 | |
 View Larger |
Vegetables from Amaranth to Zucchini: The Essential Reference: 500 Recipes, 275 Photographs By Elizabeth Schneider ( William Morrow Cookbooks )
Release Date: 2001-12-01
Average Customer Rating:
List Price: $65.00
Price: $44.20
Eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping on orders over $25.
Availability: Usually ships in 9 to 12 days
|  Add to Cart |
|
|
Product Description
Vegetables from Amaranth to Zucchini: The Essential Reference is at once an encyclopedia, a produce market manual, and a treasure trove of recipes. With produce specialist Elizabeth Schneider as your guide, take a seed-to-table voyage with more than 350 vegetables, both exotic and common. Discover lively newcomers to the North American cornucopia and rediscover classic favorites in surprising new guises.In this timely reference, Elizabeth Schneider divulges the secrets of the vegetable kingdom, sharing a lifetime of scholarly sleuthing and culinary experience. In her capable hands, unfamiliar vegetables such as amaranth become as familiar as zucchini -- while zucchini turns out to be more intriguing than you ever imagined.Each encyclopedic entry includes a full-color identification photo, common and botanical names, and an engaging vegetable "biography" that distills the knowledge of hundreds of authorities in dozens of fields -- scientists, growers, produce distributors, and chefs among them.Practical sections describe availability, selection, storage, preparation, and basic general use. Finally, the author's fresh contemporary recipes reveal the essence of each vegetable and a culinary sensibility that food magazine and cookbook readers have trusted for thirty years. Each entry concludes with a special "Pros Propose" section -- spectacularly innovative recipes suggested by professional chefs.Vegetables from Amaranth to Zucchini: The Essential Reference is an indispensable resource for home cooks, food professionals, gardeners, information seekers, and anyone who simply enjoys good reading.
|
Amazon.com Review
Elizabeth Schneider's Uncommon Fruits and Vegetables set a standard for exact yet lively investigation. Vegetables from Amaranth to Zucchini follows in her earlier book's footsteps to create a compelling guide to 350 common and exotic vegetables. This seed-to-table exploration does more, however. In addition to its usefulness as a reference work (vegetables are, for example, listed by their market, botanical, and common names), the book offers 500 up-to-the-minute recipes--such as Shredded Yellow Squash with Garlic Chives and Baked Sweet Potato-Apple Puree with Horseradish--valuable advice on seasonality and selection, multiple-method cooking instructions, and color photos of all the entries that make market identification a breeze. Interested in amaranth? Find its entry and discover, first, the magenta-veined plant's common aliases (among them, the Caribbean callaloo, the Indian bhaji, and the Korean namul); an engaging vegetable biography that distills information from many fields (for example, the Greeks thought amaranth immortal); information on selection, storage, and preparation (use the vegetable's tiniest leaves for salads; steam, braise, or sauté the larger "with garlic, shallots, tomato dice, and a touch of chilies"); and full-dress recipes (such as Garlicky Sauté of Amaranth and Tomatoes, Cuban Style). A final section, called Pros Propose, offers recipe sketches from cooking experts, like Paula Wolfert's Amaranth and Sheep's Milk Cheese. This lucid organizational scheme, common to all the entries, and Schneider's expert handling of it, promote a full yet relaxed familiarization with the selected vegetables. This is one of those few books that most cooks will want, as well as need, to own. --Arthur Boehm
|
|
 one of my 3 most often used kitchen books ( em-elle )
This is a beautiful and functional and useful book. I refer to it at least once a week, sometimes more often. Most people will use this book in at least one of the following four ways:
1) coffee table book and conversation starter - this is the least valuable way to utilize such a brilliant tome but if food books appeal to your coffe table senses you can't go wrong with this one, the photographs are lovely
2) "what the heck did I just buy at the farmers market?" reference. I frequent farmers markets and sometimes I buy a lovely vegetable that I honestly don't know what to do with when I get it home. This book tells me how to clean, store, cook, and serve those farmers market goodies
3) "how the heck do I pick a good [enter vegetable here]?" reference. Sometimes the best squash is not always the one with the hardest shell. Can a perfectly good artichoke have brown spots? Should I select leeks with fat bulbs or slender bulbs? This book tells you how to make the best selection and what time of year is prime for each item, including varietals.
4) Should I bake or steam or boil or braise or roast or gril or...? This book tells you how the flavor and texture of your selected vegetable will differ based upon cooking technique.
Another reviewer indicated that this book does not cover common vegetables in some cases. That is correct. You won't find an entry for traditional carrots, but you will find several entries for non traditional carrots. You won't find green asparagus described (though it is referenced) but you will find white and purple asparagus entries. The author clearly indicates omissions and her reasoning is that even basic home cooks already have that knowledge. I can understand why some reviewers would omit a star for that but to be honest I use this book so often that it is still a five star product in my opinion.
|
the best of my 45 ( wooddogs3 )
As an avid vegetable gardener I buy every cookbook on vegetables that comes along, and find (somewhat to my embarrassment) that I now have 45 of them. This is the one that I haul out most often and that I turn to over and over for ideas. Like many other readers, I wish that Ms. Schneider would reissue it with the commonest vegetables included, but other than that it's perfect. I particularly like the free-flowing section that follows the recipes for each vegetable, in which the author gives sketchy outlines of other dishes using that vegetable. Many of my most successful cooking experiments have been triggered by these undetailed, one-cook-to-another sections that give the gist of a dish rather than nailing it down.
|
Fantastic Resource! ( meredithfrank81 )
Other reviewers have said it all. This is truly a fantastic resource. Get it now!
|
Great resource!
This book is huge, glossy pages, an intense collection of veggie info and recipes (not all raw or even vegan) from food workers of many varieties. It includes direct quotes from famous chefs, lots of photos, and tons of information that to enhance ones knowledge about specific vegetables. It's focus is practical information about processing and storing vegetables for eating, although it also includes interesting historical and nutritional facts (for example some avocados have more fat than others, some more water...)
This book really is a treasure and is used by professional chefs.
|
an instant classic! ( renee2856 )
This is the best reference book on vegetables I know; an invaluable resource that all food or garden enthusiasts should have on their shelves for ready use.The illustrative recipes are excellent. I certainly consider Elizabeth Schneider to be one of the country's top food writers.
Renee Shepherd
|
|
|
