This book contains over 100 easy to follow recipes for sandwiches to soups to desserts to entrees. If you've never prepared foods using tofu, you're in for a treat! The recipes are delicious and often familiar (such as banana cream pie, lasagna, and burritos). Christina Clark gives an overview of tofu including the numerous health benefits (no cholesterol, low in calories and sodium, good source of protein and calcium). Each recipe uses common ingredients. The directions are simple and straightforward. Whether you're new to using tofu or an old fan, this book will delight your culinary taste buds!

This is a great cookbook. A friend of mine introduced em to some of the recipes. They are easy and quick to prepare.

For pure fun, it's hard to beat a great book of quotations. Maria Polushkin Robbins doesn't disappoint with this high-class compendium of culinary quotations on everything from strawberries to beer to garlic to roast beef and everything in between. Some of the gems included herein:

"I'm a Christian, but that doesn't mean I'm a long-faced square. I like a little bourbon."
- LILLIAN CARTER

"Strange to see how a good dinner and feasting reconciles everyone."
- SAMUEL PEPYS

"The cook was a good cook, as cooks go; and as cooks go, she went."
- SAKI (H. H. MUNRO)

In addition to these concise bits, there are longer descriptive passages from novels. What a fun stocking stuffer or Easter basket gift for your favorite cook!

This book is exactly what the title says: essential. This has something for beginning to advanced cooks. The first chapter covers definitions. What's the difference between dice and chop? How do you braise? All covered in this book. It also covers how to plan menus and shop, what the well-stocked kitchen needs, how to store foods. It covers food additives and nutrition as well. But the most useful chapter, I think, is the one that's called "How much of What." How many egg whites or graham crackers make one cup? How large a roast do you need? It goes by weight, volume, and serving size. This book is very helpful.

I have owned many baking books including Baking with Julia. I have long admired the author Carole Clements, and I own one of her French cookbook. I have very good experience with her receipe. My friends like all the dishes I made from Ms. Clement's cookbook. This is a small dimension book but full of many wonderful receipes including breads, muffins, tarts..... If you look for a receipe book, this is a good one. The photos are just tempting for you to give it a try. But if you don't know that much about baking, it is still good to own this book because it contains 3-5 photos of important steps each receipe. The only sorry I have for this book is that it repeats some receipes of my former cookbooks. I think I just have too many baking (dessert) cookbooks.

The Cook's Encyclopedia of Christmas s an excellent fountain of recipes. It covers all kinds of Christmas, including vegetarian. The recipes vary in level of difficulty so anyone can cook Christmas dinner! A lot of the recipes can also be used for other festive or special occasions. This is the best Christmas cookery book I've found yet!

If you are like me, then you always want to cook up some seafood but aren't sure what type to buy or if the shellfish is fresh. This book covers all aspects of fish and Shellfish, from how to clean it to how to eat it. It describes all most every type of fish you can imagine and several ways to cook them up. It is truley and ENCYCLOPEDIA!

I love this cookbook! Each recipe uses ingredients that you can find in the U.S. Each recipe has a color photo and accompanying photos and tips to help you prepare the dish. The book is broken up into sections like "Eggs and Cheese," "Poultry and Game," and "pastries" to name a few. I have made three or four dishes and, even though I'm not well-versed in french cooking, I have gotten rave reviews from my friends and family. My favorite recipe is the "Twice-Baked Souffle" which you can make a day ahead and then bake with the sauce right before you serve. This book is reasonably priced and I'm advising all my friends to purchase it.

The Cook's Garden tells how to grow and use the best-tasting vegetables and herbs. It covers history, best growing methods, timetables for planting, growing and harvesting, how a vegetable should look when picked, and best varieties to plant for over 22 kinds of vegetables. Included are beans, beets, broccoli, cabbages and carrots, corn and cucumbers, leeks, lettuces, melons, onions, peas and peppers, potatoes and tomatoes, squash and various root crops. There is a special section on herbs. What kind of fertilizers? What to do about pests? All are answered in the 214 pages of this easy to read book. Wonderful recipes for your wonderful harvest are included! Thirty-five sellers of seeds are listed.

Even though the publication date is 1993, there are only a few recommendations for new vegetables each year, and many of the best are the tried-and-true from generations ago. so the information is indeed timely.

If you want to grow not just tomatoes, but the best-tasting ones, and different varieties for different uses, and get the most enjoyment for your efforts, this is the book for you!

This is one of the best cookbooks I've ever come across (I have the British version.) Even fairly competent cooks are intimidated by fish. Apart from grilling them with a bit of lemon and parsley, what do you DO with these complex creatures? The first half of the book is a biology lesson - a listing of every fish and shellfish you can think of, a simple description of what it is, where it lives, what it tastes like and the best generalized ways of cooking it. Then there's a second half of recipes. These range from fairly simple to fiendishly but rewardingly time-consuming. I must have tried at least fifteen and all but one (octopus stew) has been absolutely sensational! The green curry, and the Moroccan tagine are real dinner-party conversation stoppers. I wouldn't usually take the time to write an amazon.com review, but I enjoy using this book so much I wanted to tell everyone how good it is.