This is a tough listen. The performance is just awful. The acting is flat, monotone, and riddled with mispronunciations. But it's not all the actor's fault. The editing is abysmal. The actor trails off in mid sentence and it was completely overlooked. This happens unconscionably often. The book is really good otherwise. I'd suggest buying the book instead.

I am a graduate of the CIA, and can confirm the accuracy of this discription having met most of the chef instructors personally. however the pronunciation of the jargon is a real problem for me. very well read otherwise.

The information in the book was in depth and had a nice flow to it. The book was more a journal rather than having any kind of cohesive narrative or story. There wasn't much of a underlying theme to the book. There could have been more back story to the history of the CIA and cooking instruction as a whole.

The narrator was like a robot that mispronounces words he doesn't know. There was no flow or character to the voices. I could have had more fun listening to a text to speech program narrate the book for me.

No

I love Michael Ruhlman's cookbooks and follow his blog, this book is nothing like that. Its more of a diary account of him going to the CIA.

I enjoyed the intensity of the story.

The inside look at CIA

Ensured I am never a chef.

The story was interesting, however the narrator's performance was dreadful. He spoke in a complete monotone.

The descriptions of the curriculum and the preparation that goes into a restaurant meal was very interesting.

The narration was dull. The narrator seemed to be doing a cold reading of the text. There were awkward pauses (probably poor editing) and it was next to impossible to determine which character was supposed to be speaking.

Not really, I was just interested in the subject and thought it would be a good "read".

Not likely.

Narrative boring. No climactic finish.

Monotone basically. Errors/corrections. No character vocal changes.

Need a better narrator.

Yes, but only in print format.

His performance is so wooden. There are odd pauses and weird inflections throughout, and no differentiation between various people in the book. I finally realized who he reminded me of - the guy who does the English translations on Iron Chef, only not as much personality.

I really liked this book but I found the narrator irritating. He has a voice better suited for reading news.The problem is that since this book was published, Michael Ruhlman has become a well know food celebrity. He should do this audio book over and read it himself. He has a great voice. I bought Medium Raw and if anyone but Tony Bourdain had read it I would have been very disappointed. It wasn't a horrible experience but it always took me a few minutes to get used to the voice when rejoining the book. If Ruhlman read this book I would buy it a second time for sure.

I never fully appreciated the contribution of a narrator until I tried to listen to this book. Painfully, mind-numbingly boring.....so bad that Audible may wish to review whether this is a book it wants to keep offering.

I read this book several years ago, along with its successor "The Soul of a Chef" - thoroughly enjoyed both, have recommended them to friends, and purchased several as gifts. What a disappointment to hear the audio version. This narrator is TERRIBLE - there are awkward pasues throughout the narration, and inexcusable mispronunciations of basic cooking terms and place names (Barnard College pronounced as "Bernard" eg) For a book that so passionately conveys the pursuit of perfection, its a shame that the narrator didn't bother to do minimal homework. Read the books, skip this audio. And a note to Mr. Ruhlman: if "Soul of a Chef" is going to be made into an audiobook, please narrate it yourself or get a food professional to do it.