The Fitness Kitchen: Recipes for a Fad-Free Lifestyle Review

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(More customer reviews)I particularly liked the vegetarian lasagne, but would pass on the savory bread pudding...
Interesting recipes, heart-healthy with low-salt and lots of veggies.

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The Zone, Atkins, Weight Watchers, Trim Spa ' how many fad diets have you tried?Put these complicated trends behind you and opt instead for a fad-free way of eating that promotes a lifestyle full of healthy choices and delicious and nutritious food.The Fitness Kitchen is a cookbook that debunks the hype of the usual weight-loss rhetoric and promotes a balanced and easy-to-maintain approach to cooking and living.Shelly Sinton has whipped up innovatively healthful dishes that will enable you to create gourmet fare that tastes good and is good for you. Remember, this is not a diet book, it's anti-fad, and, most importantly, The Fitness Kitchen is a promoter of good health and wholesome food. Fitness and food enthusiasts who want healthy, timesaving, and flavor-boosting cooking advice will find just that in these pages. Health-conscious cooks' cravings will be filled by the detailed nutritional analyses included with each recipe. Don't skip dessert or miss out on your favorite foods. With The Fitness Kitchen you'll be on your way to a lifestyle that puts flavor into your kitchen and guides you on the road to living with balance and moderation.

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Helen's Asian Kitchen: Easy Chinese Stir-Fries Review

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(More customer reviews)I own Helen Chen's larger cookbook, "Helen Chen's Chinese Home Cooking" and consider it one of the best Chinese cook books a person could have. Many of the recipes in it have been favorites of mine, and some of the easier ones are duplicated in this slender new volume of stir fries. For the beginning cook, this book may be less daunting. From it, I've now cooked "Garlicky Green Beans"-quite tasty, "Shrimp in Tomato Sauce"-delicious, "Kung Pao Chicken"-yummy and fiery, and ""Kan Shao Green Beans"- stellar. Obviously, I am looking forward to woking my way through the remainder of its pages. I own many other books on Chinese food and cooking, but I can think of few of them as uncomplicated as this which manage to produce such deep, rich, tasty sauces.

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"When I was growing up, my mother did all of the cooking at home and the variety was endless. But it was her everyday Chinese home cooking that I remember best-the often-revisited stir-fry dishes that are simple, easy, delicious, and part of the culinary repertoire of most Chinese families. I hope you will enjoy this collection of some of my favorites. Perhaps some will become part of your everyday cooking, too. So come with me to my kitchen and let me share with you what the Chinese do in theirs." -Helen Chen

Enjoy Easy Chinese Stir-Fries Like These:
Chicken with Mushrooms and Snow Peas
Braised Party Wings
Spicy Chunking Pork
Sparerib Nuggets in Black Bean Sauce
Stir-Fried Broccoli Beef in Oyster Sauce
Spicy Beef Shreds with Carrots and Celery
Coral and Jade
Flower Squid with Mixed Vegetables
Bean Curd with Black Mushrooms and Bamboo Shoots
Ginger-glazed Carrots and Parsnips

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The Spice Kitchen: Everyday Cooking with Organic Spices Review

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(More customer reviews)The Spice Kitchen is a good introduction to the use of spice for those who have been timid of doing so. An apt description from the back cover is that this book is "a fresh new way to make everyday foods more delicious...."
Hence, most of the recipes consist of an already-familiar dish that has been jazzed up with the addition of one or few spices. I find this to be a good approach for those who are inexperienced in using spices. The chance of success is high, compared to something like a complex Indian curry. It also allows the novice to clearly taste the effect of the spice.
Some dishes that illustrate this approach include:
Curried Deviled Eggs with cumin, coriander and turmeric.
Popcorn spiced with Creole seasoning.
Caramel corn with cloves.
Cheeseburgers with ancho chile and lemon zest.
Potato salad with fennel seed and dill weed.
While there are a few recipes that include a more complex blend of spices (Jamaica Jerk Chicken, Tandoori Chicken Skewers with Curry Butter sauce), most recipes are fairly simple. For this reason, cooks already experienced with the use of spices will probably find this book a bit lacking.
The ultimate goal of this book was to provide ways to spice up simple daily home cooking, and it meets that goal. The book is also visually appealing and well-written. Combined with a rack of spices, it would make a good gift for less experienced cooks.

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The Spice Kitchen offers more than one hundred delicious recipes for using herbs and spices to add vibrant flavors to your food at breakfast, lunch, dinner, and any time in between. From Spiced Yogurt and Granola Parfaits, to Strawberry Salad with Cinnamon-Balsamic Vinaigrette, Spiced Guacamole, Tarragon Chicken Potpie, Clove Spiced Caramel Corn, and more, this exciting cookbook is full of inventive recipes, information, and tips for using herbs and spices. Best of all, the recipes are easy and fuss free--a must for busy home cooks who want to spend less time in the kitchen and more time at the family table. And with dozens of full-color photographs and illustrations, The Spice Kitchen is as beautiful as it is practical.The Spice Kitchen changes everything, using herbs and spices to add special twists to favorite family recipes, from macaroni and cheese, to burgers, chicken salad, deviled eggs, and much more. It's the only all-purpose cookbook for spicing up everyday meals. Not just exotic extras, spices from around the world make it easier--and much more fun--to turn out delicious and healthy food. The simple but flavorful recipes and ideas in The Spice Kitchen will make old family favorites new again--and bring everyone to the table.

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The First Real Kitchen Cookbook: 100 Recipes and Tips for New Cooks Review

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(More customer reviews)This cookbook was exactly what I was looking for. There are a wide variety of recipes, and the ingredients are geared towards a budget-conscious cook with a grocery store not particularly well-stocked in ethnic foods. It's not a beginner's cookbook--my younger sister was a bit intimidated by it--but all the terms are explained and there is a very good section on what utensils and appliances every good kitchen should have.

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Every year, tens of thousands of hungry twentysomethings graduate college and rent their first apartment. They love food and want to learn how to cook. The First Real Kitchen Cookbook is the just-graduated's go-to guide, explaining in a friendly, encouraging voice everything that can be done on a tiny four-burner stove with minimal equipment and utensils. Fellow twentysomethings Megan Carle and Jill Carle teach new cooks how to stock a pantry on the cheap, buy meat, roast a chicken, cook vegetables, and bake cakes from scratchall the basics and more!

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In the Kitchen with A Good Appetite: 150 Recipes and Stories About the Food You Love Review

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(More customer reviews)This cookbook is a lot of fun! Each section has a brief essay upfront. A lot of wit here--and a passion for cooking and devising tasty recipes. Each recipe has a story; here again, considerable wit. For instance, the section entitled "Waffling toward Dinner." Putative breakfast dishes. But the author notes that one can enjoy breakfast dishes at midnight. Do your dining thing!
A couple recipes in the first section: "Buttery polenta with Parmesan and olive oil fried eggs." Ingredients: polenta, water or chicken broth, salt, butter, pepper, Parmesan cheese, olive oil, eggs, and sea salt for garnish. The recipe isn't hard to make either! Another intriguing recipe: "Soft scrambled eggs with pesto and fresh ricotta." I really enjoy the juxtaposition of ingredients in many of the author's dishes. She is like a mad scientist, who experiments with and tweaks recipes. The second section is referred to as "The Farmer's Market and Me." It starts off with "Extra-sharp leeks vinaigrette." After a delightful essay (1 1/2 pages long) we get the recipe. I like leeks, and this is a new way for me to consider preparing them. Look forward to trying this one out!
"Learning to like fish" is another section. I have used capers with Chicken Piccata. Here, capers become important ingredients for "Shrimp for a small kitchen--with capers, lemon, and feta. An interesting combination of ingredients. The next section? "It tastes like chicken." One tasty recipe. . . . "Roasted chicken thighs with peaches, basil, and ginger." I have made chicken schnitzel quite a bit over time. I use a tomato based sauce as a topping. Clark's schnitzel is way different--and I look forward to trying her version out. It features anchovy, garlic, salt and pepper, lemon zest, olive oil, eggs, bread crumbs, flour, cayenne pepper, nutmeg, chicken cutlets, oil for frying, mixed baby greens, herbs, and scallions.
And so on. . . . A delightful cookbook. What I've tried, I've liked. And there are many more that I look forward to fixing for my family. . . .


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