Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

There are a couple of problems with this book. First, like a number of other review, the physical book is of dubious quality. My copy arrived with the spine already broken and separating. I chose to keep the book figuring that, as a cookbook, that's the condition it would've ended up in anyway. Which brings me to the second issue I have with this book. Most of the recipes call for specialized ingredients that are difficult to find at local grocery stores. In the course of the book, the author specifies particular flours, canned tomatoes, pizza pans, Wagyu beef, etc. without ever offering alternatives that are more readily available or affordable. I totally get that this is supposed to be pizza at it's highest level but if it requires me having to mail-order $60 pans, $30 specialty flours and goodness-only-knows how much Snake River Farms Waygu beef then I'm just not interested. As culinary school graduate, I'm not afraid to spend money on ingredients but if everything requires time and effort, then my perception is that you're just being food snobbish. Even the tomato products called for seem exotic, many of them imported. Recognizing that pizzas made with less spectacular ingredients won't be as ethereal, it seems to me the author should have said something to the effect of "but, if you have to use whatever you find in your local grocery stores, it will be still okay because of the techniques I'm teaching you" The most pressing shortcoming of this book is that many of the pizza crust recipes just simply aren't worth the time invested. For example, the author suggests using a 18 hour biga starter plus a 48 hour fermentation for most of his doughs. Being curious, I tried these techniques using the right flour and additional malt powder. As it fermented in my refrigerator, I got exciting thinking that this pizza would be the best one I'd ever fixed. The result? Not bad by any stretch of the imagination but certainly not worth the effort. Most home cooks looking to make an impressive pizza would be just find a slow-proofing dough recipe and going with it instead of investing in this over-wrought cookbook. I appreciate how many types of dough and techniques the author includes but I just don't think purchasing this book would be a good investment for most home cooks that love pizza. Again, I totally get that this is supposed to be the ne plus ultra of pizza checkbooks but, in the end, it misses the mark.