.com Review
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Over time, twin enterprises Cook's Illustrated (
/exec/obidos/ASIN/B000069YW9/%24%7B0%7D ) magazine and America's
Test Kitchen have published many books dedicated to providing
exhaustively tested recipes--"best" versions of traditional
dishes plus definitive takes on kitchen equipment and
ingredients. Some series readers have complained of endlessly
recycled or rejiggered recipes; others take each book at face
value, finding the formulas and cooking ins good and
helpful. America's Test Kitchen Family Cookbook, which calls
itself a cookbook, cooking school, and kitchen reference in one,
offers over 1,200 approachable recipes for a very wide range of
dishes--from "weekday" fare like Creamy Rice Casserole, Cheesy
Nachos with Spicy Beef, and Skillet Lasagna, to dressier recipes,
including Pan-Seared Lamb Chops with Red Wine Rosemary Sauce,
Roasted Trout Stuffed with Bacon and Spinach, and Chocolate
Marshmallow Mousse. There are "specialty" chapters devoted to
sandwiches, drinks, and slow cooker and pressure cooker dishes; a
grilling section is a tutorial in itself.
Unorthodox, "better-way" approaches abound. For example, a fried
chicken formula instructs the cook to wet the bird's dry coating
slightly before it's applied for an extra-crunchy crust.
Predictably, side bars feature equipment and ingredient
evaluations, on bottled salsa, for example; "good food/bad food"
photographs show readers what to for when producing fare like
holiday cookies; and there are tips, charts, and "Cooking 101"
sidebars galore. Step-by-step photos offer more direction still.
Though the majority of recipes are sound and yield tempting
results, readers poring through the book will note gaffes and
curiosities. The recipe for poached eggs, for example, offers the
option of extra cooking for "firm yolks" (hard-boiled poached
eggs, anyone?) and hamburgers receive an indentation before
cooking to avoid "puffy" domed burgers, a novel problem that
could, in any case, be solved by proper shaping. The addition of
sugar to some savory dishes--for example, a pan sauce for
steak--is misguided. Readers should also know that the book,
which comes in loose-leaf form, requires some assembly, and that
the pages themselves are quite thin, making them vulnerable to
spills and tearing in daily kitchen use.
These things said, the book delivers solid, family-friendly
dishes with enough fully orchestrated "how-to" to make even
novice cooks feel secure when tackling the basics or more
ambitious fare. --Arthur Boehm
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America's Test Kitchen and founder and editor of Cook's
Illustrated magazine, as he talks about the years-in-the-making
new project, America's Test Kitchen Family Cookbook--an
800-pages-plus collection with 1,200 classic recipes.
Exclusive Recipe Excerpts from America's Test Kitchen Family
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From Publishers Weekly
----------------------
The 800-plus pages in this thorough volume are
crammed with accessible, family-friendly recipes, variations,
tips, product and brand information, and technique instructions
from the crew at America's Test Kitchen. At the same time, it
feels almost as and friendly as a specialty cookbook
from a single chef. Recipes range from utterly simple (Easy
Homemade Pita Chips, Perfect Popcorn, and the Simplest Green
Salad) to somewhat more involved—but never
intimidating—contemporary interpretations of such dishes as Pasta
Primavera, Chicken Piccata, Rosemary Foccacia, and Triple
Chocolate Chunk Pecan Pie. All the basic food categories are
included, starting with appetizers, salads, sandwiches, soups and
stews and moving through fish and shellfish, poultry, meat (plus
a separate chapter on grilling), slow cooker and pressure cooker
meals and all kinds of baked goods and desserts. The preface
promises that "the recipes in this book will work in your home
kitchen almost all the time," and the extensive, repeated testing
reportedly conducted in America's Test Kitchen backs up that
promise, meaning this volume could easily become a foolproof
go-to resource for everyday cooking. (Nov.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed
Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
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