Amazon.com
It's difficult to imagine a harder first act to follow than The Kite Runner: a debut novel by an unknown writer about a country many readers knew little about that has gone on to have over four million copies in print worldwide. But when preview copies of Khaled Hosseini's second novel, A Thousand Splendid Suns, started circulating at Amazon.com, readers reacted with a unanimous enthusiasm that few of us could remember seeing before. As special as The Kite Runner was, those readers said, A Thousand Splendid Suns is more so, bringing Hosseini's compassionate storytelling and his sense of personal and national tragedy to a tale of two women that is weighted equally with despair and grave hope.
We wanted to spread the word on the book as widely, and as soon, as we could. See below for an exclusive excerpt from A Thousand Splendid Suns and early reviews of the book from some of our top customer reviewers.--The Editors
|
An Exclusive Excerpt from A Thousand Splendid Suns |
We have arranged with the publisher to make an exclusive excerpt of A Thousand Splendid Suns available on Amazon.com. Click here to read a scene from the novel. It's not the opening scene, but rather one from a crucial moment later in the book when Mariam, one of the novel's two main characters, steps into a new role.
|
Early Buzz from Amazon.com Top Reviewers |
We queried our top 100 customer reviewers as of March 6, 2007, and asked them to read A Thousand Splendid Suns and share their thoughts. We've included these early reviews below in the order they were received. For the sake of space, we've only included a brief excerpt of each reviewer's response, but each review is available for reading in its entirety by clicking the "Read the review" link.
Joanna Daneman:
"His style is deceptively simple and clear, the characters drawn deftly and swiftly, his themes elemental and huge. This is a brilliant writer and I look forward to more of his work." Read Joanna Daneman's review
Seth J. Frantzman:
"Khaled Hosseini has done it again with 'A Thousand Splendid Sons', presenting a new, dashing and dark tale of two generations of women trapped in a loveless marriage, bracketed by great events." Read Seth J. Frantzman's review
Donald Mitchell:
"Khaled Hosseini has succeeded in capturing many important historical and contemporary themes in a way that will make your heart ache again and again. Why will your reaction be so strong? It's because you'll identify closely with the suffering of almost all the characters, a reaction that's very rare to a modern novel." Read Donald Mitchell's review
Lawrance M. Bernabo:
"All things considered, following up on a successful first novel is probably harder than coming up with the original effort and Hosseini could have rested on his laurels in the manner of Harper Lee, but as "A Thousand Splendid Suns" amply proves, this native of Kabul has more stories to tell about the land of Afghanistan." Read Lawrance M. Bernabo's review
Amanda Richards:
"There are parts of this book that will have grown men surreptitiously blotting the tears that are on the verge of overflowing their ducts, and by the time you get to the middle, you won't be able to put it down. Hosseini's simple but richly descriptive prose makes for an engrossing read, and in my opinion, "A Thousand Splendid Suns" is among the best I have ever read. This is definitely not one to be missed." Read Amanda Richards's review
N. Durham:
"All that being said, "A Thousand Splendid Suns" is a bit more enjoyable than Hosseini's previous "The Kite Runner", and once again he manages to give we readers another glimpse of a world that we know little about but frequently condemn and discard. However, if you were one of the many that for some reason absolutely loved "The Kite Runner", chances are that you'll love this as well." Read N. Durham's review
John Kwok:
"Khaled Hosseini's "A Thousand Splendid Suns" is a genuine instant literary classic, and one destined to be remembered as one of 2007's best novels. It should be compared favorably to such legendary Russian novels like "War and Peace" and "Doctor Zhivago"." Read John Kwok's review
Thomas Duff:
"Normally I'm more of an action-adventure type reader when it comes to novels and recreational reading. But I was given the chance to read A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini (author of The Kite Runner), so I decided to try something out of my normal genre. I am *so* glad I did. This is a stunning and moving novel of life and love in Afghanistan over a 30 year period." Read Thomas Duff's review
Charles Ashbacher:
"This book manages to simultaneously capture the history of Afghanistan over the last thirty years and how women are treated in conservative Islamic societies.... In many ways it is a sad book, your heart goes out to these two women in their hopeless struggle to have a decent life with a brutal man in an unforgiving, intolerant society." Read Charles Ashbacher's review
W. Boudville:
"Hosseini presents a piognant view into the recent tortured decades of the Afghan experience. From the 1970s, under a king, to the Soviet takeover, to the years of resistance. And then the rise and fall of the Taliban. An American reader will recognise many of the main political events. But to many Americans, Afghanistan and its peoples and religion remain an opaque and troubling mystery." Read W. Boudville's review
Mark Baker:
"I tend to read plot heavy books, so this character study was a definite change of pace for me. I found the first half slow going at times, mainly because I knew where the story was going. Once I got into the second half, things really picked up. The ending was very bittersweet. I couldn't think of a better way to end it." Read Mark Baker's review
Grady Harp:
"Hosseini takes us behind those walls for forty some years of Afghanistan's bloody history and while he does not spare us any of the descriptions of the terror that continues to besiege that country, he does offer us a story that speaks so tenderly about the fragile beauty of love and devotion and lasting impression people make on people." Read Grady Harp's review
Robert P. Beveridge:
"When I was actively reading it, the pages kept turning, and more than once I found myself foregoing food or sleep temporarily to get in just one more chapter. When I had put it down, however, I felt no particular compulsion to pick it back up again. It's a good book, and a relatively well-written one, but it's not a great book. Enjoyable without leaving a lasting impression." Read Robert P. Beveridge's review
B. Marold:
"While the events in Afghanistan and the wider world create a familiar framework for the stories of these two women, it is nothing more than a framework. The warp and weft of everyday life, and the interaction of the two women and their close relatives is the heartbeat of the story." Read B. Marold's review
Daniel Jolley:
"Khaled Hosseini has written a majestic, sweeping, emotionally powerful story that provides the reader with a most telling window into Afghan society over the past thirty-odd years. It's also a moving story of friendship and sacrifice, giving Western readers a rare glimpse into the suffering and mistreatment of Afghan women that began long before the Taliban came to power." Read Daniel Jolley's review
Book Description
After 103 weeks on the New York Times bestseller list and with four million copies of The Kite Runner shipped, Khaled Hosseini returns with a beautiful, riveting, and haunting novel that confirms his place as one of the most important literary writers today.
Propelled by the same superb instinct for storytelling that made The Kite Runner a beloved classic, A Thousand Splendid Suns is at once an incredible chronicle of thirty years of Afghan history and a deeply moving story of family, friendship, faith, and the salvation to be found in love.
Born a generation apart and with very different ideas about love and family, Mariam and Laila are two women brought jarringly together by war, by loss and by fate. As they endure the ever escalating dangers around them-in their home as well as in the streets of Kabul-they come to form a bond that makes them both sisters and mother-daughter to each other, and that will ultimately alter the course not just of their own lives but of the next generation. With heart-wrenching power and suspense, Hosseini shows how a woman's love for her family can move her to shocking and heroic acts of self-sacrifice, and that in the end it is love, or even the memory of love, that is often the key to survival.
A stunning accomplishment, A Thousand Splendid Suns is a haunting, heartbreaking, compelling story of an unforgiving time, an unlikely friendship, and an indestructible love.
Customer Reviews:
A Thousand Splendid Suns.......2007-10-10
This book was excellent; even better than The Kite Runner. What an eye opener to the series of horrific acts that befall women in the middle east.
A vibrant, intense, and emotionally wrenching book.......2007-10-09
"A Thousand Splendid Suns" is a gripping novel that left me with a profound respect for women who struggle and flourish under restrictive regimes and repressive religions. I could almost feel the pain, fear, anger, frustration, hope and courage these women endure each and every day. The author faithfully delivers an emotionally taut epic that will strike a chord with many. I hated and loved this story all at the same time.
Tragic Journey of Love.......2007-10-08
A Thousand Splendid Suns is an absolutely wonderful story about the things that keep us going, even when our world falls apart. You will find yourself pulled into this tragic story, unable to put the book down. This book will touch your heart on a very real level. I can't wait to read it again.
terrific book, but left with some mixed feelings.......2007-10-08
I just finished this audiobook in a straight 10-hour period while I listened to my iPod as I refinished my deck. This book certainly does not leave your emotions untouched and most certainly gets you involved intimately with the characters that Hosseini develops. It is difficult at this point to catalog the full range of emotions that I felt while reading this book. Righteous indignation may be the main emotion I can recall from most of the pages. How much I, as a man, wanted to swoop in and solve away all of their problems with my western life of abundance. On examining this particular desire, perhaps the true message of this book comes out. It is written completely and totally in a worldview that is very different from us Western readers. The themes of survival, fate, endurance, are not ones that come to the fore in our minds. Concepts so important to us in this part of the world such as ambition, achievement, and discovery of dreams keep a place in the forefront of our minds.
This is particularly pointed in my mind, since I had just visited DisneyWorld days before reading this book. Their theme is that every girl wants to be a princess and at one point they had the audience chant that "Dreams come true" and remarked how every boy wants to be a pirate and every girl a princess. The interesting thing is what our dreams are. They are not the dream shared by the characters in the novel of independence, a motherhood, and freedom from fear. This disney dream is the idea that we will be exalted above our peers, that our extreme abundance will be greater than the extreme abundance of those around us. That our difference, our individuality will give us significance, only possible at the expense of others.
This is perhaps why the novel hit me as such an unfamiliar, foreign thing. I was depressed by how everything seemed to go bad for the characters on how there was not a hero -- not a constant juxtaposition of good and bad, of hope and disappointment, that is such a similar genre or phrase used in our modern stories. Eventually as the story waged on, it seemed that surely the scars created in the characters must be too deep, too unrecoverable for there to be a happy, Disney style ending. So at some point in reading this book I became very frustrated with the seeming desolateness of the emotional landscape, the lack of a knight in shining armor that I wanted to project myself in to the story.
In the end, however, I found that redemption was there. When Lila thought of Miriam as a young girl and I thought of the hopes and dreams of a young girl and how tragically shattered they were, this touched deep inside me and created a desire to be a father who nurtured and protected the sanctity of his child's dreams. Not dreams to be a princess, but dreams to be a mother themselves dreams to be free from fear and dreams to hope and a future. I closed the book resolute to make these dreams a reality for all daughters.
Strong but disturbing.......2007-10-07
After The Kite Runner, I looked forward to Hosseini's next book. From a literary standpoint, A Thousand Splendid Suns certainly did not disappoint. He weaved personal stories into the social and historic framework of Afghanistan, and the result was wonderful. This is a very sad book, though. Also, while the character of Mariam was strong and endearing, I couldn't feel quite as strongly about Laila.
Product Description
"Likely the most spectacular book about comics ever" (LA TIMES) "....the finest." (TIME). The first edition of this book sold out in the first three months and is now out of print. The improved second printing is available NOW. Celebrate the 100th birthday of Winsor McCay's masterpiece with this FULL ORIGNAL SIZE, 120-page hardbound volume. It features Nemo's best from 1905-1910, all printed in the actual newspaper-page size, 16 x 21 inches.It was the greatest comic strip of its day, perhaps the greatest of all time, acclaimed the world over for its artistic majesty, unbounded imagination, and ground-breaking techniques that helped define a new art form. But since its debut 100 years ago, it has been all but impossible to view these masterpieces in their original size and colors.LITTLE NEMO IN SLUMBERLANDcan now be seen as creator Winsor McCay intended; 110 digitally-restored, full-size prints presented in incredible detail displaying the superb draftsmanship and unique comic style of the prolific McCay. This magnificent volume has become the most highly praised book of its kind. From a testimonial by writer and artist ART SPIEGELMAN: ". . . this heartbreakingly beautiful book is the reinvention of Winsor McCay - as if he was being published for the first time. Only better. " Famed graphic novelist CHRIS WARE calls "Splendid Sundays" "A wonderful thing. . . it's 'the book of the year.'" Writer NEIL GAIMAN says, "It is every bit as gorgeous as inspiring and as necessary as I had hoped." And from "Simpsons" creator MATT GROENING, "It's just amazing!"
Customer Reviews:
A stunning book.......2007-04-17
Let's be honest: this book's not cheap. Is it worth the price tag? Without question or hesitation: yes. If you're even contemplating buying this book, I probably don't have to tell you how great the Little Nemo strip was. What you'll want to know is that this book will make you feel like you've never really seen Little Nemo until now. It is a magnificent, absolutely stunning book.
First of all, this book is huge. McCay's work is reproduced at its original size, which reveals his superb draftsmanship in all its glory. If you remember Little Nemo as lovely but kind of cramped, you're not going to believe how open and expansive the strips look here.
Secondly, the color reproduction is superb. I'll take the editor's word that a great deal of effort was expended to match McCay's original coloring directions. What I will say is that the colors here are vibrant without being garish. It's really unbelievable that such sophisticated color work comes from a strip that's a hundred years old. I don't think most newspapers today could pull this off.
You really have to see the book to appreciate how incredible it is. This really sets a standard against which the other collections I've seen fall far short. If you can swing the price, you won't be sorry. You might, however, have a hard time finding a place to store it!
An Extraordinary Work Of Art.......2007-03-26
This is a wonderful book - any digital animator should start here. Some of the frames look like storyboards for the Lord of the Rings films. It is amazing that a work of art of this quality appeared in a popular newspaper - and reproducing it now, at full scale, was a true labor of love. Winsor McKay was a fantastic artist.
I would rate it 6 stars if I could.......2007-02-16
This is the most beautiful book I have ever seen. Having purchased the complete Little Nemo book series in the 1980's I really looked forward to finally being able to see this lovely comic in its original format. When the book arrived today I realised that it was even better than I had hoped for, extremely high quality and of impressive size.
The only drawback is that it does only contain a selection of the story, but I can always read the missing pages in the cheaper old edition. A big applaud for the publisher who dared produce this wonderfull piece of art.
Great Price-TERRIBLE PACKING!.......2007-02-07
This is a large and delicate book, in spite of this, Amazon does it's usual awful packing and it arrives damaged after a two month wait. Amazon packing for small items, (books, cds etc) is quite adequate. For large items, be it a $3000 laptop or a collectors item like this, the packing is this: An oversized & flimsy box, barely taped together, with the item plopped in the bottom and a few bubble packs tossed on top. It always arrives crushed and half open, and your laptop or whatever is simply slammed around in it. Great price for this book, but after the long wait and the damage, I should have bought it from a private seller.
Little Nemo. So may splendid Sundays.......2007-01-17
Beautiful book.A splendid example of the quality of book production possible to-day. As for Little Nemo, one does not need to be a New Yorker- or even an American-to appreciate the artistry involved.
Chris Hunt, Alnwick, UK
Book Description
No country inspires as much fascination as Italy, and no region in Italy inspires as much adoration as Tuscanyâfor its interior design, art and architecture, fashion, artisans and crafts, food and wine. In Dreaming of Tuscany you'll experience the essence of a place that dreams are made of, ensuring you'll get the most out of your experience. Sharing her recommendations of favorite insider places and word-of-mouth gems, best-selling lifestyle author Barbara Milo Ohrbach acts as a guide to food markets, exquisite shops, overflowing antiques markets, not to mention cooking courses, outdoor painting classes, ancient palazzos and small museums. And you can live like a Tuscan once you return home, with this book providing sources for everything from luscious bed linens to peppery olive oil. Dreaming of Tuscany is illustrated with three hundred sumptuous images by photographer Simon Upton. Don't dream of visiting Tuscany without first reading this book.
Customer Reviews:
Dreaming of Tuscany.......2007-06-07
As a frequent traveler to Tuscany, I find this book one of the best. It reflects the romantic and unique part of the world known as Tuscany. Wonderful coffee table book, resource for Tuscany and reading for rainy days.
Dreaming of Tuscany.......2007-01-15
Since my daughter and I are going to be in Tuscany in the spring, I found the book to be a great resource for the area. I'm looking forward to seeing things firsthand...but so glad that Ms. Ohrbach has done the groundwork for us...a much more efficient use of our limited time there!
Amazon.com
Everyone loves soup, the world's most versatile dish. James Peterson's Splendid Soups, first published in 1993 and now updated, celebrates that fact with stunning comprehensiveness. Offering almost 300 tantalizing recipes ranging from the most pristine consommés to the heartiest peasant stews, the book also provides extensive technical information, tips, and serving suggestions that make it a true soup tutorial. The book's "ultimate goal," says Peterson, "is to give the reader the tools with which to invent," an aim he realizes with clarity, warmth, and precision. It's hard to imagine a cook who wouldn't embrace this authoritative yet companionable work.
The recipe range is vast. In 10 chapters that cover all the soup bases, including yogurt, bread, and fruit mixtures, Peterson offers an encyclopedic dish array. Among the entries new to this edition are Roast Garlic and Acorn Squash Soup, Thai-Style Hot and Sour Blue Crab Soup, and Dried Fruit Soup, a traditional Swedish specialty. Especially noteworthy is Peterson's introductory section on ethnic soups; a section offering strategies for reducing a soup's fat content (don't let meat broths boil, which homogenizes fat and liquid); and advice on what to drink with soup. With 40 color photos taken by the author, an equipment guide, and a useful chart for soup improvisation, the book is better than ever and a must-have for any kitchen library. --Arthur Boehm
Book Description
Praise for the fully revised and updated Splendid Soups
"Jim Peterson's Splendid Soups is a comprehensive and mouthwatering atlas of the world of soup. It not only covers soups of all nationalities and every garnish, but provides a handy list of sources for every hard-to-find ingredient and kitchen tool, too. More importantly though, through his gargantuan world tour Jim empowers home cooks to strike out on their own and invent new soups. It just makes me want to get into the kitchen and start cooking!" -SARA MOULTON Host, The Food Network's Cooking Live; Executive Chef, Gourmet magazine; Food Editor, Good Morning America
"We love James Peterson. Splendid Soups is a bountiful source of enticing ideas!"-the moosewood collective Authors of the Moosewood Restaurant Cookbooks
Customer Reviews:
Learn to Make Stocks.......2006-08-18
The most useful thing about this book is that it teaches you how to make a good stock. I can't tell you how much it has made a difference in my cooking. I do like the recipes in the book, but more often his techniques are being applied to other recipes vastly improved by my new ability to make a good stock. Once you get into the habit of making stock, you will be horrified at the thought of throwing away bones! Use them to make stock now, or freeze them and make stock later. The recipes are loose, but if you read the opening chapters you will not need absolute precision because you will know what you are doing!
Good compilation of recipies, but poor quality of each recipe.........2006-03-11
First of all I have to say that I am spanish and I am not writing in my mother tongue. So I have to apologise in advance for my poor English skills.
When I read a review I like to know who write it in order to guess what he expected to find in the book and what sort of judgment he is going to give us.
I am an Spanish Food Engineer. I am not a professional chef but, I dare say, I am an advanced amateur cook.
I read the cookbooks form cover to cover at least twice. I underlain it and even it compare the recipies with other books.
I dont want a compilation of recipies that I left in my shelves for checking a recipe from time to time.
What I expected to find in this book was:
1-A classification of soups.
2-A correct description of the techniques for cooking the soups.
3-A collection of really splendid soups. I dont mind how many recipies the book has, but I mind the quality of each recipe.
I want a perfect recipe for each soup. Whether I like or not the soup, once I have cooked it, it depends on my personal taste.
So with this in mind, here is my review.
1-The book is organized by ingredientes (meat soups, fish soups, vegetable soups..). It makes easier to find a recipe if you have some ingredientes in the refrigerator and you wants to know what to do with them. But it should be arranged by technique as the book "Professional Chef" (CIA) does (consommes, hearty broths, cream soups, puree soups and bisques).You cant remember all the recipies but you can remember the techniques. This is the most didactic way of organize the book if you want to read it from cover to cover.
2-The general description of the techniques are omitted. The author goes straight to the description of the preparation of each recipe. What it is good if you want a compilation of recipies, but it isnt very useful if you really want to learn how to cook soups at your will.
By the other hand, the description of the preparation of the recipies are detailed and correct. Neither it is "over-detailed" nor ambiguous.
3-At first sight, the number of recipies seems to be huge. But once you have read some chapters you will realise that some recipies are almost the same. Organizing the book by ingredients its easy to repeat recipes because you only need to change an ingredient.For example, "Miso Soup" and "Miso soup with egg plant", the first one appears in the chapter of broths and the second one appears in the chapter of vegetables. But both are the same .Another example "Puree of Artichoke", "Puree of Asparagus", "Puree of Cauliflower"...etc.
The number of recipies has been falsely increased
4-I cant say the recipies doesnt works, but I cant say the recipies are excellent.In some cases I am sure the recipe is wrong. As I said I am spanish, and I cant assure that Gazpacho doesnt contain neither chicken broth nor lime. I understand the author wants to transform/interpret some exotic/ethnic soups. But the changes should not become the dish into another thing. Another example is the Bisque. He uses vegetable puree to thick the soup. By definition a Bisque is a soup that only contains crustaceans and the vegetables are only use for give a subtle taste and it should not distort the crustacean taste.
I wouldnt say that from the 400 soups all of them are "splendid". On the contrary, only few ones are good (but not excellent). He should be more concentrated on the quality rather than in the quantity.
5-There are few photographs (8 pages). The "soups" showed by these photos has got so many solids and so few liquid that you would need a fork and a knife for eating it. So it isnt soups, because you dont use a spoon for eating it.
6-The style of writing is a bit arrogant. I agree with other review. He uses a lot the word "I". I think he is too worry about demostrating that he has cooked each soup, because he repeat many times "Each time I cook it..." "I like to eat it.." "I cant image a summer without it.." and so on.
I dont think he has cooked all the recipies, or at least, I dont think he cook the soups with frequency he try to show.
The book contains 400 recipies, really do you think that he eats so often all them during the 365 days of the year?.
On the other hand, he is too precise with very tiny details (add the parsley just 1 minute before serving, for example) but he is too loose with other matters.
Does he pretend to be exquisite? an epicurean?
7-This book has got some good points. The chapter of ethnic soups is excellent. He describes some ethnic and exotic ingredients and also incorporate soups from Thailand, Vietnam, Korea, Japan, China, India Morocco, Mexico etc...
After reading the book you will be able to prepare a soup freely just watching what you have got in the refrigerator.
All in all, I doesnt believe its a masterpiece as other reviewers does. The recipies arent totaly perfect and if you are purist the book will disappoint you.
But if you arent a purist, if you doesnt look for the perfect soup, and if you only want to find a recipe and cook it from time to time, this is your book.
Best Soup Cookbook Ever.......2006-02-18
Every recipe was easy to follow and came with set-by-step instructions. All of my favorite soups are from the Splendid Soup cookbook. Everytime I make a soup from this cookbook (which is once a week) I get a thumbs up from my family, especially from the hard to please little ones!!!
A fantastic book, but not for beginners.......2002-10-12
I am a self-described soup addict. I make soups at least once a week year round, even when the weather in my hometown is well above 100 degrees! This book is an excellent book, great for someone who has spent a lot of time making soups and is willing to put the time and effort into getting the ingredients, and doing the chopping and cooking that is required. It has nearly every soup imaginable in it and is great for coming up with great ideas for your own new recipes. However, the reason I can't give it 5 stars is that, as others have mentioned before, it does not go into intimate detail in the instructions, it includes some hard-to-find or largely unfamiliar ingredients, and some of the recipes are difficult. If you are a beginner, you should probably stay away from this book. If you are soup obsessed like me, this book is well worth buying and will become an invaluable source of information for you.
great book.......2001-12-01
great book. i tend to use it as a base for creating soups (e.g., a turkey soup that was based on 3 different veggy soup recipes). i've bought a copy for a buddy and for my brother-in-law and they both love the book (for some reason, men in my family do the cooking!!)
Average customer rating:
- A "Splendid" Read...
- It was OK but there are better...
- Loved it
- By far my most favorite Julia Quinn book!
- SPLENDID!
|
Splendid
Julia Quinn
Manufacturer: Avon
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Mass Market Paperback
 Quinn, Julia | ( Q ) | Authors, A-Z | Romance | Subjects | Books
General | Romance | Subjects | Books
Regency | Historical | Romance | Subjects | Books
General | Historical | Romance | Subjects | Books
Authors, A-Z | Romance | 4-for-3 Books Store | Stores | Books | ( A ) | ( B ) | ( C ) | ( D ) | ( E ) | ( F ) | ( G ) | ( H ) | ( J ) | ( K ) | ( L ) | ( M ) | ( N ) | ( P ) | ( R ) | ( S ) | ( T ) | ( W )
General | Romance | 4-for-3 Books Store | Stores | Books
General | Historical | Romance | 4-for-3 Books Store | Stores | Books
Regency | Historical | Romance | 4-for-3 Books Store | Stores | Books
All 4-for-3 Deals | 4-for-3 Books Store | Stores | Books
Similar Items:
-
Minx
-
Dancing at Midnight
-
Brighter Than the Sun (An Avon Romantic Treasure)
-
To Catch an Heiress
-
Everything and the Moon
ASIN: 0380780747 |
Book Description
Based on the phenomenal growth of Quinn's popularity, and her four–week stint on the New York Times bestseller list with Romancing Mr Bridgerton, it's the perfect time to revisit Ms Quinn's 'splendid' storytelling.
American heiress Emma Dunster has always been fun–loving and independent with no wish to settle into marriage. She plans to enjoy her Season in London in more unconventional ways than husband–hunting. But this time Emma's high–jinks lead her into dangerous temptation...
Alexander Ridgely, the Duke of Ashbourne, is a notorious rake who carefully avoids the risk of love...until he plants one reckless kiss on the sensuous lips of this high–spirited innocent...and condemns himself to delicious torment. Little does he know that his passion has touched the very soul of the lovely enchantress...and committed them both to a lifetime of splendid ecstasy.
Download Description
American heiress Emma Dunster has always been fun-loving and independent with no wish to settle into marriage. She plans to enjoy her Season in London in more conventional ways than husband-hunting. But this time Emma's high-jinks lead her into dangerous temptation...
Alexander Ridgely, the Duke of Ashbourne, is a notorious rake who carefully avoids the risk of love...until he plants one reckless kiss on the sensuous lips of this high-spirited innocent...and condemns himself to delicious torment. Little does he know that his passion has touched the very soul of the lovely enchantress...and committed them both to a lifetime of splendid ecstasy.
Customer Reviews:
A "Splendid" Read..........2007-09-29
This was the beginning for me into the world of Julia Quinn. I'm glad I found this book and the many pages of enjoyment it held! :-)
It was OK but there are better..........2007-05-07
I love this author but this book was just OK for me. It was somewhat entertaing, but for the most part it was predictable and the characters are unbelievable. And I really didn't find it very romantic. The characters really didn't show their tender side to each other very much, yet you were suppossed to believe they were madly in love. It just didn't ring true. The only reason I didn't give it 2 stars is b/c I've read the author's other books and she gets much better. From what I understand, this was one of her first books. Her later writing are much better. But I don't recommend this book unless you have absoultley nothing else to read and you need to kill some time.
Loved it.......2007-03-28
I loved this story. She is a hard headed red head and he is a hot "I don't want to get married" Englishman. Julia Quinn is a great writer and I love this book.
By far my most favorite Julia Quinn book!.......2007-01-30
This was an absolutely fabulous read. It was witty, romantic and unbelievably funny. Ms. Emma Dunster, a plucky and spirited American heiress, is sent to England to enjoy the London season with her cousins where she meets the much sought after, "I will never marry" Alexander Ridgely, the Duke of Ashbourne. Emma is determined that she will never marry an Englishman but her resolve begins to waver as she gradually loses her heart to Alex.
Alex, on the other hand, is busy fighting his attraction to the beautiful Emma. However, he can't seem to stay away from her, constantly pursuing her and rescuing her from trouble. It's a definite match made in heaven.
I finished this book in one night. I couldn't put it down. Ms Quinn's wonderful prose and gift in weaving such a magnificent story is simply splendid.
SPLENDID!.......2007-01-04
I have only one word to describe this book: Splendid!
As always Julia delivers. I will read every single book she writes because she is the best writer. She gives her readers exactly what they want: romance, wit, and intrique and suspence. I absolutely love her characters and the way she will keep them with us by bringing them back again and again in other books. It's like revisiting old friends.
This book was one of her best. I couldn't put it down. Again... Splendid!
Book Description
The first and only comprehensive guide designed especially for donors and families who are starting family foundations is now available from the National Center for Family Philanthropy. Splendid Legacy: The Guide to Creating Your Family Foundation helps donors, families, and their advisors create a detailed blueprint for their family foundations to fulfill their hopes and goals.
If you have recently started a family foundation, are seriously considering starting one, or are seeking to renew the mission, programming, and administration of your family foundation, Splendid Legacy is for you.
Splendid Legacy is the only resource guide that…
Is designed specifically to meet the needs of the founders of family foundations.
Addresses the full range of considerations in starting a family foundation, including values, mission, hopes for family involvement, governance, legal issues, ethics, funding the foundation, grantmaking, communications, investments, and management.
Offers dozens of stories and vignettes from the experiences of family foundations to illustrate how family considerations affect key decisions.
Splendid Legacy helps you translate the passions values, and dreams for your philanthropy and your family's participation into a comprehensive and practical action plan for setting up the foundation. The combination of the personal and practical makes this guidebook most unique and most relevant to the needs and aspirations of giving families.
Dozens of charts, checklists, and pull-quotes throughout make Splendid Legacy inviting and easy to read. The guide is 258 pages and includes a comprehensive glossary, sample policies and forms, and list of resources.
Customer Reviews:
WHAT A WONDERFUL TOOL.......2002-10-02
This book is a wonderful tool for any trustee whether new or seasoned.!!!
It is splendidly laid out and easy to navigate.
Every possible problem has been addressed and solved for the family planning to start a new foundation.
Along with that, there is information that can vastly enhance those who are newly appointed to longstanding boards of old established family foundations.
I was very impressed with this book and plan to suggest our foundation buy copies for all board members, associates and staff members.
Best regards,
Bonnie
Herbert H. and Grace A. Dow Foundation
Board member
Midland Michigan
Bonnie B. Matheson
Book Description
Just when you thought you knew the best of Northern Italy, along comes Lynne RossettoKasper to introduce you to Emilia-Romagna, a fertile wedge between Milan, Venice, and Florence, as gastronomically important as any land in the world. The lush homeland of balsamic vinegar, Prosciutto di Parma, tortellini, and Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese, this is a region venerated by Italy's food cognoscenti. "Ask an Italian where to take only one meal in Italy, and, after recommending his mother's house, he will more than likely send you to EmiliaRomagna,"writes Kasper.
A cuisine at once voluptuous and refined, the dishes of Emilia-Romagna's kitchen are literally irresistible. just listen to the names"Little" Spring Soup from the 17th Century, His Eminence's Baked Penne, Modena Crumbling Cake. Then imagine sitting down to a dish of Hot Caramelized Pears with Prosciutto, a Risotto of Red Wine with Fresh Rosemary or a Pie of Polenta and Country RagÚ
The first American book to present the food of this singular northern region, The Splendid Table is an Italian cookbook for the nineties. It will take you from Parma, Bologna, Modena, Ravenna, and Ferrara to tiny villages in the foothills of the Apennines, from Renaissance banquet halls to the simplest of farmhouses, offering history, folklore, and substantive cooking tips along the way.
Among the things you will find are:
Customer Reviews:
yjm-oh!!!!!!.......2007-01-10
I used to work in a great italian restaurant. One of the books from the chef's library that stood out was this one. It has great recipes. Very true to the food. Close your eyes. Pick a recipe. Make it and its a hit!
I am one that LOOOOVES to "twik" recipes. With this book, there is no need.
Lots of work but worth it.......2007-01-01
This is a fantastic book. At first glance I set it aside as it looked labor-intensive, but as I tried it out I've had nothing but great results. Most recipies involve a *lot* of overall time and work, especially getting some of the ingredients (hard to find veal neck bones) but so far worth it!
Handmade Pastas.......2006-04-09
Delicious.
I adore this book. I love sitting down just to read the histories and evolutions of dishes. And I love the actual recipes I've made so far from it.
But most importantly, I've learned not to be afraid to make homemade pastas thanks to Kasper's easy conversational style.
The pasta doughs are simple and forgiving, and the pastas are delicious, filling, and a huge cost and nutrition savings compared to packaged.
No serious kitchen should be without this book!.......2006-03-24
My wife is a food professional and we eat very well at home. She mentioned this book after our trip through Tuscany & Umbria earlier this year and I bought it as a gift for her. Wish that we'd had it years ago! The Bolognese sauce alone is worth the price! I do not personally use the cookbook but have been hearing raves about the content - both recipes and general information about this region in Italy. This is very high praise from my hard-to-please retired teaching chef wife.
The very best regional Italian cookbook! Buy It!.......2005-07-27
`The Splendid Table' by Lynne Rossetto Kasper is simply the most splendid book I have read on a regional cuisine and it is by far and away the best of the three books on the cuisine of Emilia-Romagna, even though the other two, `Biba's Taste of Italy' by Biba Caggiano and `Recipes from My Two Villages' by Mario Batali are excellent, as far as they go. Ms. Caggiano's book is simply a collection of recipes from Emilia-Romagna and Mario's book is more of a personal diary of recipes than a thorough examination of a historical cuisine.
Ms. Kasper's book, in the year it was published, won both the James Beard and Julia Child (IACP) cookbook awards, which is roughly the same as winning both the Academy award and the Foreign Press Writers award for best picture. And, I believe this book deserved all the attention it has received. Even Mario, who has his own book on the subject, made a special point to mention this book on his `Molto Mario' show. Since I have owned the book for over a year, it is one of those cases where I deeply regret having taken so long to get to studying the volume.
All that remains, then, is to point out what it is which makes the book so good.
For starters, it covers every aspect of a region's cuisine. That is, it deals with the history, the agriculture, and the economy of the region as well as the great recipes. And, what a background we have to relate. Emilia-Romagna is not just another region in one of the world's great culinary countries. It is THE very heart and soul of that culinary tradition, even more than the fabled provinces of Tuscany (Florence) in the north and Campagna (Naples) in the south. It is the home of Italy's three most important non-wine food products, Proscuitto de Parma, Parmesano-Reggiano, and Balsamic Vinegar. On top of that, it is also the home of some of the most famous fresh pasta dishes to come out of Italy plus several of the most famous salume products from Italy (witness the name Bologna, the region's capital city, given to some of these products).
While this coverage is necessary for a complete book on this subject, it is not enough. And, this book gives us the most important component, an excellent selection of very well written recipes. And, with over five hundred pages to fill, Ms. Kasper has given us several different takes on many of the more interesting recipes. A fine example is the famous ragu Bolognese, which is offered up in at least six different variations, each for a slightly different purpose or from a different background.
Never having studied this northern (generally tomatoless) sauce in detail before, I am struck by how similar it is to the most common recipes for Texas chili. It has no beans, the meat is diced and browned, not ground, and tomato and other spices are added sparingly. In the place of dried chiles, the ragu includes cinnamon (in several of the more traditional recipes). One very odd facet of these recipes is that where a Bay leaf is specified, the author calls for the California bay leaf rather than the milder Turkish bay leaf.
The recipes are organized like all good Italian cookbooks, by course. The chapters are:
The Antipasto Course
Ragus
Essential Sauces and Stocks (In no other book have I seen such a thorough treatment of Italian broths and stocks. Ms. Kasper includes the simple traditional `brodo' but adds much more, highlighted by the rich `Il sugo de carne' or meat essence.)
Pastas
The Sweet Pastas of the Renaissance (So, not only do we get modern dishes, we also get recipes for historical dishes which one usually never finds outside a book specializing in Renaissance cooking).
Risotto, Soup, and Vegetable First Courses
Second Courses
Vegetable Side Dishes
Breads
Desserts
Aside from the atypical choice of the California bay, nothing in this book disagrees with anything I have seen from any other authority on Italian cooking. In fact, Ms. Kasper generally improves on other advice by giving more details and a finer turn to her information on ingredients, techniques, and background. I am especially happy to see recipes for some of the more complicated dishes which simply never find their way into less ambitious books, such as `bomba di riso', a northern Italian analogue to the pasta `timbale' of the south. And, while many books cover bread making in a very superficial manner, this book not only does justice to this difficult subject, it covers many of the more arcane flatbreads which tend to be overshadowed by pizza from Naples and foccacia from Genoa. Her chapter on desserts also gives the lie to Sr. Batali's often-repeated statement that the Italians are not big on sweet desserts. While many of these may have grown out of French and Austrian influences, there are tortes and tarts aplenty to enliven an Italian themed entertainment.
Ms. Kasper also gives us a very nice little guide to ingredients, mail order sources, and a bibliography composed almost entirely of Italian language sources.
It is not hard to see how Ms. Kasper has been able to produce such a great book. Elizabeth David lived in Italy and studied its cuisine for a year before producing her excellent `Italian Food'. Ms. Kasper has spent the better part of a lifetime, including five years living in Bologna, studying this cuisine. It is no surprise that the recipe writing in this book rivals that of Julia Child in `Mastering the Art of French Cooking', as this author has spent about the same time mastering her subject before committing it to paper.
Any culinary library that has any pretensions to being complete must include a copy of this book!
Amazon.com
Author of Trattoria Cooking among other cookbooks, PBS personality Biba Caggiano provides Italian recipes that are authentic, approachable and delicious. In Biba's Italy she offers 125-plus formulas from Rome, Florence, Bologna, Milan and Venice--among the great food centers in a country devoted to good eating. The book provides definitive versions of old favorites, including Stuffed Artichokes Roman Style; Potato Gnocchi with Classic Bolognese Ragù; and Roasted Pork with Rosemary, Sage and Garlic, as well as recipes for more innovative fare, such as Chestnut-Flour Tagliatelle with Mushrooms, and Prawns with Cannellini, Rosemary and Hot Pepper, plus formulas for a few homey sweets. Included also are reminiscences of the restaurants that yielded the recipes plus wine and dining information for those wishing to retrace Caggiano's steps. Photo-illustrated, the book excels by offering a superior, easy-to-do repertoire for both everyday and special occasion cooking--one that all cooks will use. --Arthur Boehm
Book Description
Here is the very best food from our very favorite cities—the glorious dining destinations Rome, Florence, Bologna, Milan, and Venice—brought to life by one of the most authoritative authors in the field. The 100 delicious, simple recipes range from time-honored home-cooking traditions to restaurant classics and even startling innovations by Italy’s star chefs, and are accompanied by invaluable cooking tips and rich, evocative atmosphere. And each chapter offers travel tips galore—on the best restaurants, wine bars, gelatarie, and markets—as well as eminently useful reference sections on ingredients and menus. Biba’s Italy will at turns transport you to a canal-side caffè in Venice and a bustling outdoor market in medieval Bologna, to a chic Milanese ristorante and the lively streets in Rome and cozy enoteca in Florence. Then lure you back home to re-create these experiences in your own kitchen.
Customer Reviews:
Fun book, with recipes, and menus from each City.......2007-06-11
I love how this book is sectioned into 5 Italian cities: Rome, Florence, Bologna, Milan, and Venice. And at the beginning of each section is a 'full' restaurant menu with English translation. This is great to have if you plan to travel to Italy, since not all restaurants have English translation (and you may want restaurants that DON'T). Of course, the recipes for all of the mouth watering menu items then follow, as well as personal anecdotes that make this book so much fun to read. Tons of helpful tips for each recipe. Just reading the menus make me salivate!
This book is fantastic!!!!.......2007-02-14
This book is fantastic!!! Yes it's full of essays and stories about her travels thoughout Italy, but its also about THE FOOD. Bibba provides the reasons and the history for why Italian food is so wonderful. As the previous reviewer mentioned the Chicken with potatos, pancetta, and herbs is delicious, as are other recipes in the book. I can't recommend this enough.
Great Portmanteau of Classic Recipes. Buy it!.......2006-09-14
`Biba's Italy' by notable restauranteur and cookbook writer, Biba Caggiano succeeds because it has established itself in a tidy little niche at the intersection between Italian travel guide, study of regional Italian cooking, and Italian recipe reference.
From the first influence, Biba gets a breezy, engaging writing style which is far superior to many other highly touted interpreters of Italian cuisine such as Mario Batali or Giada DeLaurentiis. It shares the same virtues as the much less culinarily talented Ina Garten's book `Barefoot in Paris', which gives us a culinary tour of great venues and products from the City of Lights. Since I have been in four out of these five cities myself, I can guarantee that Ms. Caggiano is not exaggerating one wit about the charm and beauty of these five great cities. For anyone who is planning to visit Italy, I would recommend this book before any more pedestrian tourist guide, assuming, of course, that the prospective traveler liked to eat.
From the second influence, most notably represented by Claudia Roden's classic `The Food of Italy', we get a sampling of great dishes from five of Italy's most important cities, Rome, Florence, Bologna, Milan, and Venice. While journalist Roden is looking to cram as many different dishes as possible into a small book (actually, a series of newspaper articles originally), Ms. Caggiano is simply treating us to the high points. Anyone familiar with Ms. Caggiano's earlier books will know that she did not include Naples or Sicily because Ms. Caggiano is a northern girl, originally from Bologna in Emilia-Romagna, north of both Tuscany (Florence) and Lazio (Rome). What this means is that the book is heavy on the fresh pasta, polenta, and risotto, but light on pizza and other southern specialities.
From the third type of book, the Italian culinary `encyclopedia', we get `classic' versions of the representative dishes. While it is common knowledge that aside from some recent inventions such as Pizza Margarita, there is no one essential recipe for classic dishes, but some recipes come a lot closer (and are a lot more interesting) than others to the ideal.
Based on having reviewed several different cookbooks on the dishes of Rome, for example, I'm convinced that almost all of Biba's recipes in this book are based on the way they actually make it in Rome. And, the choice of recipes stays with all the best-known dishes. If one has been diligent in learning the Italian names of many dishes, you may not immediately recognize this, since Ms. B. always gives the English name first, but it should not be too hard to recognize that `Veal Scaloppine with Prosciutto, Sage, and Wine' is the famous `Saltimbocca alla Romana'. It jumps in your mouth by simply saying the name! I must warn you that the book doesn't have simply every classic Italian dish. It does not, for example, include a recipe for Ragu Bolognaise (although it DOES have `Bistecca alla Fiorentina').
I am pleased that Ms. Caggiano includes a complete list of all recipes on the opening page of her chapters on each of the five cities. Following the recipes for each city are sections on the wines of the region; the city's Restaurants, Trattorie, and Wine Bars; food markets, specialty food stores, bakeries, and cooking schools; caffes, pastry shops, and other speciality shops.
The very last chapter covers `Basic Recipes' for broths, pasta dough, potato gnocchi (Roman style), basic polenta, and basic pie dough. These recipes demonstrate that Ms. Caggiano is a far better cook than the average Italian recipe hack. The description of her techniques lacks a lot of the finer background, but the actual instructions are equal to some of the best from Marcella Hazan.
I would not say this of Ms. Caggiano's other cookbooks, but of this I insist that even if you have a library of Italian recipe books, this one will be more enjoyable to read and a surer and faster source to dozens of classic and authentic Italian dishes than many bigger tomes. It doesn't have pizza and it doesn't have 50 spaghetti sauce recipes, but it's a great addition to the kitchen.
On a personal note, I'm tickled that Ms. B. includes New York City's Di Palo store in Little Italy as a source for Italian specialities (They make their own mozzarella and ricotta daily). I thought I had discovered them myself, until I found they were a darling of the Food Network NY venues and known to every important Italian chef in the business. But, I still consider them my own discovery.
A delightful book all around!
Average customer rating:
|
Ikat: Splendid Silks of Central Asia
Kate Fitz Gibbon , and
Andrew Hale
Manufacturer: Laurence King
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
Fashion Design | Commercial | Graphic Design | Design & Decorative Arts | Arts & Photography | Subjects | Books
General | Fashion | Arts & Photography | Subjects | Books
General | Arts & Photography | Subjects | Books
General | Asia | History | Subjects | Books
Textiles & Costume | Antiques & Collectibles | Home & Garden | Subjects | Books
General | Crafts & Hobbies | Home & Garden | Subjects | Books
Textile Arts | Crafts & Hobbies | Home & Garden | Subjects | Books
Weaving | Crafts & Hobbies | Home & Garden | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 1856691519 |
Average customer rating:
- Awesome resource!!
- Fabulous in Every Way
- A kitchen library essential
- These recipes are consistently excellent, and wholesome too.
- A Healthy Little Gem
|
The Splendid Grain
Rebecca Wood
Manufacturer: William Morrow Cookbooks
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
General | Cooking, Food & Wine | Subjects | Books
Culinary Arts & Techniques | Cooking, Food & Wine | Subjects | Books
Rice & Grains | Cooking by Ingredient | Cooking, Food & Wine | Subjects | Books
General | Arts & Photography | Subjects | Books
Similar Items:
-
The New Whole Foods Encyclopedia: A Comprehensive Resource for Healthy Eating
-
Greens Glorious Greens: More than 140 Ways to Prepare All Those Great-Tasting, Super-Healthy, Beautiful Leafy Greens
-
366 Delicious Ways to Cook Rice, Beans, and Grains
-
The New Book Of Whole Grains: More than 200 recipes featuring whole grains
-
Easy Beans: Fast and Delicious Bean, Pea, and Lentil Recipes, Second Edition
ASIN: 0688166121 |
Amazon.com
Rebecca Wood grew up on a family farm near Ogden, Utah. As a college graduate in the '60s, she landed in San Francisco and studied cooking with macrobiotic masters Michio and Aveline Kushi. The Splendid Grain proves that Wood's continuing holistic passion for being on intimate terms with what we eat has appeal for mainstream cooks. Philosophical, eclectic, homey, hokey, stuffed with old-fashioned values, and strewn with appealing new ideas, this is a lovingly written, thoroughly researched work. An enchanting storyteller, Wood sweeps you through interesting cultural anthropology and agricultural history, then presents an inspired collection of whole grain dishes. Recipes range from simple variations on the familiar oat pilaf, risotto, and tabouleh to tempting and imaginative barley-stuffed meatless dolmadakia. (The book is not vegetarian; meat, poultry and seafood dishes are included.)
Book Description
With 250 luscious recipes, along with eight pages of color photographs, The Splendid Grain dramatizes how you can incorporate extraordinarily healthful grains into your life without changing your lifestyle.
Grains can transform taste and texture in unsurpassed ways like these:
- Nutty, sweet oats form the delicious crust of fried chicken
- Piquant quinoa heightens and absorbs the savory juices of gingered lamb
- Hearty buckwheat becomes a sweet, delicate, Parisian-inspired crepe
- Thai black sticky rice flavored with coconut makes unforgettable exotic banana dumplings.
The natural and native history of each grain is also explored along with its health benefits.
Customer Reviews:
Awesome resource!!.......2007-10-10
I initially checked this book out at the library and just had to have my own copy. The author has done years of research and provides very detailed and interesting information about various grains to include their origins, historical uses and various methods of preparation. There is also a section detailing little-known places where you can order seeds to grow your own or purchase ready to use grains/grain products. This book should be in every home cookbook collection!
Fabulous in Every Way.......2007-09-29
Who says whole grains have to taste like health food? Rebecca Wood lays out everything you need to know about the common grains (oat, wheat, barley, rice), the not-so-common (quinoa, millet, amaranth, buckwheat) and the downright rarely eaten in this country (tef, Job's tears). For each one she explains how/where it is grown, how to buy and store it, what it is used for, its nutritional advantages, etc. She gives basic recipes for cooking the grains plain or nearly so, as well as more complicated recipes and suggestions for what to pair with what. The chapters are divided first by the continent to which each grain is native and then by the grains themselves, and then for each grain there are recipes for plain grains, soups, main dishes, side dishes and desserts. I like this organization, although if you want to make a whole grain dessert, for instance, you'll have to look through the chapters on the various grains or in the index, as there is no organization by type of dish, e.g., soups, desserts, etc. The intros to each dish give you a good idea of what to expect, the instructions are pretty clear, and the results are spectacular. The Winter Squash and Quinoa Pottage is amazingly great (especially if you make it with homemade stock -- it is particularly awesome using the vegetable stock recipe from The New Basics Cookbook, but was also good with Swanson low-sodium chicken broth), is ridiculously easy, and extremely high in protein and vitamins. Just wash the quinoa really well first. Takes less than 1/2 hour plus the time to wash the quinoa and cut the onion and squash. The pinon (pine nut) crackers with amaranth are all whole grain, super easy and the only problem with it is that it's hard not to eat the entire batch myself as soon as it's done. Recipes include a good mix of vegetarian items and ones with meat so it's a good book no matter how you eat. My only quibble is that measurements for baked goods are given solely by volume, rather than by weight, which is more accurate, but it's a small one. This is my new favorite cookbook.
A kitchen library essential.......2006-08-28
Wood's book is a must have for any cook serious about understanding how to cook with whole grains.
These recipes are consistently excellent, and wholesome too........2006-02-14
I knew nothing about this book when I checked it out of the library, except that it had recipes for some of the more unusual grains. It is only now that I looked it up on Amazon that I discovered that it won the James Beard award. I am not the least bit surprised, however, because all the recipes I have tried have been consistently delicious, wholesome, and creative. You will find very few run-of-the-mill recipes in this cookbook.
I check many cookbooks out of the library, but for many I can't find any recipes that I want to make, or if I do find recipes to try, once I make them I am generally not impressed. So I was amazed when I opened this cookbook to find so many intriguing recipes, each of which turned out better than the last.
Some highlights: The grilled millet and butternut squash cakes had so few spices I was sure they would be bland, but they weren't. They were subtle but sweet and crunchy and addictive. The millet, quinoa, and burdock pilaf again looked underseasoned, but the burdock adds a great earthy depth to the pilaf, and again, I could not stop eating this dish. Wood's recipe for Locro, a South American soup, has a large number of ingredients, but it is well worth the effort. The barley and beans that make up the bulk of this soup make it substantial and extremely filling. The celeriac is sweet and delicious, the anise seeds add a subtle mysterious note, and the roasted New Mexican chili and the kombu create a great tasty broth with more depth than a typical vegetarian soup.
The only recipe that I was disappointed in was her basic recipe for "steamed" amaranth. Wood swears it's the best way to cook amaranth, but I thought it turned out exactly the same as it always does when I cook it--gooey, but tasty. Also, as a previous reviewer noted, Wood doesn't use too many green vegetables in this cookbook, but since it is a grains cookbook I can forgive this one shortcoming.
Overall, this book is full of healthy, nutritious, creative, well-tested recipes that please the palate and the body, and are reasonably quick to prepare. The flavorings are generally subtle, but perfectly balanced, allowing the taste of the ingredients to shine through. If you like very strong tasting food, however, you might find the recipes a bit bland. The recipes are not all vegetarian, but there are enough vegetarian recipes that I just returned my library book and ordered this book on Amazon.
A Healthy Little Gem.......2005-09-23
This book is layed out by grain, making it easy to navigate, and has a good range of recipe-types (main dishes, breads, desserts, breakfasts). The recipes are healthy in a very holistic and balanced way.
I have already tried several recipes, all of which I was extremely pleased with- they were easy, and delicious. I can't wait to keep cooking from this book, it will surely be turned to again and again.
Books:
- Against the Wall
- All About Us
- Arthur Spiderwick's Field Guide to the Fantastical World Around You (Spiderwick Chronicles)
- Body Heat (The Simply Series, Book 4)
- Boy Meets Girl: Say Hello to Courtship
- Carving the Human Figure: Studies in Wood and Stone
- Dancing in the Shadows of the Moon
- Dare to Dream and Work to Win
- Dead and Dateless: A Novel of Vampire Love (Dead End Dating, Book 2)
- Devil's Acolyte (Knights Templar series)
Books Index
Books Home
Recommended Books
- The OASIS Guide to Asperger Syndrome: Completely Revised and Updated: Advice, Support, Insight, and
- On His Terms
- Biological Functions of Microtubules and Related Structures
- Fundamentals of Cavitation
- History: Fiction or Science
- Juvenile Delinquency: Theory, Practice, and Law
- Killifish: A Complete Pet Owner's Manual
- Four Inches
- Building for the Ages, Omaha's Architectural Landmarks
- Cyclamen a Gardener's Guide to the Genus.
Water for Elephants: A Novel
The Kite Runner
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (Book 7)
Eat, Pray, Love: One Woman's Search for Everything Across Italy, India and Indonesia
Suite Francaise
