Recipes Blog

Recipe for Leeks Vinaigrette from JACQUES PÉPIN QUICK & SIMPLE

Cookbook review by Tracey Zabar

Chef Pépin was a dean when I went to culinary school, many years ago. He was always kind, with a twinkle in his eye. And he can cook most of us under the table, pun intended. His cookbook is filled with wonderful recipes, photos, and lovely paintings. There is an interesting cabbage, shrimp, and caviar dish; a garlicky roast leg of lamb; pureed peas with mint; and an apple brown Betty after my own heart. Go in your kitchen and try this simple dish.

Excerpted from JACQUES PÉPIN QUICK & SIMPLE © 2020 by Jacques Pépin. Photography © 2020 by Tom Hopkins. Reproduced by permission of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. All rights reserved.

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Recipe for Slow-Roasted Salmon with Sunchoke Puree and Sweet-Sour Onions from Chasing Flavor by Dan Kluger and Nick Fauchald, photographs by Evan Sung

Cookbook review by Tracey Zabar

I really love this book. It has recipes grouped into meals, so if you are making the pot roast, you can incorporate some of the braising liquid into broccoli rabe as the side. Make your own ricotta cavatelli, then add a mixture of veggies and spices, and cover with a cheese sauce. I am having fun creating salads and mixing and matching the lovely dressings: Celery Root, Fennel, Pear, and Apple Salad with Meyer Lemon Vinaigrette. Throw in the roasted beets of another salad recipe, add the Meyer lemon vinaigrette, and this refreshing salad is my new favorite. Next up: a grandma pizza pie.

Excerpted from CHASING FLAVOR: Techniques and Recipes to Cook Fearlessly © 2020 by Daniel Kluger. Photography © 2020 by Evan Sung. Reproduced by permission of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. All rights reserved.

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Recipe for Roasted Tomato Soup from Hawksworth by David Hawksworth, Jacob Richler and Stéphanie Nöel

Cookbook review by Tracey Zabar

This beautiful book has inspired me to go in the kitchen and add to my recipe repertoire. The local farm markets still have some fabulous melons, perfect for the simple watermelon, cherry tomato & Macedonian feta salad. The book also has detailed instructions for preparing gravlax from a side of salmon, a yummy pea soup with lobster on the side, Thai fish curry, a mile-high burger with homemade onion rings, and a very enticing lemon tart. And about a million other recipes that I can’t wait to dig into. First up, this tomato soup for a cozy dinner as the evenings turn cold.

Excerpted from Hawksworth by David Hawksworth, Jacob Richler and Stéphanie Nöel. Copyright © 2020 David Hawksworth Photography by Clinton Hussey Published by Appetite by Random House®, a division of Penguin Random House Canada Limited. Reproduced by arrangement with the Publisher. All rights reserved.

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Recipe for Spaghetti alla Puttanesca from Old World Italian by Mimi Thorisson, photographs by Oddur Thorisson

Cookbook review by Tracey Zabar

This beautiful book holds a culinary trip to Italy, with a little bit of France thrown in. Try this pasta dish that is easy to throw together and get on the table. There is also a recipe for torta pasqualina that is right out of my childhood. I remember my eighty-year-old cousin, Grace, cutting one open to reveal Swiss chard or maybe escarole, with a perfectly cooked hard boiled egg in the center of each slice. It was so beautiful that you barely knew, as a child, you were eating a green vegetable. I never asked her for the recipe, because I was afraid of her. Now, thanks to this book, I have it!

Reprinted from Old World Italian. Copyright © 2020 by Marie-France Thorisson. Photographs copyright © 2020 by Oddur Thorisson. Published by Clarkson Potter, an imprint of Random House.

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Recipe for Lemon Bars from The Good Book of Southern Baking by Kelly Fields with Kate Heddings, photographs by Oriana Koren

This wonderful book will inspire you to practice your pumpkin pie making skills. Then, on to cornbread, a crumby, fruity coffee cake, some puddings of the bananas Foster and warm chocolate varieties, buttermilk pie, a Creole cream cheesecake, and some pretty wonderful berry treats. Or try these amazing lemon bars. Go in the kitchen and bake!

Reprinted with permission from The Good Book of Southern Baking by Kelly Fields with Kate Heddings copyright ©2020 published by Lorena Jones Books, a division of Penguin Random House, LLC Photographs copyright © Oriana Koren

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