject as he took cooking training and felt the need to understand the underlying processes of cooking.

Reviews

[Diana · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’ve never seen the cooking show that this cookbook is based on but it seems like it’d be fun. I’ve bookmarked a few recipes including gluten-free sugar cookies, cabbage latkes and quick preserved lemons.

[Karen · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you only read one cookbook in your life...make it be Alton Brown's Good Eats series. Not only are the recipes superb but he includes all the food history and chemistry which really adds interest such as: all medjool dates descend from a single tree from Saharan Morocco; the first known mention of pudding in European literature took place in Homer's "The Odyssey"; it was the Dutch-not the Belgians who 1st made square waffles and the word vinegar comes from a French word meaning "sour wine". Excellent read.

[Kate Atonic · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love the science and the theater of Good Eats, but some of the early recipes were disappointing. In this volume he goes back and admits “yeah, my biscuits were okay, but I’ve tweaked it and tweaked it until they were worthy of Ma Mae.” Same with a few of his other early recipes, like his golden cake (8 egg yolks!) Lots of new material, though, with the same emphasis on understanding “why” not just “how”, such as in his recipe for turkey Tikka Masala and a side bar on whey-based marinades.

I tried reading this as a library book on my old black and white Kindle but struggled to read the text on pages with pictures. There are a LOT of pictures with text. Had better luck with my iPad mini, but it was still frustrating to have zoom and scroll. Got as far as Scallion Pancakes (yum!!) before I just added a paper copy to my Amazon wishlist.

[Clwseattle · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's been a busy two years for me. I wasn't, and am still not, watching much television, but I wondered what happened to Alton Brown. Well, here he is.

Please, take your time and savor Good Eats 4: The Final Years.

Reading Good Eats 4: The Final Years is as fun as watching 'Good Eats'. I'm so glad he included vignettes about the show. Even in print he's his adorable preachy self about that which he is passionate, the science of cooking. The pictures will make you run to the kitchen drooling.

As in the previous three Good Eats books and the show, he explains the history, the science, the why's, and the how to's he's perfected along the way.

There is a wealth of information on each page of that shares space with pictures from the shows, his ubiquitous charts, and yellow notes.

"Food can sense fear better than a dog."

5 stars for Good Eats 4. Thanks, Alton.

[Mark Schmidl-Gagne · Rating 3 out of 5]

It’s a better than average as cookbook go, but I have an issue. In his earlier books, he provided “definitive” recipes, which he is now coming back saying “yeah I gave you a definitive recipe, but now I have a better way to make it.” It’s a personal issue for me; don’t plant your ultimate or definitive flag on ANYTHING. Fine say it is the best you have ever had or made, but why do we feel so cocky or arrogant that we can say our’s is the absolute best, and then put out a revised recipe which we now say is better than the first. Yo Alton, I remember when you said you had the best Bloody Mary recipe 12 years ago. Now you are once again saying it with a different Bloody Mary recipe. If you’d only said “this is the best I’ve ever had”, you’d be leaving room to have/create a better one. Instead your arrogance is proven and you come off as mor than a little bit of a jerk.

[Julie Capell · Rating 1 out of 5]

I'm sure this is a great cookbook for ... someone. It just wasn't for me. The recipes are too complex for me, and many are inedible if you are gluten-free (like me). When I got to a couple of recipes specifically designated as GF, like the amaranth cookies, and I realized they didn't sound all that good to me, I decided to stop reading and move on to another cookbook. Love Alton on TV, but apparently I am not the audience he is writing his cookbooks for.

[Cynde · Rating 4 out of 5]

The fourth book in the series Alton Brown highlights some of the recipes on his television show with comments and improvements and updates. If you are familiar with the shows this will be a fun nostalgic update. If you haven't watched the shows you will want to find them (probably streaming somewhere). If not it is still a book filled with excellent recipes and lots of great information.

[Celeste · Rating 4 out of 5]

Even better than before. He has taken his old recipes and improved and sometimes in direct opposition to his previous directions, e.g., how to cook steak. More pictures, which I love, to understand better. Lots of tips and tweaks. I especially like the tweaks how to use ordinary ingredients versus Super Chef ingredients. Love the book and the niece who gifted it to me.

[Paul · Rating 5 out of 5]

Mr. Brown is an American treasure! Good Eats combines two of my loves - food and science!

Reader's note: I didn't "read" this book cover-to-cover. It's a cookbook. (Does anyone read a cookbook cover-to-cover?) I did a quick cover-to-cover survey of the entire book.

However, I have used several recipes from the book.

[P.J. · Rating 5 out of 5]

This cookbook is BIG! I'd already cooked a lot of the things in it from watching Good Eats, but I love having a physical cookbook. And it's Alton Brown so it's full of science, sarcasm, and deliciousness.

[Shannon · Rating 4 out of 5]

When looking at a new recipe, there are certain people I know will never let me down, and Alton Brown is in my top 3. He knows his stuff and has the science to back him up. This book is especially great because he went back and improved some already good recipes. This one is definitely a keeper.

[Sharon Blair Scott · Rating 5 out of 5]

Big Alton fan and this book another example of why. He is honest about who he is. He is genuine about where he has come from. He is willing to share what he has learned about life and good. Much knowledge here.

[Tim LaSalvia · Rating 5 out of 5]

I took a long time with this book, savoring each page. I read through every recipe, even those I know I'll never make because I knew I'd likely learn something and I thoroughly enjoy Alton Brown's quirky humor. This was a really fun and interesting book for me.

[Savanna · Rating 5 out of 5]

Awesome book! I loved all of the historical facts and food trivia.

[Leane · Rating 3 out of 5]

Informative and entertaining--full of photographs and footnotes on each recipe/espisode.

[Brooke · Rating 4 out of 5]

198:2022
I'll have to actually cook from this one to give it five stars, but it's a good foodie read, regardless.

[Soc Page]

updates of some of their more popular episodes as well as updates using new techniques that were not available when the original shows posted.

[Juli Anna · Rating 4 out of 5]

An excellent end to this series.

[Kevin]

Resume on page 282