Cooksbakesbooks' Reviews
207 recipes reviewed. Showing 1 to 50Sort by: Book Title | Date 
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Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking
By Marcella Hazan
Knopf - 1992
This is one of my go-to meatball recipes. I adapt it to include pesto if I have some on hand, but the recipe is great made as stated in the instructions, as well. There are a lot of milk-soaked bread crumbs in them which makes them very moist. The meager amount of tomatoes that Hazan recommends serving them with works in certain circumstances, or you can adapt that part of the recipe to include a greater-volume, more substantial sauce depending on your desired finished product. I often add salt, pepper, an herb (rosemary is very nice), olive oil, a bit of red wine, some sugar, and even a smidge of baking soda if the tomatoes are super acidic.
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Stir-Frying to the Sky's Edge: The Ultimate Guide to Mastery, with Authentic Recipes and Stories
By Grace Young
Simon & Schuster - 2010
I had some beautiful bok choy on hand and looked in this book for a recipe and, lo and behold, there was an easy one for which I had all the ingredients already on hand. I trimmed and rinsed the choy, got the other ingredients ready to go and the dish was done, start to finish, in just a few minutes. It was so delicious that even my little kids asked for more.
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This recipe was just about magical. It was so easy to put together--getting the ingredients measured and ready was the main part--and so quick to cook, and the result was super tender, excellently flavored, and unlike any other salmon I've ever had. The light velveting on the salmon was perfect. I used sliced, fresh button mushrooms instead of the straw mushrooms called for, and they were such an amazing part of the dish, so mushroomy in their taste, somehow more than usual. When I have the time to put the ingredients together, this will be my preferred way to cook salmon from now on.
useful (4)
Vegetable Soups from Deborah Madison's Kitchen
By Deborah Madison
Broadway - 2006
This soup was a mess of off flavors and textures. The greens were bitter, the beans lacked flavor, the rice was a distraction, and the whole thing did not meld together as a soup should. If I were to make it again, I probably would cook it for several hours with the beans, greens, and seasonings, and I'd still put the rice in more toward the end, or I'd have left the rice out entirely.
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Perfect Cakes
By Nick Malgieri
William Morrow Cookbooks - 2002
This cake rose very high, but it has a blah taste and a terribly dry and tough texture. We are eating it like a bread item because it is flavorless and dry.
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Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone
By Deborah Madison
Broadway - 1997
This is delicious and thrifty. Made too much skinny spaghetti last night? Don't throw it away! Save it and make this well-flavored frittata the next day, for breakfast, lunch, or dinner. Flavored with marjoram, parsley, garlic, and lemon zest, it's a yummy twist on a gremolata flavoring--good enough to serve to guests.
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The side bar to this recipe starts, "Of all souffles, this is my favorite." This may be my favorite, also. It has a great tangy, goat cheese flavor that is not over much, and the thyme is the perfect herb to go with that flavor. It is elegant, and it puffed beautifully, and held the puff for a few gorgeous minutes. It is also very quick to put together. All around excellent.
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Made with tempeh, this was a very good vegetarian main course item. It was not elegant or outstanding, but it was good, and it was a nice change of pace from a slab of meat. This would go well as part of a fall meal (with sauteed cabbage, potato gratin, etc.), or a summer grill, with well-grilled, marinaded vegetables, corn on the cob, and other summery sides.
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The flavoring of orange zest, and cloves with delicious plums is divine. The recommended 1/4 cup of sugar is perfect--not too sweet--and still lets the great flavor of the plums come through. The crisp topping, made optionally with ground almonds instead of rolled oats, is an enhancement, not a detraction as is true of other crisps I have made. The plums are just rinsed and quartered, so this is an unfussy, but very presentable, quick dessert to make. Serve with vanilla ice cream.
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Truly exquisite flavor, gorgeous to look at, all around fantastic. I used very fresh shiitakes and corn from the cob. This recipe employs a somewhat fussy technique in that you have to make a stock while you saute ingredients in succession. But I made this for a weeknight meal with about 20 minutes of active cooking time. Then I let it bubble gently while I got some caramelized Brussels sprout halves made, and seasoned turkey chops seared. I served it with reheated hash browns, and pre-made cranberry sauce, and this was a feast. The corn ragout elevated the meal almost into elegance.
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Homemade Cookies
By Farm Journal
Doubleday - 1971
These rate 5 stars, easily. They are soft and smooth, and well-flavored, not too intense, and not too delicate in their taste. The banana flavor is slight, but marvelous when it does peek through. This is a great way to use up overly-brown bananas.
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Martha Stewart's Baking Handbook
By Martha Stewart
Clarkson Potter - 2005
I was skeptical that these would be excellent--the salt, cinnamon and vanilla seemed to be called for in too-small amounts--but, no, these muffins are great. They are quite sweet, but the zucchini and cranberries have a real presence in these. And, as much as I love nuts, it was refreshing to have a nut-free muffin for a change. These don't need nuts to be delicious.
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Moosewood Restaurant Book of Desserts (Moosewood Collection)
By Moosewood Collective
Three Rivers Press - 1997
These are in the Cookies and Bars chapter, but they're really like a breakfast bar or a healthy cookie. They do have tons of butter in them and some chocolate, so you'd think they'd seem quite decadent, but the high proportion of whole grain to the rest of the bar knocks the experience into "energy bar." These are good for an energy bar type thing. They are not great if you want something that is sweet and delicate. These are very coarse--the oatmeal base constitutes about 90% of the whole. The cranberry and chocolate is a good combination.
useful (1)
The Family Baker: 150 Never-Let-You-Down Basic Recipes
By Susan G. Purdy
Broadway - 1999
If it were up to me, I'd give this one zero stars. But I made this as an extra cake for a birthday party that had extra people coming on quick notice, and people said they liked it! And then, after the party, my two little boys ate piece after piece until it was gone! To me, it tasted like paste, and with that texture. The frosting was kind of good in a super-sweet, grainy way, but the cake was flavorless and extremely gummy. I tried it several times to see if my palate was off the mark somehow, but no. It was terrible. Very unlike Susan Purdy who is usually so good!! I give it two stars: zero for me, three to four for my guests and kids, averaged out to 2.
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Perfect Recipes for Having People Over
By Pam Anderson
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt - 2005
These are very good made with grocery store-bought ingredients. If you use excellent chocolate, they will be outstanding. They take about 15 minutes to make, so would be great if you had to make something in a hurry.
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This cheesecake is delicious, moist and very easy to make.
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When I give this recipe 5 stars, I really mean it. I am always looking for banana recipes to use up the couple that get overripe each week. This recipe is outstanding. Anderson lets us in on the secret, which is the high heat used and the small size of the muffins. The 425-degree F oven heat bakes the mini muffins quickly without drying them out, and it caramelizes the sugar in a most delightful way.
My boys usually ask for some sweetened cream cheese on their banana muffins, but not on these. They ate muffin after muffin when I made this recipe. This will be my every-week muffin recipe from now on.
I modified the recipe (as Anderson encourages you to do) by omitting the cinnamon chips and adding 3/4 of a cup of chopped walnuts. I imagine that the cinnamon version would also be excellent.
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The Cake Bible
By Rose Levy Beranbaum
William Morrow Cookbooks - 1988
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The sour cream in this recipe takes it just a fraction of a notch higher than the Perfect All-American Chocolate Torte, in my opinion. The tang of the sour cream pitches it upward, and it tenderizes it just slightly, making the crumb seem a bit tighter, but still extremely light, compared to the PAAC Torte. This and the Perfect All-American Chocolate Butter Cake from The Cake Bible are my favorite chocolate cakes.
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The Bread Bible: 300 Favorite Recipes
By Beth Hensperger
Chronicle Books - 2004
Wow, great bread: soft, moist, tall, great crumb, excellent flavor, and beautiful. Plus, it took just a couple of minutes to put together. This bread would be great for sandwiches, either savory or sweet. And it makes -fantastic- toast.
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Ice Pops: Recipes for Fresh and Flavorful Frozen Treats
By Shelly Kaldunski
Weldon Owen - 2011
This made a good pop, refreshing and sweet, but not too sweet. The coffee flavor was strong, but the cream and sugar balanced it well.
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This was a good pop--refreshing and just sweet enough to be a treat. The lime flavor is just right, not overpowering nor too subtle. Putting the rind layer on is a nice touch, but it would be just as good if made with only the pink part of the watermelon through and through.
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This pop was grainy in texture (like ice milk) and the flavor was too intense to be refreshing. I was hoping it would be like heavenly buttermilk ice cream with a lemon-y flavor, but it was not. The lemon flavor was too dominant and the texture was not creamy.
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This pop was marred by a too-chunky texture and a too-earthy, not-sweet taste. This pop wasn't a treat, as such--it wasn't refreshing and sprightly--but it tasted healthy.
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Moosewood Restaurant Daily Special: More Than 275 Recipes for Soups, Stews, Salads and Extras
By Moosewood Collective
Clarkson Potter - 1999
First off, I will mention that I used white potatoes and not the sweet potatoes called for in the list of ingredients, and I used homemade chicken stock instead of water. With those changes, the flavor of this soup was excellently well balanced. I topped the soup with grated Fontina cheese, and chopped fresh parsley and chives, all of which elevated this soup to a 5-star level. My little kids ate every bit of it and asked for more, which is certainly high praise for a heavily vegetable-based soup.
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Maida Heatter's Book of Great Cookies
By Maida Heatter
Knopf - 1977
The caption reads: "These are Austrian. They are coal-black, chocolate, black-pepper cookies--buttery, crunchy, and spicy." I liked these a lot. They were unusual but not challenging in their flavor. It turns out that chocolate and black pepper, surprisingly, can be a good taste combination.
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The flavor and texture of these are outstanding. The crust is not hard, like a usual Linzer bar, it is tall and cake-like, with a pronounced but not overwhelming cinnamon flavor.
I have made these with raspberry jam as well as homemade rhubarb compote and both versions were excellent.
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These have a subtle lemon presence. There is sweetened condensed milk in the filling, so if you like that with a lemon flavor, you'll like these. These are not elegant cookies, but they are good tasting.
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These are calls rocks because of their shape, not their texture. They are very moist and soft.
Dates are so sweet by themselves that I find date cookies to be tricky to pull off successfully. This is one such example of a use of dates that misses the mark just a bit. The recipe calls for a full pound (half kilo) of dates, and it's almost date over kill. But they were fine to have as a small sweet with coffee or tea at breakfast.
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This makes a great cookie if you use a top-quality butter and very fresh spices. The texture is cakey (they are called rocks because of their shape, not their texture) and very soft. Their softness makes them difficult to store, and the flavor is really best the day of and the day after baking, so they don't keep well flavorwise, either. But I love these cookies and have made them often.
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This is another excellent cookie from this book. It has a wonderful texture--very cakey inside, but lightly crisp on the outside. The pineapple and pecans are a perfect taste combination.
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These are really outstanding. They are crisp and chewy and so delicious. When I made them, everyone in the family was trying to be judicious and not eat them all at once, but all of us kept coming into the kitchen to have another one and another until they were quickly gone. But note that you have to use -very fresh pecans- to make them so excellent.
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I have made these cookies more times than I can count. These are great cookie to make when you need to use browning bananas. Adding the nuts really elevates the flavor of this cookie, so I would not omit them unless you have to.
The flavor is excellent, but they are very, very soft, hence the 4 stars. Their moistness makes them hard to store, so they should be eaten right away, or frozen on a cookie sheet in a single layer, and stored in a container in the freezer after that. Do not thaw before taking them out of the container or the cookies will stick together as they warm up.
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As Heatter said herself in the recipe caption, "Dark, thick, soft, covered with a thin, dark chocolate glaze. These are easily mixed in a saucepan." I gave this my highest rating of "excellent" when I made this cookie. To ensure success, use top-quality ingredients.
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As the caption says beneath the hand-drawn image of a cookie on the recipe page, "These are thin, dark, and brittle-crisp." They have a good, double-chocolate flavor, with the melty chocolate chips nicely offsetting the crisp texture of the cookie. Use really good ingredients when you make this cookie and you will be very happy with the result.
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Madhur Jaffrey's World-of-the-East Vegetarian Cooking
By Madhur Jaffrey
Knopf - 1981
What a delicious, refreshing drink this makes. I have added 1 cup of frozen strawberries to this and an extra 1 1/2 tablespoons of sugar, and it's outstanding. Adding the optional rose essence is recommended if you have it on hand, for depth of flavor.
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The Bread Baker's Apprentice: Mastering the Art of Extraordinary Bread
By Peter Reinhart, Ron Manville
Ten Speed Press - 2001
I agree with the other reviewers that the key is to roll the dough out very thinly. I cut the dough into four pieces and rolled it out very thinly, and I loved it. I loved that the toppings really stayed on with just a finger-sprinkling of water, and that I could customize the them (caraway or fennel for me, poppy seed or salt for my husband).
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201 Muffins
By Gregg R. Gillespie
Black Dog & Leventhal Publishers - 2001
This sounds like it might produce a great muffin--the combination of banana and chocolate chip is promising. But this recipe produced a merely serviceable muffin, one that I won't clamber to make again soon. It was sturdy in a good way, and had a fine flavor, but it was not remarkable in any way. The kids let them sit after the first meal of them.
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This scone had a good flavor from the nutmeg and the whole rolled oats, but the texture was way too crumbly. My kids' plates were a heap of crumbs, and they couldn't grip the scone to eat it before it fell apart. Adults can gingerly pick it up but, still, it's not a nice, firm scone that you can take a neat mouthful of.
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Sacramental Magic In A Small-town Cafe: Recipes And Stories From Brother Juniper's Cafe
By Br. Peter Reinhart
Running Press - 1994
This makes a yummy slaw. There is tons of sugar in it which is what makes it so good. I have liked this best when I have cut the cabbage in tiny squares with a knife. When I have grated the cabbage, the cabbage juice somehow makes the slaw less good.
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Vegetable Harvest: Vegetables at the Center of the Plate
By Patricia Wells
William Morrow Cookbooks - 2007
This was very easy to put together--it required no kneading. The flavor was excellent the afternoon after the evening I made it, and it stayed good to eat for about three days. The texture was very dense, but in a good way. It was different from anything I could buy, and the flavor was excellent. The crunch of the walnuts made it festive. The bread was good with cheeses, with jams, with butter, and even plain. I would not use it for sandwiches, but it was a good snacking or breakfast bread.
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This was very quick and easy to make and very delicious. I served it at a party with some firm, creamy-white cheeses, and it was a wonderful combination. The little tang from the vinegar cut the cloyingness of the honey. The bit of saffron taste was marvelous. I loved this so much that I ate the remainder of it every morning with gobs of Greek yogurt, and it was even better that way. I will definitely make this again.
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I served this at my New Year's Eve celebration, 2010, to have something nice for the vegetarian who'd be attending. It was super quick to put together after the potatoes were prepared, and it was uncomplicated in its taste, and delicious. I would make this again.
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I used a mixture of freshly-roasted pumpkin and Hubbard squash, and I substituted walnuts and walnut oil for the pistachios. I used homemade turkey stock, and added 3/4 teaspoon of dried thyme. This was good, and a couple of people liked it a lot. I found the texture a little too smooth and thin--it might as well have been served as a soup. Next time, if I make it again, I will reduce the stock to 1/4 cup, or even less, and keep it firmer. The taste was very good, but the bit of thyme I added gave it some depth. Fresh thyme would have been better to use if I'd had it. If we could award half stars, I'd give this one 3 1/2.
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This was a hit at my New Year's Eve gathering, 2010. It was incredibly easy to put together, and extremely forgiving in terms of the time you could ignore it while the sausages and potatoes were simmering. People came late, and the sausages and potatoes held well, simmering, for an hour with no loss in quality. When people arrived, I mixed the meat and potatoes with the vinaigrette in a colorful ceramic baking dish and garnished it with rosemary sprigs and it was so warming and delicious. If we could award half stars, this would get 4 1/2.
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This made a tangy, cold beet soup, that I served out of shot glasses on New Year's Eve, 2010. It was not the best dish I served, but it was festive and refreshing, and I would make it again. The balance of flavors was good--not too tangy, and nicely tasting of beets. A small shot or two was a perfect amount. This soup did not keep well--it was best within the day I made it.
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Joy of Cooking: 75th Anniversary Edition - 2006
By Irma S. Rombauer, Marion Rombauer Becker, Ethan Becker
Scribner - 2006
This makes a good cream-based biscuit. The dough is very easy to put together because the fat in it comes from cream only; you do not have to work butter or shortening into this dough. This recipe has no eggs in it. It is good used as the basis for strawberry, or other fruit, shortcake, as the title implies. Be careful not to overbake the biscuits or they will be tough and won't taste good, either.
Egg-free.
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This is a good basic French toast recipe. If you are looking for a recipe that will make regular, familiar French toast, here you have it. The version with half and half is very good.
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This recipe makes a very good gingersnap. If you use freshly-ground spices, the flavor is very strong and delicious. Even if your spices have been ground way ahead of time, this still makes a nicely spicy cookie. The texture is kind of firm and chewy. They are easy to eat many of in a sitting.
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This is a good recipe for Mexican Wedding Cakes (also known as Russian Tea Cakes). It calls for toasted pecans, which is a wonderful nut to use in this recipe. I have also used walnuts, and that variation is equally delicious. There are only six ingredients, and this cookie is egg-free. You must use butter, and not margarine or shortening, to yield the correct flavor.
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