The Best of Cooking Light: Over 500 of Our All-Time Greatest Recipes


Cooking Light Magazine - 2005
    To make the final cut for The Best of Cooking Light, each recipe had to meet one or more of the following criteria: • Earned a high rating in the Cooking Light Test Kitchens • Has a surprising and satisfying “no-way-this-can-be-light” flavor • Named a “reader favorite recipe” based on calls, letters, e-mails, and comments on cookinglight.com • Voted “most popular” among the Cooking Light Foods staff—these are the recipes they cook for their families and friends You’re guaranteed success with every recipe! Each recipe has been tested at least twice, often three or four times, in the Cooking Light Test Kitchens to ensure that not only are they supremely healthy, tasty, and easy to prepare, but that they also have the all-important “yum factor.”  “Our Test Kitchens’ staff does the hard work every day so the rest of us can take Cooking Light accuracy for granted.” Mary Kay Culpepper Editor, Cooking Light  Over 250 color photographs make this all-star collection come alive. A virtual feast for the eyes, this book is as beautiful to read and display, as it is practical to use. Look for serving suggestions and artful food presentations throughout to show you how to turn an ordinary dish into an extraordinary meal. This healthy cookbook is for all cooks and for all occasions. While some recipes take very little time, others require a bit more commitment. Eitherway, you’ll have your choice of great food that adjusts to your schedule, your grocery list, and your mood. Plus, • Step-by-step instructions and complete nutritional analysis with each recipe • Preparation and make-ahead tips • Menu suggestions• Ingredient substitutions and purchasing information Whatever your definition of “best” is, there are recipes here for you. Just step into your kitchen and make them your own.

Appetites: A Cookbook


Anthony Bourdain - 2016
    And for many years, first as a chef, later as a world-traveling chronicler of food and culture on his CNN series Parts Unknown, he has made a profession of understanding the appetites of others. These days, however, if he’s cooking, it’s for family and friends.Appetites, his first cookbook in more than ten years, boils down forty-plus years of professional cooking and globe-trotting to a tight repertoire of personal favorites—dishes that everyone should (at least in Mr. Bourdain’s opinion) know how to cook. Once the supposed "bad boy" of cooking, Mr. Bourdain has, in recent years, become the father of a little girl—a role he has embraced with enthusiasm. After years of traveling more than 200 days a year, he now enjoys entertaining at home. Years of prep lists and the hyper-organization necessary for a restaurant kitchen, however, have caused him, in his words, to have "morphed into a psychotic, anally retentive, bad-tempered Ina Garten."The result is a home-cooking, home-entertaining cookbook like no other, with personal favorites from his own kitchen and from his travels, translated into an effective battle plan that will help you terrify your guests with your breathtaking efficiency.

Chocolate from the Cake Mix Doctor


Anne Byrn - 2001
    It's a marriage made in baker's heaven-150 all-new, all-easy recipes for cakes, starring the ingredient that surpasses all other flavors, including vanilla, by a 3-to-1 margin, and that Americans consume to the tune of 2.8 billion pounds a year. Starting with versatile supermarket cake mixes and adding just the right extras-including melted semisweet chocolate bars, chocolate chips, or cocoa powder, plus fresh eggs or a bit of buttermilk, dried coconut, mashed bananas, or instant coffee powder-a baker at any level of experience can turn out dark, rich, moist, delicious chocolate layer cakes, time and again. Not to mention sheet cakes, pound cakes, cupcakes and muffins, cheesecakes, cookies, brownies, and bars. Rounding out the book are 38 all-new homemade frostings and fillings, and a full-color insert showing every cake in the book.

Momofuku


David Chang - 2009
    A once-unrecognizable word, it's now synonymous with the award-winning restaurants of the same name in New York City: Momofuku Noodle Bar, Ssäm Bar, Ko, and Milk Bar. Chef David Chang has single-handedly revolutionized cooking in America with his use of bold Asian flavors and impeccable ingredients, his mastery of the humble ramen noodle, and his thorough devotion to pork.  Momofuku is both the story and the recipes behind the cuisine that has changed the modern-day culinary landscape. Chang relays with candor the tale of his unwitting rise to superstardom, which, though wracked with mishaps, happened at light speed. And the dishes shared in this book are coveted by all who've dined—or yearned to—at any Momofuku location (yes, the pork buns are here). This is a must-read for anyone who truly enjoys food.

Weber's Big Book of Grilling


Jamie Purviance - 2001
    Includes 350 tasty and reliable recipes guaranteed to turn anyone into a barbecue champion. 133 color photos.

Simple French Food


Richard Olney - 1974
    It is a classic of honest French cooking and good writing. Buy it, read it, eat it." --Lydie Marshall"I need this new edition badly because Simple French Food is the most dog-eared, falling-apart book in my library. Here it is newly bound to enrich one's life." --Kermit Lynch, author of Adventures on the Wine Route"Simple French Food has the most marvelous French food to appear in print since Elisabeth David's French Provincial Cooking.... The book's greatest virtue is that the author...really teaches you to cook French in a way I've never seen before. Here you acquire the methods, the tour de main, the tricks that are the heart and essence of French food, unforgettable once acquired in this book because of their logical, well-explained presentation." --Nika Hazelton, The New York Times"I am unable to find an ad equate adjective to express my enthusiasm.... I find Simple French Food marvelous. I have never read a book on French cuisine that has so excited and absorbed me." --Simone Beck

Relaxed Cooking with Curtis Stone: Recipes to Put You in My Favorite Mood


Curtis Stone - 2009
    . . But I know that for a lot of people, putting together a meal, especially for guests, is the opposite of relaxing . . . I'm here to tell you: It doesn't have to be that way."--from the IntroductionAussie Curtis Stone, host of TLC's Take Home Chef, is best known for his laid-back approach to cooking. Though he's worked as head chef in several Michelin-starred London restaurants, some of his most memorable meals are the ones he's shared with friends at home. Now, Curtis shows you how to have as much fun in the kitchen as your guests are sure to have over a comfortable, unforgettable meal.In Relaxed Cooking with Curtis Stone, you'll find everything from "First Thing in the Morning" bites and "Brunches to Blow Their Minds" to "Weekend Lunches" and "Something to Eat on the Sofa." With the home cook in mind, Curtis avoids off-putting culinary lingo and hard-to-find ingredients. Instead, he picks what's in season and just around the corner. This down-to-earth approach results in wonderfully interesting and flavorful taste combinations that are perfect for parties or just hanging out with a close friend or loved ones.Recipes include:- Caramelized Nectarines with Yogurt and Honey- Crispy Tortilla with Ham, Chile, Spinach, and Fried Eggs- Heirloom Tomato and Burrata Salad with Pepper-Crusted New York Steak- Pan-Fried Calamari with Roasted Asparagus Salad- Homemade Salted Caramel Popcorn- Baby Baked Potatoes with Sour Cream and Chives- Sticky Chicken Drumsticks- Red Curry with Lobster and Pineapple- Veal Cutlet Coated in an Aged Jack Cheese Crust- Slowly Cooked Brisket with a BBQ Bourbon Sauce- Creamy Mascarpone and Parsley Polenta- Brownie CupcakesThese delicious recipes and Curtis's infectiously easygoing attitude are all it takes to end your entertaining stress and get you and your guests into a relaxing mood.

Every Day's a Party: Louisiana Recipes For Celebrating With Family And Friends


Emeril Lagasse - 1999
    In the fun and colorful style that Emeril brings to his Food Network television show Emeril Live and to all his cookbooks, Every Day's a Party is filled with over 125 recipes and Emeril's signature "kick-it-up-a-notch" way of making every occasion an over-the-top celebration.You've never had this much fun on President's Day.

How to Bake: Complete Guide to Perfect Cakes, Cookies, Pies, Tarts, Breads, Pizzas, Muffins,


Nick Malgieri - 1995
    In a single, illustrated volume, Nick Malgieri, one of America's preeminent bakers and baking teachers, leads cooks through the simple art of creating an international assortment of delicious sweet and savory baked goods. Here are the best recipes for breads, including such quick ones as Buttermilk Corn Bread, Irish Soda Bread, Classic Southern Biscuits, and Currant Tea Scones, as well as such delicious yeast-risen breads as Italian Bread Rings, Swiss Rye Bread, Challah, and English Muffins. Malgieri also offers recipes for savory treats like Old-Fashioned Chicken Pie, Pepper and Onion Frittata Tart, Cheese Quiche, and Rosemary Focaccia; and for sweet pastries ranging from puff pastries--Apple Turnovers, Banana Feuilletés with Caramel Sauce, Brioches, Strawberry Savarin, and Croissants--to pies and tarts, cobblers, and cookies of every stripe--drop, bar, rolled, and filled; brownies, macaroons, and rugelach. Cakes, too, are here, from layered to rolled, from angel to devil's food.The recipes in How to Bake are clear and methodical. Master recipes explain all the steps to making a classic dish. They are frequently followed by creative variations so that the baker's palate and skills will always be accommodated and challenged. Start out with a simple spice cake, for example, and transform it, under Malgieri's reassuring guidance, into a lavishly decorated celebration cake.In addition to an exhaustive and tempting selection of recipes, Malgieri offers clear, detailed instructions, interweaving techniques and helpful sidebars: how to make a pastry bag out of parchment paper; what baking pans to buy; mastering pie and cake toppings; learning to decorate a cake so it looks as if it came from the bakery; and scores of other helpful tips. All this is punctuated with precise explanatory illustrations and thirty-two pages of luscious color photographs to inspire and guide the baker. How to Bake is a one-volume "bible" for bakers.

Lidia's Family Table


Lidia Matticchio Bastianich - 2004
    The emphasis here is on cooking for the family, and her book is filled with unusually delicious basic recipes for everyday eating Italian-style, as well as imaginative ideas for variations and improvisations.Here are more than 200 fabulous new dishes that will appeal both to Lidia’s loyal following, who have come to rely on her wonderfully detailed recipes, and to the more adventurous cook ready to experiment. • She welcomes us to the table with tasty bites from the sea (including home-cured tuna and mackerel), seasonal salads, and vegetable surprises (Egg-Battered Zucchini Roll-Ups, Sweet Onion Gratinate). • She reveals the secret of simple make-ahead soup bases, delicious on their own and easy to embellish for a scrumptious soup that can make a meal. • She opens up the wonderful world of pasta, playing with different shapes, mixing and matching, and creating sauces while the pasta boils; she teaches us to make fresh egg pastas, experimenting with healthful ingredients–whole wheat, chestnut, buckwheat, and barley. And she makes us understand the subtle arts of polenta- and risotto-making as never before. • She shares her love of vegetables, skillet-cooking some to intensify their flavor, layering some with yesterday’s bread for a lasagna-like gratin, blanketing a scallop of meat with sautéed vegetables, and finishing seasonal greens with the perfect little sauce.• She introduces us to some lesser-known cuts of meats for main courses (shoulders, butts, and tongue) and underused, delicious fish (skate and monkfish), as well as to her family’s favorite recipes for chicken and a beautiful balsamic-glazed roast turkey.• And she explores with us the many ways fruits and crusts (pie, strudel, cake, and toasted bread) marry and produce delectable homey desserts to end the meal.Lidia’s warm presence is felt on every page of this book, explaining the whys and wherefores of what she is doing, and the brilliant photographs take us right into her home, showing her rolling out pasta with her grandchildren, bringing in the summer harvest, and sitting around the food-laden family table. As she makes every meal a celebration, she invites us to do the same, giving us confidence and joy in the act of cooking.

Roasting-A Simple Art


Barbara Kafka - 1995
     When you're in a rush, roast. When you're in doubt, roast. When you're entertaining, roast. Crank up the oven and throw in a chicken; roasting is simply the easiest and best way to concentrate and deepen flavor, to seal in succulence, and make robust, crusty, and sweet all kinds of meats, birds, fish, fruits, and vegetables. Roasting offers more flavor on its own than any other cooking technique. Everything you need for a lifetime of happy roasting can be found here in the pages of Barbara Kafka's ground-breaking new book. Even baby goat, a suckling pig, and loin of buffalo make it into this bible of roasting.Roasting is absolutely essential, whether you're planning to roast a potato or leg of lamb, a turkey or a tomato, a pepper or a red snapper. Barbara's fussless high-temperature method caramelizes the surface of meat, the skin of birds or fish, or the outside of vegetables, transforming them into such savory sweet dishes as Roast Chicken with Pomegranate Glaze and Fresh Mint, aromatic Garlic Roast Pork Loin, moist and sweet Roasted Striped Bass with Fennel, and Whole Roasted Peaches with Ginger Syrup.Nearly one hundred stellar recipes for roasted vegetables attest to the fact that Barbara Kafka's new book is not for meat eaters alone. The recipes for roasted vegetables begin where other books leave off. Try the Roasted Sliced Fennel Bulb and the Roasted Chinese Eggplant with Balsamic Marinade, the Roasted Portobello Mushrooms with Garlic Marinade, and more.Roasting is packed with indispensable tips, techniques, and innovative cooking ideas. There are great recipes for marinades, salsas, vinaigrettes, and stuffings. You'll also find an inspiring assortment of simple but original recipes for sauces that will lift your everyday roasts into perfect party fare. You'll discover, too, the many joys of "companion roasting," learning when to add the carrots or the onions so they don't over- or undercook, and guaranteeing everything comes out at the same time.Never a believer in unnecessary work, Barbara Kafka is a cook's best friend. Barbara never follows; she blazes new trails, challenging the sacred rules of roasting by never trussing a chicken or basting a turkey. She proves you can actually walk away from your oven and enjoy your food and your guests. It's all so quick and easy, most dishes don't need to go into the oven until your guests walk in the door.Often the best part of the roast is the leftovers, and Roasting is overflowing with possibilities. In Barbara's knowing hands leftover onions become a smoky-flavored Roasted Onion Soup with Cannellini Beans; last night's roasted cod and boiled potatoes are transformed into a scrumptious Best Cod Hash; a deeply flavored Roast Duck Pasta Sauce is a rich reward to the cook for having made last night's duck dinner. Nearly one hundred recipes for leftovers show you how to build them into new meals of soups, salads, pasta sauces, hashes, fritters, fish cakes, and more.Replete with all the tables, timing charts, and the encyclopedic wisdom that are hallmarks of every Barbara Kafka book, Roasting: A Simple Art is a dream of a cookbook, one that will soon bear the soils, stains, and well-worn pages of constant and creative use.

Flour Water Salt Yeast: The Fundamentals of Artisan Bread and Pizza


Ken Forkish - 2012
    For Portland-based baker Ken Forkish, well-made bread is more than just a pleasure—it is a passion that has led him to create some of the best and most critically lauded breads and pizzas in the country. In Flour Water Salt Yeast, Forkish translates his obsessively honed craft into scores of recipes for rustic boules and Neapolitan-style pizzas, all suited for the home baker. Forkish developed and tested all of the recipes in his home oven, and his impeccable formulas and clear instructions result in top-quality artisan breads and pizzas that stand up against those sold in the best bakeries anywhere. Whether you’re a total beginner or a serious baker, Flour Water Salt Yeast has a recipe that suits your skill level and time constraints: Start with a straight dough and have fresh bread ready by supper time, or explore pre-ferments with a bread that uses biga or poolish. If you’re ready to take your baking to the next level, follow Forkish’s step-by-step guide to making a levain starter with only flour and water, and be amazed by the delicious complexity of your naturally leavened bread. Pizza lovers can experiment with a variety of doughs and sauces to create the perfect pie using either a pizza stone or a cast-iron skillet. Flour Water Salt Yeast is more than just a collection of recipes for amazing bread and pizza—it offers a complete baking education, with a thorough yet accessible explanation of the tools and techniques that set artisan bread apart. Featuring a tutorial on baker’s percentages, advice for manipulating ingredients ratios to create custom doughs, tips for adapting bread baking schedules to fit your day-to-day life, and an entire chapter that demystifies the levain-making process, Flour Water Salt Yeast is an indispensable resource for bakers who want to make their daily bread exceptional bread.

Wahaca - Mexican Food at Home


Thomasina Miers - 2012
    Inspired by the flavours of Mexico but using ingredients easily found in Britain, Wahaca - Mexican Food at Home is all about cooking authentic Mexican food in your own kitchen. Mexican cooking is fresh, colourful and full of flavour, with breakfasts to get you through the day, hearty dinners, sensational puddings, and zingy cocktails. Follow Tommi on her trip through the markets, cantinas and fiestas of Mexico to discover recipes bursting with flavour you'll want to eat and share.

Betty Crocker Cookbook, 12th Edition: Everything You Need to Know to Cook from Scratch (Betty Crocker's Cookbook)


Betty Crocker - 2011
    Few books have stood the test of time like the Betty Crocker Cookbook; none have kept up as well with the times and how people cook today. Classic meets contemporary in the 12th edition, with 1,500 recipes, all from scratch, over one-third new, and more than 1,000 photos.This one-stop resource bursts with kitchen information and guidance as only Betty Crocker can deliver. Learn to make a lattice crust, master a braise, can pickles, and even debone a fish via hundreds of how-to photos. Discover new ingredients organized by region, such as Middle Eastern or Indian, in vibrant ID photos. New and expanded chapters on one-dish meals, beverages, DIY foods, whole grains, and vegetarian cooking reflect what today’s budding cooks want to eat, as do recipes such as Baba Ganoush, Short Rib Ragu, Pho, Korean Fried Chicken, Cold-Brew Iced Coffee, Cauliflower Steaks, Smoked Beef Brisket, Quinoa Thumbprint Cookies, and Doughnuts. And complete nutrition is included with every recipe.

The Pleasures of Cooking for One


Judith Jones - 2009
    It’s a fulfilling and immensely economical process, one perfectly suited for our times—although, as Jones points out, cooking for one also means we can occasionally indulge ourselves in a favorite treat.Throughout, Jones is both our instructor and our mentor, suggesting basic recipes—such as tomato sauce, preserved lemons, pesto, and homemade stock—that all cooks should have on hand; teaching us how to improvise using an ingenious strategy of building meals through the week; and supplying us with a lifetime’s worth of tips and shortcuts. From Child’s advice for buying fresh meat to Beard’s challenge to beginning crêpe-makers and Lidia Bastianich’s tips for cooking perfectly sauced pasta, Jones’s book presents a wealth of acquired knowledge from our finest cooks.The Pleasures of Cooking for One is a vibrant, wise celebration of food and enjoying our own company from one of our most treasured cooking experts.