Tag: cookbook

5 stars Cookbook

This is more than a cookbook. This book is packed with information about being a cowboy and cooking with a chuckwagon. Kent starts the book by explaining what a chuckwagon is and how it came to be. Chuckwagon cooking is simple, and I was surprised at the variety of food that it consisted of. “Cowboy cooking is made from ingredients you’’ already have on hand” and most of the ingredients were canned ingredients except for the spices and the meat. Chuckwagon cooking reminded me of good-old family gatherings as it brings folks together over a meal where stories and the day’s events can be discussed and everyone can be themselves and feel accepted. Inside this book, you will find Kent’s recipes from his chuckwagon, stories, and interesting articles about being a cowboy in the lower United States.

This book is sectioned off into 9 sections. From the introduction to the index, there are 248 pages in this hardcopy book. Again, Kent discusses the first chuckwagon, then he discusses taking care of your cast iron pans, as those are respected tools of the trade for great chuckwagon cooking. Whether they are brand new pans or ones that you have saved from the depths, these treasures will be with you forever, if you keep them looking nice. Now Kent starts into the food part of the book. We have Breakfast, Lunch (dinner), Appetizers, Supper, and Dessert. Each of these sections, Kent came up with a cute title for. Each of the sections has 10-23 recipes. You will not get pictures for all of the recipes, but you will get detailed step-by-step directions, yield size, list of ingredients, and a couple paragraphs explaining the recipe. There is an estimated prep and total time given in case you need that too. Start your morning with some Sourdough starter so you can make Kent’s cinnamon rolls or his pancakes, cowboy coffee, or how about a breakfast egg bowl with a smoky cream sauce. Want to try some Smoky Mac & Cheese, or Sloppy Cowboy Joes, or Sweet Heat Barbeque Chopped Pork Sandwiches for lunch? Appetizers are normally a part of the cowboy’s menu, but they can happen, and Kent has recipes for Cowboy Sushi, Bite-Sized BJT’s, or Red River Smoky Chip Dip. Supper can pack a hearty meal and Baked Potato-Stuffed Pork Chops with Creamy White Gravy, Garden Harvest Stir-Fry, Brown Butter and Bacon Pasta, or Creamy Beef and Parmesan Company Casserole. I’m not a huge dessert fan but if you are, there is some Jan’s Spiced Wine Cake, Cowboy Coconut Cake, Buttermilk Pie, Raspberry-Apple Crumble or Cowboy Fry Bread. I’ve only included some of the recipes that are inside this book, as there are plenty more to choose from.

I’m thinking that this would be a great cookbook to have, one that doesn’t require a lot of fancy ingredients, and the recipes offer something different without a lot of time requirements. It would also make a good gift for someone who likes to cook, and you want to give them something different. The index in the back is very helpful too.

3 stars Cookbook

After reading the other cookbook by Nadia, I had to pick up this one.   There were similarities among the two cookbooks, yet the recipes were somewhat different.  This cookbook was not for me though. 

Nadia begins this cookbook just like her other one.  She introduces herself and explains her cooking journey.  It is an interesting journey from her family to where she is today.   Next, she spends a great deal of time talking about tools, terms and items that you might need to create great Italian dishes.   This section is very detailed, and it does provide some good information but there is a lot of reading and information.  The recipe section begins next, and it is sectioned off into 7 categories.  They are: Aperitivi, Antipasti, Primi, Secondi, Contorni, Dolci, and Street Food.  

With each recipe you get: a list of ingredients (grams and cups), total prep and cooking time, how many it will serve.  Some recipes have an icon to scan so you can watch the recipe if you scan the icon with your phone.  Some recipes also tell you how much/how many the recipes make.   Some of the recipes are titled in their Italian name which left me boggled sometimes but Katie puts on the page what it means in English.  

This cookbook begins with some interesting alcohol beverages.  Nothing hard or too fancy but they are simple and sound delicious.   The appetizer section had a recipe I might try: Insalata Pantesca (Sicilian Potato Salad).  The first course is next, and this is the section that I thought I would like the most, but it had a lot of seafood in it and I’m not a huge fish eater.  Zuppa Di Pesce, Scialatielli Alle Vongole, Baked Seafood Linguine, and some risotto recipes were some of the offerings in this section.  The second course comes next, which had more meat, chicken, and fish recipes. Cozze Alla Tarantina, Abbacchio Alla Scottadito, Piccata Di Pollo, and Frittura Di Pesce were some of the dishes offered here.  Side dishes were next, and I couldn’t find anything in here for me.  Cicoria in Padella, Carciofi Alla Romana, and Broccoletti in Padella were a couple of the dishes in this section.  Desserts, yes.  Ciambelline Al Vino looks tempting and easy to prepare.  For those coffee drinkers, there is Caffe Alla Panna.  Nothing in the street food section caught my eye.  Tiella Alla Scarola or the Pizza E Fichi just wasn’t something that I would eat.

Nadia closes the book with some comments and a great index.  The illustrations in the book were great.   Not every recipe had a picture with it and some recipes had multiple pictures. 

I don’t understand why there were so many photographs of Nadia throughout the book when there weren’t photographs of all the recipes included.  I’m not against a couple individual shots but I think this cookbook had too many photographs of the author and not the food.  It’s a cookbook, right?        3 stars

4.5 stars Cookbook

I’m a pasta lover!  Seriously, I love my pasta!  Ok, let me rephrase that, I love pasta that doesn’t have anything to do with fish.  I’m not a fish person.  Nevertheless, I was excited to get my hands on a few of the pasta books at the library.    From how she got started cooking, to what a cook needs to make pasta, to recipes, this book has a little bit of everything in it.

I enjoyed reading how Nadia began her career and learning about her family’s history.   Sharing these recipes, she hopes that she is keeping her family’s traditions alive and bringing together her family’s history with society today.   Nadia explains the tools, terms and items that are needed to make good Italian recipes even before providing any recipes to her readers.   

She then puts her recipes into 6 chapters in this book.  There are also some closing remarks from her, a resource guide (where to locate items), a pasta by category page, and a great index.   The six chapters are:

Pasta Basics, Where It All Began, Be My Guest, Family First, Falling in Love With America, The Pasta Renaissance. 

With each recipe you get: a list of ingredients (grams and cups), total prep and cooking time, how many it will serve.  Some recipes have an icon to scan so you can watch the recipe if you scan the icon with your phone.  Some recipes also tell you how much/how many the recipes make.   Some of the recipes are titled in their Italian name which left me boggled sometimes but Katie puts on the page what it means in English.  

I liked that this book spends a lot of time discussing and showing how to make the different kinds of pasta.  I’ve been meaning to do this, and I think I can tackle this now.  I also like how most of her recipes don’t take a lot of ingredients to make.   Using fresh tomatoes, I like how she adds a few more ingredients, her pasta and there’s a new dish.    There are not a lot of fish recipes, and I think I could tweak most of the recipes to make them something I would enjoy.   What I didn’t like about this cookbook was that every recipe didn’t have a picture.  Now, I’m not expecting a huge picture each time but something small would be nice. 

I think around 80 % of the recipes had their accompanying recipe pictures with them.  Some of the recipes had no pictures and some had pictures of Nadia or Nadia and her family.   I still think this cookbook is a keeper.  4.5 stars for me     

5 stars Cookbook

Yes, I need this one!  I think they need to stop coming out with such great cookbooks.  I have bought quite a few cookbooks over the past couple months and this one, is next on my list.  Living in the Midwest, my grilling season is limited but that won’t stop me from adding this one to my hoard.  It’s a Test Kitchen cookbook so I know the recipes will be great as I already have quite a few of their cookbooks on my shelves.

Inside this book, there are 8 main chapters on food: Let’s Go Outside, Snacks and Small Plates, Both Hands Needed, Weeknight Dinners, Weekend Gatherings, Over an Open Fire, Grilled Breads, Don’t Forget Dessert.  There is also Nutritional Information for Our Recipes, Conversions and Equivalents, an Index and a Welcome page. 

If you’ve never had a Test Kitchen cookbook, you’ve been missing out because they test their recipes over and over again and they actually tell you why their recipe works.  They’ll tell you what to expect and sometimes, why other things don’t.  So, if you look at a Test Kitchen recipe and think perhaps: it looks a bit difficult or time consuming or why do they do it like that?  There’s a logical reason and it’s probably written by the recipe.  

Let’s look inside this book.  Inside the Let’s Go Outside chapter, they discuss the different types of grills and charcoal.  They talk about cleaning grills, discuss smokers, and other equipment you might want for your grill, etc.  In the Snacks and Small Plate chapter, there are 26 recipes.  From Charred Guacamole, Grilled Potato Wedges with Lemon-Dill Mayo, Grilled Butternut Squash, Apple, and Goat Cheese Flatbread, and Burnt Whisky Sours.  In this chapter, I’m looking at the Smoked Nachos, the Bruschetta with Marinated Grilled Tomatoes and Fresh Mozzarella, Grilled Onion, Pear, and Prosciutto Flatbread, Grilled Chicken and Vegetable Quesadillas and the Charred Pineapple Margaritas.  That’s only from this one chapter!

In the Both Hands Needed Chapter the Philly-Steak Cheesesteaks, Tacos al Pastor, Smashed Burgers, Grilled Smokehouse Barbecue Burgers are calling me but you might like the Smoked Salmon Tacos, Grilled Turkey Burgers with Spinach and Feta, or the Eggplant and Mozzarella Panini.   I’m going through the book and the Stir-Fired Cumin Beef sounds fantastic! 

There’s lots of seafood, vegetarian, and beef entrees to choose from.  Pesto chicken, grilled tofu, grilled vegetable salad, and a clam bake.  They packed in more recipes: breakfast recipes, ribs, chicken, prime rib, bacon, and a vegetable platter. You want bread?  Of course, you do!  Biscuits, flatbread, pizza dough, cornbread, dinner rolls, focaccia, and even tortillas.   Finish it up with some upside cake, a hot toddy, a skillet cookie or brownie, apple crisp or an ultimate s’more.  

I couldn’t include everything in my review but I touched on the ones that looked tempting to me.  With each recipe, you’ll get a detailed ingredients list, step-by-step instructions, serving size, the total time it takes to make the recipe, and which type of grill is perfect for this recipe. There are also a few tips with each recipe and of course, “Why This Recipe Works.”  I suggest you read the “Why This Recipe Works” as I feel it helps when preparing this dish and other dishes like it, in the future.  Also, with each recipe, you’ll get a colorful illustration of the recipe. The index at the back is also fantastic.  This cookbook is a keeper in my eyes.  5 stars!   

3.5 stars Cookbook

This is one terrific looking cookbook.  The pictures of the recipes look fantastic, almost too pretty to eat.  The recipes look like masterpieces that took hours to create but if you read the directions, most of them took under an hour to prepare.   Jamie wants to make cooking easy, practical,  and tasty. 

Let’s talk about why this cookbook is amazing.  I’m going to start with the layout of this book.  It fits many 2-page spread cookbook layouts with a recipe the left side of the page and a picture of that recipe on the right but I think this cookbook steps it up a notch.  On each of the two-page spreads, you will also find the nutritional value information in chart-like format, at the bottom of the page.  Along the side of the recipe, you’ll find pictures of the ingredients that you’ll need for the recipe.  So, you need some garlic, you’ll see a picture of garlic.  Need rosemary, there’s a picture of rosemary.  If you have 8 ingredients listed for your recipe, you will see 8 small pictures on the side.  I liked this little addition to an otherwise empty space.  The pictures of the recipes take center stage on the right side of this 2-page spread.  Nothing unnecessary competes with this space but the completed dish. Like I mentioned before, these pictures looked amazing.

There are a lot of interesting recipes in this cookbook. I’m not a fish eater but there were plenty of fish recipes in here and the pictures made me think that I could eat it.  The Upside Down Fish Pie, Teriyaki Shrimp, and the Shrimp Fried Rice, wow….they looked delicious! Jamie Oliver sure has presentation down perfectly!  The one issue that I found with this cookbook is that although the pictures of the dishes look fantastic, I only found a few of them that I would actually prepare.  Sure, there were a couple recipes that I might create but there were only a few that I knew that I would definitely try.  The Smoked Pancetta & Bean Pasta and Honey Roast Chicken looked like something that I would definitely eat. 

Jamie does make each recipe easy to prepare with detailed instructions and I found that the ingredient list is not complicated, he tries to use items that most individuals can find at their local grocery store.  Jamie doesn’t include anything personal, nor does he include any additional tips or ideas on these two pages, you just get the recipe and your picture. If you’re looking for something personal, you’re going to have to look at some of the other pages in the book where Oliver talks about each of the different sections in this book, his own personal journey and why this cookbook is so special.

If you like to try new dishes or want some easy recipes that’ll make you look as if you’re an award-winning chef – you need to check this book out.   3.5 stars.

I don’t know anything about Cheryl Day but her name got positive reviews when I brought it up online.  When I think about Southern food, I think comfort food, flavor and food that I normally want more of.  There are some Southern dishes that I could do without but most of them, don’t give me a sliver, I want a full piece!

I noticed upon opening this cookbook that not all the recipes have pictures which is not good BUT this cookbook is packed FULL of recipes.  I mean packed!  So packed, that it does one of the things that I don’t like in a cookbook: the recipes flow across pages.  I know that this is probably my own pet peeve but I don’t like it when a recipe flows over onto the next page and then, this behavior continues and continues …..page after page.  It’s not that the recipe flows onto the back page but that a recipe flows onto the page beside it. Anyway, back to this cookbook.

There is plenty of variety in this cookbook and the illustrations are beautiful.  Cheryl organized this book to include an introduction, Southern baking rules, baking tools and equipment, hot breads and crackers, coffee cakes, loafs and Bundt cakes, muffins and scones, slow breads (breads that need time to rise), gathering cakes, layer cakes and cupcakes, pies, cookies, brownies and bars, grits and grains, custards, puddings and cobblers, jams and preserves, and basics.   This is baking, there is nothing but special goodies in here.  This is one thick book to contain nothing but sweet goodness.  I’m pretty excited to take this all in as I’m not much of a sweet baker. 

I got to know Cheryl in the introduction and this book is amazing.  I never even thought about making crackers, who makes crackers?  There is a recipe for buttermilk crackers, benne crackers, sea salt crackers and crispy cheese crackers, I’ve never even thought about making crackers, for the Keebler Elves make them for me but after seeing this recipe, I think I could try it as they look really good and they keep in the freezer up to a month!  There’s even a recipe for Red, White, and Blue Muffins, now doesn’t that sound like something fun to make.  I’m not a fan of fruitcake but Boozy Fruitcake…..I think a few people might be willing to at least try that one.  What about Strawberries and Cream Cake? Oh, yum!  Now, there is Sweet Potato Pie but Peach Lattice Pie, Blueberry Icebox Pie, and Chocolate Chess Pie, I’m liking the sounds of them.  There are recipes for making jams, marmalade, apple butter, salted caramel sauce, brown butter, and a variety of other butters too.

With each recipe, there is a paragraph about the recipe, how many the recipe will serve, an ingredients list, and step-by-step instructions.  No nutritional information is given nor do you get how much the whole recipe yields.  There are some pictures of the recipes included in this book but like I said, not every recipe.  The ones that you do get, look fresh and authentic.  There are some pictures where the food looks very realistic.  Where everything isn’t all perfect, where there are crumbs lying next to the finished dish, where the nuts have fallen off the muffins, and the food hasn’t been polished to shine.  These pictures tell me that this book has recipes that I can attempt.  With so many recipes inside the pages of this book, I’m bound to find something I can create.  What a gem!

This is the second Barefoot Contessa cookbook I picked up and I thought this one looked a bit better than Barefoot Contessa at Home.  I noticed that this cookbook didn’t have as much fluff as the “at Home’ cookbook did and I was hoping that the Family Style would provide me more realistic dishes to prepare.

In the Barefoot Contessa at Home cookbook, I found that the “everyday recipes you’ll make over and over again” were not everyday recipes for me.  Her everyday recipes were too fancy for me. My question when I opened up this cookbook was, are Ina’s “easy ideas and recipes that make everyone feel like family” actual recipes and ideas that we will use and like?  Are they family-time meal recipes or will they fancy meal recipes that we’ll make for company?  (These quotes were taken from the front of the cookbooks)

This cookbook has a bit of everything in it.  There is the simple dishes for individuals like me who like chicken stew with biscuits, oven-fried chicken, real meatballs & spaghetti, deep dish apple pie, string beans & shallots, and parmesan chicken just to name a few.  Yet, there is also garlic sauteed spinach, tiramisu, run raisin rice pudding, arugula with parmesan, lobster cobb salad, Sunday rib roast, saffron risotto with butternut squash and linguine with shrimp scampi for those who like something different. 

This cookbook has lots of different sections: Welcome Home, Planning the Meal, Starters, Salad for Lunch, Dinners, Vegetables, Desserts, Breakfast, Kids, Nine Ingredients, Ten Kitchen Tools, Menus, Credits, Index and Recipe Index.  Ina includes some personal information in the Welcome Home section and each of the recipe sections contains around 10-12 recipes.  In the Nine Ingredients section, Ina lists nine ingredients that are her favorite.  In Ten Kitchen Tools, Ina lists ten pieces of kitchen equipment that she feels individuals will use over and over again on a regular basis.  Ina puts together some of the recipes in this cookbook and creates menus for different occasions under the Menu section.  From a Winter Breakfast, to a Summer Brunch, to a Spring Lunch, Ina puts the dishes together for you.  There are 2 indexes which I like in cookbooks.  One is the general index and one is the recipe index.  Another big plus for me in this cookbook.  

For each of the recipes you will find, how many the dish will serve, a small paragraph describing the dish, a list of ingredients and step-by-step directions.  There is a picture to accompany each recipe which to me is a big plus. Sometimes she adds additional information to the recipe at the end, like additional cooking information, what to serve with the recipe, additional ingredients, etc. You will not find any nutritional information nor how much the serving size is or many total cups the whole recipe yields.  I really wish cookbooks would include either the total cups or the serving size per person as that really helps me when I am cooking.  Sometimes I can tell by looking at the list of ingredients but sometimes, it’s hard to tell.  The pictures make the recipes look delicious!  I liked that this cookbook has more recipes and these recipes looked appealing.  There were a few that looked out of my range but a majority of them were something I would try. 4 stars