Tuesday, December 9, 2008

Barefoot Contessa Family Style or Everyday Low Carb Slow Cooker Cookbook

Barefoot Contessa Family Style: Easy Ideas and Recipes That Make Everyone Feel like Family

Author: Ina Garten

Ina Garten, who shared her gift for casual entertaining in the bestselling Barefoot Contessa Cookbook and Barefoot Contessa Parties!, is back with her most enticing recipes yet—a collection of her favorite dishes for everyday cooking. In Barefoot Contessa Family Style, Ina explains that sharing our lives and tables with those we love is too essential to be saved just for special occasions—and it’s easy to do if you know how to cook irresistible meals with a minimum of fuss.

For Ina, the best way to make guests feel at home is to serve them food that’s as unpretentious as it is delicious. So in her new book, she’s collected the recipes that please her friends and family most—dishes like East Hampton Clam Chowder, Parmesan Roasted Asparagus, and Linguine with Shrimp Scampi. It’s the kind of fresh, accessible food that’s meant to be passed around the table in big bowls or platters and enjoyed with warm conversation and laughter.

In Ina’s hands tried-and-true dishes are even more delicious than you remember them: Her arugula salad is bright with the flavors of lemon and Parmesan, the Oven-Fried Chicken is crispy without excess fat, and her Deep-Dish Apple Pie has the perfect balance of fruit and spice. Barefoot Contessa Family Style also includes enticing recipes that are memorable and distinctive, like Lobster Cobb Salad, Tequila Lime Chicken, and Saffron Risotto with Butternut Squash.

With vivid photographs of Ina cooking and serving food in her beautiful Hamptons home, as well as menu suggestions, practical wisdom on what to do when disaster strikes in the kitchen, and tips oncreating an inviting ambience with music, Barefoot Contessa Family Style is the must-have guide to the joy of everyday entertaining.

Publishers Weekly

This second book follows the same basic premise as Garten's phenomenally popular Barefoot Contessa Cookbook: simple, elegant home cooking with good ingredients and a minimum of fuss. It takes a certain amount of chutzpah to include ordinary chicken noodle soup and mashed potatoes and gravy in a cookbook, but Garten pulls it off with heart and style. Dinners are conceived as crowd-pleasers, with a big nod to Italian home-cooking: oven-fried chicken, penne with five cheeses, Sunday rib roast, risotto, lasagna. Like other cookbooks with a specialty-shop pedigree (such as Silver Palate), Garten's book is inflected with a certain catering mentality-a lot of salmon, sun-dried tomatoes, the inevitable Curry Chicken Salad, the forgiving and easy Chicken with Tabbouleh. However, these recipes manage to seem not dated but just reasonable solutions to the eternal problem set of practicality, flavor and time. With photographs of the dishes on nearly every spread and a nice, open format, Garten's book is easy to use. Sections on desserts, kids, and brunch complete this fine snapshot of real-life cooking and the joys of eating in. (Oct.)

Library Journal

Garten's first two books featuring recipes from the Barefoot Contessa, her gourmet takeout shop in East Hampton, NY, have sold more than 400,000 copies. Her latest repeats the appealing format of those titles, offering sophisticated but easy recipes and an attractive design featuring dozens of color photographs, mostly closeups of the recipes but including some casual shots of the author, friends, and family. Garten's "family style" cooking includes dishes like Chicken Noodle Soup and Parker's Fish & Chips (separate chapters are devoted to breakfast and kids' foods), but there are also elegant dishes like Tuna Tartare, Saffron Risotto, and Lobster Cobb Salad, not exactly everyday fare. Sure to be popular. Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.



Everyday Low-Carb Slow Cooker Cookbook: Over 120 Delicious Low-Carb Recipes That Cook Themselves

Author: Kitty Broihier

We all love to eat good food, but no one seems to have the time to cook it anymore. The resurrection of the slow cooker has changed all that, giving busy food lovers a simple way to prepare delicious meals with very little effort or attention. Now, in The Everyday Low Carb Slow Cooker Cookbook, nutritionist and food consultant Kitty Broihier and recipe developer and creative chef Kimberly Mayone offer low carbers a chance to jump on the slow cooker bandwagon with over 120 delectable low carb recipes designed especially for slow cooking. They cover everything from breakfast foods, snacks, and chilis to soups, entrees, and desserts, and even include potluck favorites, easy-prep entrees requiring five ingredients or less, and ethnic cuisine. Complete with information on the convenience and health benefits of using the slow cooker, how to convert favorite low carb recipes for slow cooking, low carb "go-with" recipes that round out slow cooked meals, and tips and serving suggestions featured throughout, The Everyday Low Carb Slow Cooker Cookbook is sure to become a staple in every low carb cook's kitchen.

Library Journal

Here are some easy slow-cooker recipes for the Atkins crowd, from nutrition consultant Broihier and recipe developer Mayone. But while the Mexican Pot Roast and Beef Bourguignonne will benefit from a slow cooker's long, gentle method, other recipes seem out of place. Why, for example, make Peanut Butter Fudge Cake in a slow cooker? And would a chicken cooked for six hours in a slow cooker really be "roasted"? Nevertheless, the title alone ensures demand. Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.



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