THE BAD DEAL

“A Girl and Her Pig,” chef April Bloomfield’s first cookbook, was published in April. Naturally. But we at The Bad Deal waited to get the digital book, which dropped in May. The hardcover version on Amazon.com is $16.29. It weighs 2.4 pounds. The digital version on iBooks is $14.99. It adds zero pounds to the weight of your iPad. That itself is a GOOD DEAL. 

What’s a better deal is that Bloomfield’s cookbook is the first one we’ve gotten our hands on with a lightning fast, fully-indexed text search. Many digital books can anywhere from 5-30 seconds to fully execute a word search. With April’s book, the hyperlinked page numbers (along with suggested search terms) appear like magic, not as quickly as with Google’s autocomplete, but quickly enough. And when you don’t have an actual physical book to flip through, text search becomes all the more crucial. 

So just as Bad Deal Editor Ryan Sutton (that’s me) named Bloomfield’s The Breslin best new restaurant of 2010, today we’re calling “A Girl and Her Pig,” the most iPad-friendly cookbook we’ve encountered. Those who wish can download the tome from iBooks. For now, here are a few fun quotes from “A Girl and Her Pig.” 

• “What  a gorgeous thing — a lamb’s head all deep brown from a slow cook in the oven, perfect for anyone who likes nibbling on bones. It’s such a treat discovering all the different textures in the head: some bits creamy and sticky, others tender with a nice chew, the custardy brain, the meaty deposit behind the eye.” 
• “Ken [Friedman] sent a list of dishes he wanted on the menu. It went, ‘Tofu hot dogs, veggie burgers, nachos … .’ I flipped.” 
• “One day I swear I’m going to take gnudi off the menu at The Pig.” 
• “I quite like the metallic, iron-like character of kidneys that fans of soaking them want to snuff out. I think if you soak your kidneys, you probably don’t like kidneys all that much.” 

(Photo: iPad Screenshot of “A Girl and Her Pig,” Ecco 2012).