Next challenge?
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Could we do The Olive and the Caper sometime? I'm just reading it -- there's lots of fun stuff to read beyond the recipes -- and really enjoying it. Ten of us own this book so far, but there are no reviews, recipe or book, posted. I've not yet made anything, but will remedy this today, if all goes well.
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Never heard of it. Could you write a review?
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I haven't finished reading it yet, and have only made one recipe. But it is a wonderful read so far, with lots of stories and extra information.
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I do love Greek food. This sounds like a lovely cookbook - I'll look for it!
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I love the flavours of Mediterranean food but have only dabbled in Greek cuisine so a challenge with this book would be great, and if it's a good read as well, even better.
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Or a general challenge on Greek cooking? There must be so many good Greek cookbooks around, it seems a shame to focus on just one.
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Actually, I have the impression that there aren't actually all that many Greek cookbooks, let alone good ones. Not surprisingly given the long Ottoman occupation Greek cooking is really a subset of Middle Eastern cooking, particularly at the more sophisticated level; at the domestic level it tends towards hearty meals of simply cooked meat and fish and overcooked veggies, or it does in Melbourne anyway.
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I'm not trying
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Funny, my memory of eating in Greece was salads and seafood, yet restaurants tend to have heavy things like moussaka. I haven't gotten to the meat chapters in O&C yet (and they're not the majority of the book), but have marked a lot of veggie meze things. So far it's a slow but enjoyable read because there are so many non-recipe pages and side bars with history and stories and useful information.
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I didn't mention salad, did I? Greek salad is usually simple enough but it has to include cucumber and fetta cheese. Anything with fetta cheese in it is by definition Greek! And they do seafood really well - calamari, octopus, whole baked fish. It's really a matter of ingredients rather than method, though.
You're dead right about moussaka not being something you'd get in a village. It could hardly be traditional peasant cuisine. I mean, bechamel sauce? My understanding is that it was devised in the early twentieth century by somebody who thought Greek cooking needed modernising. Of course we all think it's authentic Greek now and even Greeks make it at home.
I should explain that I've never been to Greece. My generalisations are based on living Melbourne, which allegedly has the largest Greek population of anywhere outside Greece. We're getting to third and fourth generation people of Greek descent and they've been adapting their cooking as everybody does, particularly as they've joined the affluent middle classes, but there are still some constants like baking cakes with oil and not butter.
O&C sounds a bit like Claudia Roden's wonderful new book The Food of Spain. As a book it's handsomely designed, beautifully illustrated and of course very well written. It's part travelogue, full of history and stories about people who produce and cook regional food, but there are lots of recipes that look worth trying. I do like books of this sort! -
At one time, we discussed having a challenge on a cookbook featuring an Asian cuisine. Last year there were some interesting Korean cookbooks. But I think that one issue with the challenges is finding books owned by enough cookbookers - or books that are widely held by libraries. I think the new book about Burma, for example, would be a really interesting challenge. However, its only just come out, and so few of us would own it.
That said, all this discussion of Spanish and Greek foods also sounds pretty awesome. I love the challenges because they make it easier for me to select recipes to try. -
Now that the Martha Shulman challenge has come to an end, any further thoughts on the next one?
I borrowed the Olive and the Caper from the library as well as Food from Many Greek Kitchens by Tessa Kiros to take a look at them. There are similarities in the recipes offered by both books, with information provided about each but the Olive and the Caper is far more than that, including anecdotes and Greek history delivered with a humour that makes it a fun, not a didactic read. The Kiros book has lots of gorgeous photographs including pictures of most of the finished dishes (and the fonts are easy to read!!!). I ended up buying the Olive and the Caper and have lots of recipes flagged but not yet made.
I also have the book Burma. For this cuisine, you need to create your own pantry though most items are made from accessible ingredients eg fried shallots, fried shallot oil, (requiring only shallots and peanut oil) toasted chickpea flour, dried shrimp powder…..I haven’t had time to give this book the attention it deserves but it’s beautiful to look at (though the amazing photographs deserved better quality paper to do them justice!), many of the recipes sound really delicious and if it’s anything like the author’s previous books, they’ll turn out well. Serious Eats tested a few of them with good results.
Greek, Asian....I'll go for either.....or anything else that's suggested!
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Another challenge idea might be Amanda Hesser's Essential New York Times Cookbook. This is a huge book and it would be nice to have more recipe reviews.
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And it's already owned by 46 members, Kaye. I agree this would be a good idea for a challenge. At this time of year, when many of us are cooking for the holidays, this cookbook would offer something for everyone.
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That book (essential NYT cookbook) is owned by 43 cookbookers and it has two excellent reviews. Not a bad idea at all!
I also picked up Olive and the Caper from the library - it looks like a fun read.
But as always, I'm up for anything.
I do like a challenge that stretches me on some front (other than the waistline). I've often reflected on the Zuni Cookbook challenge, where I really learned to seek out new ingredients and try techniques I'd not done before. The Pie & Pastry challenge did that too. I wasn't a cookbooker during the bread baking challenge, but that would have been something where I would learn a lot, too. -
How about Japanese? I just bought Nobu : the cookbook, and I have some other Japanese cookbooks, but I never seem to really make anything from them as they tend to need ingredients I don't have in my cupboard. Maybe a challenge would help me make the trip to the shop to get seaweed, and dashi, and...
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Japanese sounds like an exciting challenge!
Wester, have you had a chance to look at the recipes in Nobu….do they seem doable for the home cook with no experience with this cuisine? Based on my recent experiences with Ming Tsai, who hasn’t scaled the recipes down far enough to be practical, and Thomas Keller, who calls for all sorts of specialty baking equipment and expensive, mail order only ingredients, I’m a little wary of restaurateurs’ cookbooks :) -
I just got "Japanese Farmhouse Cooking" and some of the recipes in there look relatively doable in a home kitchen--but I too never really seem to make Japanese recipes--mirin and dashi and the like not being in my pantry either. Maybe it's time I tried cooking with some of these ingredients.
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@Zosia: it depends a bit.
Some recipes, such as the new style sashimi, don't look all that complicated, and the ingredients are quite straightforward, although you do need yuzu juice even for this one. Other recipes need really weird ingredients (one tentacle of a giant octopus) or just plain expensive ones (truffle). I think that if you have an excellent fishmonger, access to the plainer Japanese ingredients (yuzu, mirin, sake, pickled ginger, sesame oil) and are willing to deviate just a bit from the recipe, it's possible to make most of these. They are not going to look like the pictures though - I think you need to do a few ikebana courses as well to accomplish that.
No special equipment I can see, although you do need a very good knife. -
Thank you, wester, that's good to know.
kateq, that looks like a wonderful book - you were lucky to score a copy......it's not currently available through the North American retailers I checked.
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Japanese would be interesting to me! I own one japanese cookbook that I almost never use.
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The Olive and the Caper is a very good book For all the reasons cited above. The author is an anthropologist and cook who is lived and worked in Greece for more than 30 years And has lots of very good and interesting anecdotal information. It is at all my local libraries. So I vote for that. On the Japanese front, a very good basic cookbook is "Basic Japanese Cooling" by Jody Vassallo. I also like the idea of "Plenty" and "Food 52 Vol 2". Also just looked up your comments on "Ottolenghi" and that sounds pretty amazing too.
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So many excellent choices! I'm think that my long-wished-for kitchen remodel will finally start in Feb or March. It would be great to participate in a challenge before most cooking shuts down for me.
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Great ideas, everyone. Okay, let's go with the following for the next challenges. We'll do the Olive and the Caper now (starting this week and going into February). Then we'll choose an Asian cuisine - Japanese most likely (though I'm intrigued by Korean also). Then The New York Times cookbook if everyone's into that.
I'll get going this week on setting up Olive and Caper. Happy New Year everyone! -
Hope you had a great holiday, Andrew. Happy New Year!
Looking forward to all of the challenges... -
Fun! Thanks, Andrew.
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Sounds great Andrew. I think my library has Olive and Caper so I'll be checking that one out. I love Asian Cuisine especially Korean which I fell in love with while in CA. Wish we had some Korean BBQ restaurants closer to us in NC. I have several Korean cookbooks and maybe a Korean cooking challenge would kick start me into using some of them. Happy New Year and here's to fun cooking in 2013.
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I picked up some grape leaves and retsina (and lots of lemons!) today....is everyone else ready for the first challenge of the new year?
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I picked up the cookbook during the week. I'm guessing if we go ahead and start cooking, perhaps Andrew will grandfather in our January reviews. I'm hoping to find a recipe for an amazing fava bean dip I had in Crete in 2004. If you see a recipe like that, let me know!
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My daughter got me a copy from the library where she works last Wed. I get to keep it three weeks, so I guess I better be picking out some recipes to try.
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Here's a link to a Saveur article which itself links to several recipes from the book.
http://www.saveur.com/article/Kitchen/The-Olive-and-The-Caper
and Chow made it the cookbook of the month last March--there are various threads on the different chapters of the book. Breads/soups/salads chapters thread is here: http://chowhound.chow.com/topics/836483--
I'm sorry I can't remember how to post links so that they are part of the text... -
Those threads on Chow are pretty hard to follow but they have some useful information - thanks kateq!
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I've started cooking today from the olive and Caper.
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I think I may join you this weekend.
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Me too!
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I started cooking from it myself a few days ago as it has to go back to the library soon unless I can renew it.
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I'm in. I also obtained this cookbook from the library. I wasn't sure I would like it. I usually prefer more pictures and less talk. However I am really getting into it. As we are Orthodox and do a lot of fasting I found the story about the lemon cheese tarts something I could relate to and very hilarious. I am glad the contest hasn't started yet but I am ready to go. I was glad to find big jars of capers and Kalmakata olives and packages of anchovies at Costco.
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Peckish Sister, do you still have mastic left over from the Moroccan challenge? It's used in a few recipes, both sweet and savoury, including the the lemon cheese tarts. I'm on the hunt for some.
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I recently found mastic at my local Italian market! I guess this means that you might find it in unusual places, so keep your eyes open.
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Thanks, Queezle Sister, I will.....
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Zosia, After buying it on line (and yes I have some and am anxious to put it to work) I found it cheap in the refrigerator at a Mediterrean deli/store. Then I also saw it in the International Food Club in Orlando. Good luck finding it.
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I found mastic at a Moroccan/Iranian (and possibly Turkish as well) shop. It was just an unmarked packet, and when I asked what it was, I got the answer "It's a kind of chewing gum. It's a bit bitter".
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A friend of mine found some at her local Greek bakery but apparently they only have it just before Easter.
It looks as though I have a lot of avenues to explore..... -
Hi all: sorry for the long absence. Definitely I'll be grandfathering reviews from when I announced the title. I'll try to get the announcement page up later today. I've become very busy (as you may have noticed) with other aspects of my life, and Cookbooker is not getting quite as much attention as it once did. However, it's not going anywhere, and we'll keep doing challenges. Just bear with me if I seem to vanish for a while now and then.
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Well, it was almost too easy to find mastic once I started looking. After buying it the Middle Eastern grocery store I went to first, I found it in 2 others, including one of the grocery store chains here.
I have a feeling though that not all mastic is created equal.....it has very mild flavour.... I was expecting something more intense. I'll buy from a different store next time. -
@wester, I've just been looking for mail-order mastic in France (turned out to be a non-trivial exercise) and found a lot of mastic-flavored chewing gum. I wonder if you've bought some of that?
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@kaye16: I don't think so. It looked quite like I expected it to look, and it is bitter and unsweetened. And don't forget that mastic actually means something to chew!
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In French, "mastic" is also putty and such things.
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For what it's worth, I think it would be good to keep challenges fairly general in order to bring in more people to the fun. (Which cookbooks would MOST folks have or like to cook from? is what I'd be thinking.) For myself, I would have and make recipes in general or baking or even Mexican or vegetarian/vegan books and most cooking magazines, but not so much Japanese or Korean. That does not mean that I wouldn't enjoy the reviews, however...just for challenges I think more mainstream would be best. I am too new here to voice this opinion...and am very grateful to you who do so much for Cookbooker. But I just could NOT bite my lips since I don't even go to Japanese restaurants and figure it might limit responses instead of getting folks excited to cook and share.
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Welcome to Cook Booker. I look forward to your reviews. You have one heck of a cookbook collection. The nice thing about the contests is that they seem to go pretty quickly and hopefully onto something you might like better. One of my favorite things is getting email alerts when someone cooks out of one of your cookbooks.
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I love the inspiration to try something new that comes with reading reviews by other adventuresome cooks. I had quite a challenging year with cancer treatments and felt at times so disconnected from cooking and life "before". I would read reviews from other cooks and remember what it felt like to be passionate about cooking. I wondered if I would ever even want to cook again if I got my energy back. A lot of things including a remission diagnosis, have brought gradual change into my life since Christmas. I started cooking again but only when I'm up to it. I look for the extraordinary, the simple and pure, and the tastes that bring me home. I want to thank all those great cooks that share their food adventures.
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