The Peppers Cookbook: 200 Recipes from the Pepper Lady's Kitchen (Great American Cooking) Review

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(More customer reviews)The Peppers Cookbook: 200 Recipes From The Pepper Lady's Kitchen by Jean Andrews is a truly mouth-watering compendium of delicious "I've just got to try this!" recipes showcases the culinary delights and possibilities of the pepper ranging from jalapenos to serranos to bells. Beginning with "What is a pepper?" and moving on to descriptions of eighteen different peppers, and an invaluable section on selecting, storing, and using peppers, the kitchen cook is introduced to recipes featuring various peppers in everything from appetizers to entrees, from sauces to desserts, from baked goods to condiments. With recipes ranging from Roasted Portabella Mushrooms with Basil-Red Pepper Cream; Green Chile Pasta; and Rocoto Relleno (Peruvian Stuffed Peppers); to Chipotle Hominy Casserole; Ethiopian Afrin or Spiced Ground Pepper Seed; The Pepper Lady's Version of Laura Bush's Texas Cowboy Cookies; and Pickled Jalapenos or Hungarian Wax Peppers, The Peppers Cookbook is the ultimate culinary compendium for pepper enthusiasts!


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Bobby Flay's Mesa Grill Cookbook: Explosive Flavors from the Southwestern Kitchen Review

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(More customer reviews)Being a Bobby Flay fan (I've had great experiences at all of his NYC restaurants and love Iron Chef/Boy Meets Grill), I knew I wanted this cookbook the minute it came out. But the moment I flipped through the pages, my expectations were totally exceeded--beautiful, full-page color photos incite you with every recipe (prompting a determined "I want to make that!), and tons of useful southwestern-cooking tips/tricks are spread throughout, including a chile pepper guide and tons of sauce/relish preparations. It seems like almost every recipe in here is either a dish at Mesa Grill or something Flay has created for Iron Chef America, and once you're finished making any recipe, this becomes obvious just because it's all so delicious! I've made probably around 20 of the recipes in this cookbook, and each time the result was simple; completely cleaned plates all around the table.
This includes Thanksgiving, where I made an all-Flay meal for about 15 people, complete with his maple and ancho-glazed roast turkey with a roasted garlic/cilantro gravy and a mango cranberry relish, sweet potato gratin, green onion smashed potatoes, and the gorgonzola, apple and toasted walnut salad with a spicy orange vinaigrette. All was a huge hit.
Whether or not you're a Bobby Flay "fan," perse, I would do yourself a favor and pick up this cookbook--you will learn tons about American cooking, Mexican cooking, and the orchestration of flavors (Flay's signature seems to be the balance of sweet and spicy--you will first taste the sweet elements, then your tongue will dance with heat). Not to mention all the great sauces, glazes, rubs and reductions that are dabbled throughout--there is even a fantastic margarita section, giving you everything from the "classic," to a pink cactus-pear version, to my favorite, a pineapple-chile margarita. Good Stuff!!!!!!

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Meat: A Kitchen Education Review

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(More customer reviews)I own almost all of Peterson's books. He is truly a master of teaching how to cook. His recipes focus on the most basic techniques and using the natural flavors of the foods themselves to make them stand out. I have never found better recipes for stews, pot roast, steak, etc. No celebrity chef will teach you the way Peterson can. You cannot go wrong with any of his books.
So on to Meat.
This is a very good kitchen education on meat. You will learn all of the basics about how to grill, braise, sauté, etc. The photos are marvelous and the recipes are very good. There's literally every type of meat you can cook here--squab, rabbit, brains, kidneys, I mean it goes on forever.
There's not much contained in here that is not contained in his work Cooking, though. It seemed like he used this book more as a medium for showing off his photography than for delivering new recipes. There are a few, certainly, but goose with sauerkraut, that's not too innovative, and few of us really want to know how to cook brains. There's a great recipe for if you can find a really old rabbit, which Peterson acknowledges is close to impossible.
So I enjoyed reading it and I will keep it. But this is not in-depth like Glorious French Food: A Fresh Approach to the Classics or Sauces: Classical and Contemporary Sauce Making, which really get into the explanations about how and why you cook a certain way. It's sort of like he took out the meat recipes from Cooking, added maybe a couple dozen useful new recipes, and some really pretty photos.
But I will end the review on a high note. If you haven't read Peterson before and you all you want is a book on cooking meat, this is it, you'll love it. If you need a new cook book and don't know where to start, start with Cooking--that book changed my life. If you have Cookingand you want more in-depth information about meat, you'll find a few bits here and there that you'll like. If you are really hungry for an in-depth education from Peterson, track down Glorious French Food: A Fresh Approach to the Classics--light on photos and heavy on teaching.
Four stars because it's Peterson, and it's a great work. One star penalty for being a little redundant.



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