The Essential Thomas Keller

Two award-winning books in one box offer a lifetime of learning for anyone who loves fine food.

 From two acclaimed restaurants came two of the most acclaimed, award-winning cookbooks ever published—now packaged together in a luxurious slipcased boxed set, the ideal holiday gift for any food lover. 

First there was French Laundry in Napa Valley, setting a new standard for American fine dining. Then there was The French Laundry Cookbook, setting a new standard for American cookbooks. In 2006, Chef Keller opened Ad Hoc, his casual family-style restaurant that serves a single menu a day, and that restaurant, too, gave birth to a groundbreaking cookbook, in fact a New York Times best seller.

Whereas Ad Hoc at Home offers a huge happiness-inducing collection of family-style recipes that includes lunch-counter favorites—lemon meringue and cherry pie; such classics as Buttermilk Fried Chicken and Herbed Rack of Lamb, plus Thomas’s mom’s coconut cake and his dad’s favorite meatballs—The French Laundry Cookbook is a culinary ode to finesse. Every recipe in it has become a classic: from Keller’s Salmon Cornets to his Oysters and Pearls and Butter-Poached Lobster. From the casual but carefully considered food of Ad Hoc at Home to The French Laundry Cookbook’s recipes at their most refined, this is cooking that delivers in taste, and makes us all better cooks.