Let's get this out of the way right at the start: Dalia Jurgensen is not Anthony Bourdain. This is true in many ways — she's short, he's tall; she's pastry, he's savory; she's she, he's he — but it is most relevantly true in the matter of culinary memoir. Jurgensen is the author of the recently released book Spiced (buy on Amazon), and as is the case with any book whose subtitle promises "A Pastry Chef's True Stories of Trials by Fire, After-Hours Exploits, and What Really Goes on in the Kitchen," comparison with Bourdain's seminal Kitchen Confidential is unavoidable. Sadly, in matters of kitchen revelation, Spiced gets left in the dust.

Which is a shame, really, because if it weren't for what Bourdain hath wrought, Jurgensen might have delivered a different book. Bourdain blew the lid off of what really goes on in the kitchen nearly a decade ago, and absent solid handfuls of hilarious heroin-related anecdotes involving the garde manger, no one else's kitchen memoir is really going to be able to top it. Nevertheless, Spiced can't break free of the now genre-mandated need to remind us (and often) that the kitchen is vulgar, has its own fraternal code, and that restaurant staff are a rowdy, alcoholic lot. Still, for all that Jurgensen talks about foul mouths and drunken benders, it's clear that she isn't really trying to break new ground when it comes to her subtitle's promise. Instead, Jurgensen's heart lies in unfolding the linear tale of her own progress from newbie to experienced chef.

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