wester's Reviews
740 recipes reviewed. Showing 1 to 50Sort by: Book Title | Date | Rating 
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Madhur Jaffrey's Spice Kitchen: Fifty Recipes Introducing Indian Spices and Aromatic Seeds
By Madhur Jaffrey
Clarkson Potter - 1994
This is a lovely and very different way of cooking zucchini/courgettes, as a cooked salad with yogurt dressing. It combines well with lentil recipes.
It's very aromatic, not too hot and the mustard seeds add a nice nutty flavor. Very easy to make as well.
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Real Cooking
By Nigel Slater
Penguin Books Ltd - 2006
Even if you think you dislike beetroot, you must try this recipe! It has converted many people who thought the same, including myself. The taste is warm, sweet and deep.
You do have to start early, it needs a total of about an hour and a half in pan and oven.
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Madhur Jaffrey's Spice Kitchen: Fifty Recipes Introducing Indian Spices and Aromatic Seeds
By Madhur Jaffrey
Clarkson Potter - 1994
This is just so easy and so wonderful! Mix the sauce, wok the shrimp, heat it all through. Serve with rice. Enjoy!
I used passata where this called for canned tomato sauce, I suppose it could be done with fresh tomatoes as well.
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Sophie Grigson's Sunshine Food
By Sophie Grigson
BBC Books - 2000
A lovely vegan omelette/pancake. Serve with drinks, or with soup or a salad as a light meal.
If you've ever had to buy a big bag of chickpea flour because you needed half a cup in a recipe, this is the recipe to use up the rest.
In the photo fennel seeds were used instead of rosemary. Also very good.
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The 30-minute Cook: The Best of the World's Quick Cooking (Penguin cookery books)
By Nigel Slater, Juliet Dallas-Conte, Kevin Summers
Penguin Books Ltd - 1996
My favorite way of cooking chicken livers, very tasty. I do usually cook the onions for a bit longer than he suggests.
I usually serve with oven potatoes and a salad.
useful (1)
A heavily bastardized and therefore much easier to make version of a Sicilian pasta dish (I have seen a much more complicated dish with exactly the same ingredients in The Silver Spoon, I suppose that's the original). A wonderful and very unusual combination of flavors and textures.
useful (2)
Real Food
By Nigel Slater
Fourth Estate Ltd - 2000
Creamy and very tasty fish pie variation. Easy to make.
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Website: Smitten Kitchen
An Alice Waters recipe.
This is a very unusual combination of ingredients, but it works perfectly. The cauliflower is sauteed over a high heat which makes it very crunchy and lovely.
Do make it exactly as prescribed, at least the first time, because the details really matter here.
useful (1)
Website: Smitten Kitchen
Crunchy, slightly bitter and aromatic. This definitely takes green salad a step further.
Very flexible as well. The minimum you need is both bitter greens and less bitter ones (say, lettuce and endives), or alternatively, celery. When you've got that, combine away!
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Website: The Wednesday Chef
www.thewednesdaychef.com/the_wednesday_chef
This has to be my very favorite recipe of last year. It is very quick, very easy, and tastes totally amazing: light, subtly spicy and fragrant. It has an Asian feel to it, but very subtle. It's probably pretty healthy as well!
All ingredients of this have an amazing synergy. Make enough basmati rice and resist the tempation to do anything more fancy.
useful (1)
Website: Orangette
This is one of those recipes where you have to be careful not to make it every day once you've discovered it. So simple, so lovely, why didn't you think of this before?
I think other strong-flavoured hard cheeses can work just as well as Parmesan here, maybe even better because they can be slightly creamier. I've had good results with old Gouda and blue goat's cheese.
useful (3)
Website: Smitten Kitchen
Spinach and chickpeas? Doesn't sound exciting, does it? Well, it is, actually.
This is one of those dishes that is sure to become a staple. To start with, it tastes totally lovely. The slightly bitter silkenness of the spinach with the nutty firmness of the chickpeas, deepened by the richness of fried bread and the acidity of a touch of vinegar, finished with cumin and smoked paprika. Hearty, comforting, spicy, all of them. Hopelessly moreish.
It is also flexible - except for the spinach you might have all ingredients already. You can serve it as tapas, or cook some rice with it and have it for dinner. It is vegan. Oh, and have I told you yet that it tastes awesome?
Some notes on details: The fried bread should probably be either in or under this, not both. Unless you want it gluten-free, then I'm sure it will be fine without as well.
When I set out to cook this, I found I was all out of tomato sauce. I used an equivalent amount of mild Turkish red pepper paste instead. Great. Now I've tried both I can say I actually prefer to substitute the pepper paste.
It will probably work with frozen spinach as well, as long as it is whole-leaf or only roughly chopped. The feel of leaf should still be there, not the totally fine mush that cheap frozen spinach can be.
useful (3)
Website: Smitten Kitchen
Roasted potatoes with an aromatic crunchy crust. So easy, and so tasty. Just make it, will you?
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The Zuni Cafe Cookbook: A Compendium of Recipes and Cooking Lessons from San Francisco's Beloved Restaurant
By Judy Rodgers, Gerald Asher
W.W. Norton & Co. - 2002
Sometimes you are making something and you're quite certain you will like it, and still the end result totally blows you away. This is one of those cases. The spices and lemon zest give a really spicy and fragrant (but not overly hot) result, and they go really well with the tuna.
As I am not "burdened or blessed" with leftover fresh tuna, I used canned. It was still very lovely.
If I have any criticism, it's that I don't really feel the pine nuts add much to the recipe. They could be left out without diminishing the dish.
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Real Fast Puddings: Over 200 Desserts, Savouries and Sweet Snacks in Under 30 Minutes
By Nigel Slater
Penguin Books Ltd - 1994
Lovely, lovely, lovely. Scented with rose water and cardamom, sweet but not too sweet, exotic but not too exotic. This is a regular in our house.
We usually make it without pistachios and vanilla.
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See Rice pudding with Rosewater, Cardamom and Pistachio.
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The Zuni Cafe Cookbook: A Compendium of Recipes and Cooking Lessons from San Francisco's Beloved Restaurant
By Judy Rodgers, Gerald Asher
W.W. Norton & Co. - 2002
I don't roast whole chickens that often, but this one was excellent. It was really succulent and very flavorful. It wasn't that difficult to make either, if you take the time to read the recipe, and don't forget to salt the chicken one or two days before roasting it. I made the bread salad with it as well (with flat-leaf parsley), and a tomato salad. The bread salad was finished way before the tomatoes.
I did have a problem with fitting the bread salad and the chicken in the oven at the same time: you might want to check the size of your baking dishes.
useful (1)
Website: 101 Cookbooks
These look great and taste lovely - a very sweet first bite, followed by an explosion of cranberry tartness. Like cranberry sauce, but with a much better texture. The children (4 years old) devoured them.
I found it difficult to find the right cooling time for the sugar syrup. I waited 6 or 7 minutes and still some of the cranberries made a popping sound, although I found no burst berries when they were finished. Next time I'll wait at least 10 minutes before adding the berries. And do drain them very well of the sugar syrup, or they will be quite difficult to dry.
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Great Food Without Fuss: Simple Recipes from the Best Cooks
By Frances McCullough, Barbara Witt
Henry Holt & Co - 1992
Together with the Zuni Café's brine this made an amazing turkey - succulent meat, brown crispy skin, and very tasty.
We used a baby turkey (6 pounds) and roasted it for 1 hour, covering it with foil about halfway. We then rested it for about half an hour. It was well-cooked throughout, no pink bits anywhere.
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The Zuni Cafe Cookbook: A Compendium of Recipes and Cooking Lessons from San Francisco's Beloved Restaurant
By Judy Rodgers, Gerald Asher
W.W. Norton & Co. - 2002
Together with Barbara Kafka's high-temperature roasting this made an amazing turkey - succulent meat, brown crispy skin, and very tasty throughout.
If you can find enough room in the fridge (or another sufficienly cool but not quite freezing place) for a week, and if you can start a week before roasting, you must try this with your next turkey.
We used a baby turkey (6 pounds) and brined it for 4 days.
The amount of brine given in the recipe is not enough to brine even such a small turkey, we needed three times that amount. Better to see it as a ratio.
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Website: Smitten Kitchen
Really quick and really tasty. I did not bother with the cheese as I have a cheese-hater in the house, but it was lovely all the same. Make sure you make enough of this!
As I could not resist tinkering with this either, I tried it with some lemon zest, which was not really an improvement, although it was still very good. I also tried sautéing in butter instead of olive oil, and I found that different but equally good.
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Eat This Book: Cooking with Global Fresh Flavors
By Tyler Florence
Clarkson Potter - 2005
Excellent. A nice touch of orange and a good amount of nutty freshness from the arugula. The almond flavor could have been more pronounced - next time I will take more almonds and/or toast them first.
However, the freshness does not last long, so don't make more of this variation than you need right away. You can make the mayonnaise in advance, just wait with mixing in the extras.
I used this as a dip with celery sticks, and with fried potatoes. I loved it, and so did the kids. I will also try it with fennel.
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The River Cottage Fish Book
By Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, Nick Fisher
Bloomsbury Publishing PLC - 2007
This was totally delicious, even with supermarket mackerel and sausages. The sausages, smoked fish, chicory and creamy dressing blended together to a total that was definitely more than the sum of its parts. Even the kids loved it - my five-year-old daughter actually asked it she could have more chicory!
I think keeping the leaves of the chicory whole makes them too big. Halving them (except the really small ones in the middle) works better.
I used balsamic vinegar instead of wine vinegar with sugar.
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Website: Smitten Kitchen
Deb does it again!
She has found an already brilliant recipe (by Melissa Clark) and added the perfect finishing touch to it. Those pomegranate seeds are exactly what this salad needed, not just visually, but also taste- and texturewise.
I had this for breakfast today, and I will serve it for dinner too. And then I will try some moderation, but I don't know if I'm going to succeed.
useful (4)
Roasting-A Simple Art
By Barbara Kafka, Maria Robledo
William Morrow & Co. - 1995
This is going to be my recipe for endives from now on (unless I want to make a salad, of course).
Soft, buttery and full of roasted flavor. I made 4 of them, which according to the recipe should feed 2 to 4 people. I ate them all by myself.
And it is so easy as well.
I used all butter instead of butter and another fat. I definitely will experiment with other fats. I added some fish stock, as I served them with fish. I'm not sure the stock is really needed, just with salt it is delicious already.
The outside is even better than the inside, so use small endives or cut them in half.
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Fat: An Appreciation of a Misunderstood Ingredient with Recipes
By Jennifer McLagan
Jacqui Small LLP - 2009
This one blew me away.
Green salads don't sound very exciting, but occasionally there is one that is really special, like this one. The poultry fat (I used goose) really works with the grapefruit. You will have to try this out to know how good it is.
I did not think segmenting the grapefruit was worth the trouble, as the segments fell apart anyway. Next time I will just squeeze them. And half the amount of grapefruit was plenty.
useful (4)
Tapas: The Little Dishes of Spain
By Penelope Casas
Knopf - 1985
Meatballs flavored with nutmeg and garlic and stewed with some vegetables and a splash of wine. This recipe does not look spectacular, but boy, is it delicious. Everybody licked their plate clean, and then they scraped the pan. Easy to make and no weird ingredients. A keeper, for sure!
useful (1)
Vegetables (Good Cook)
By Richard Olney
Time Life UK - 1979
Very simple, excellent taste. It does need a big casserole - I halved the recipe and I already needed a pretty big one.
Substituted whipping cream for milk + flour. Do salt enough - there is not really enough anchovies to make any difference in saltiness.
The page number is of my Dutch version. Feel free to change it if you know the right one.
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Sophie Grigson's Meat Course (A Channel Four book)
By Sophie Grigson
BBC Books - 1995
This was excellent. Not very refined, it's true, just a really good hamburger with some extra kick added by the capers and beets. The fried eggs on top worked well too.
I added some anchovies to the meat mixture as I felt they would fit in, and I replaced the potatoes with cauliflower to decrease the carb content. Both tweaks worked well. I did not need any milk to get to the desired consistency.
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Entertaining
By Donna Hay
William Morrow Cookbooks - 2003
Excellent. I made this into meatballs instead of burgers, and they were just bursting with flavor. The seasonings brought out the flavor of the meat really well without being overpowering. I was afraid the balls/burgers might be too hot with this amount of mustard, but they were fine for children too (if you leave off the chillies, but those are on the meat, not inside).
A keeper.
This is the page number of the Dutch translation. If you have the original, feel free to correct.
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Fat: An Appreciation of a Misunderstood Ingredient with Recipes
By Jennifer McLagan
Jacqui Small LLP - 2009
Very good - meltingly tender meat, crisp cracklings.
Husband wants the five stars - I would have preferred 4 1/2 as some small tweaks were needed.
This was the first time I made pork belly and the first time I used a meat thermometer. The pork belly is going to stay, I'm not sure about the meat thermometer. It reached the given temperature in half an hour or so, so I just turned the oven down to 150 C and cooked for about two hours, then finished under the grill as the recipe says.
I salted the skin the evening before, at the same time as adding the herb paste, and I think this works very well.
I will use more fennel and less kale next time.
The recipe says you need 3 pounds of meat to feed 6 people. I fed 6 people (well, 4 adults and 4 children) on 2 pounds, and we were all so full that nobody wanted dessert.
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Website: Smitten Kitchen
More a technique than a recipe, but an excellent technique. Why didn't I think of this before? Because I'm too chicken to heat an empty pan on high heat. Will (probably) become my go-to method for frying eggs.
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De Volkskeuken / 2 De Volkskrant kookt / druk 1
By M. van Dinther, M. Wijntjes, A. Bos
Meulenhoff, Uitgeverij - 2008
Recipe in Dutch.
Erg lekker. Het zoetzuur van de granaatappel, de licht bittere walnoot, en de zachte maar smaakvolle kip combineerden tot een prettig complex smaakprofiel. Naar suggestie van een ander recept wat koenjit toegevoegd, wat weinig verschil maakte. Ik & manlief vonden het heerlijk, de kinderen wat minder.
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Eat Your Greens (Network Books)
By Sophie Grigson, Jess Koppel
BBC Books - 1993
Nice combination of ingredients. Sweet and aromatic.
Goes well with chickpeas.
My husband thinks there's too much vinegar in it, though.
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If you have turnips, this is a nice way to serve them.
Don't add the lemon zest too early or it will turn bitter.
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As the book itself says, cabbage cooked this way 'softens down to a nutty, mellow flavor'. Just lovely.
I like it with red cabbage too (increase the sugar a bit and add cloves, cinnamon and some cooking pears in small pieces).
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A very original way to serve Savoy cabbage.
If you want to make it a bit more substantial, some smoked tofu works well.
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A lovely way to serve broccoli.
Goes well with pasta carbonara.
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Jane Grigson's Vegetable Book
By Jane Grigson
Penguin - 1998
Not much of a recipe, but this sure is a wonderful combination. These two complement each other perfectly.
I always ignore the serving arrangement she suggests though. I think it looks much better when they are mixed together and the beetroot gives some of that lovely color to the oranges.
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A lovely light soup.
I made it without the savory and I did not miss it at all.
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Madhur Jaffrey's Spice Kitchen: Fifty Recipes Introducing Indian Spices and Aromatic Seeds
By Madhur Jaffrey
Clarkson Potter - 1994
An aromatic way with tomatoes.
Good cupboard recipe as well, if you use canned tomatoes.
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Dill, rather than garam masala, is the flavor on the foreground here.
This is one of those dishes you keep on making because it's easy, everybody likes it and yet it is distinctive.
It's vegan if you replace the chicken broth with vegetable broth.
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Very aromatic and the fish stays unbelievably moist.
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Roast Chicken and Other Stories (Ebury Paperback Cookery)
By Simon Hopkinson, Lindsey Bareham
Ebury Press - 1999
A good version of a good basic recipe.
Why oh why does no cookbook ever tell you for how long you should cook leeks?
I need 10 to 15 minutes till tenderness when dropped in boiling water.
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Sophie Grigson's Sunshine Food
By Sophie Grigson
BBC Books - 2000
This does make a pretty good limoncello, using wodka a a base. It does take at least 5 weeks though.
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The 30-minute Cook: The Best of the World's Quick Cooking (Penguin cookery books)
By Nigel Slater, Juliet Dallas-Conte, Kevin Summers
Penguin Books Ltd - 1996
A good rich pasta dish.
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Real Fast Vegetarian Food
By Ursula Ferrigno
Metro Books,London - 1996
Another case of "more than the sum of the parts". Nice plump figs in a thick orange-flavored sauce. Serve with thick yogurt.
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Happy Days with the Naked Chef
By Jamie Oliver
Michael Joseph - 2001
Very nice all-purpose curry sauce. Very spicy. You probably don't have all the spices yet - I bought fenugreek and curry leaves especially for this one. It is a base sauce, you still need to add meat or fish or something else.
I make a vegetarian version with cashew nuts as well. Very good, and a bit more filling than the mixed vegetables suggested.
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Filling and spicy, with the breadcrumbs adding some extra crunch. I usually have this with penne, not spaghetti.
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Festive, tasty and vegan. It looks spectacular and tastes good.
Pretty easy, except for scooping out the flesh from inside the squash. A teaspoon definitely does not work (it gave me big blisters), I will try a melon baller next time.
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