Modern translation of La Varenne's The French cook, The French pastry chef, and The French confectioner, published in Paris between 1651 and 1660, essential reading for anyone seeking to understand French cookery of the seventeenth century. Includes a detailed commentary covering the life of La Varenne, the nature of his three works, and period French cooking. La Varenne (1618-1678) was chef to the Marquis d'Uxelles and the first to produce a French cookery book of any substance since Le Viandier almost 300 years earlier, and therefore the first to record the advances in French cooking since the fifteenth century.