Dessert Express or New Way to Cook

Dessert Express: 100 Sweet Treats You Can Make in 30 Minutes or Less

Author: Lauren Chattman

Though constantly pressed for time, moms want to bring something homemade to the table—Dessert Express allows them to indulge their family and still get to soccer practice on time. Mother of two and former pastry chef Lauren Chattman is here to save the course most people crave. Molten Chocolate Cherry Cake, Homemade Mallomars, Bourbon Brown Sugar Fudge, and other tantalizing treats are among the 100 from-scratch recipes that just about anyone can prepare in a half hour or less. Her secrets?

Downsize: make only what you need for that moment
Turn Up the Heat: focus on baked goods that do well in hotter ovens
Chill Out: use ice or a freezer to quickly cool down dishes
Think Outside the Oven: make good use of waffle irons, frying pans, and other alternatives
Use Convenient Ingredients, Get Organized, and more

Dessert Express offers 100 deliciously indulgent recipes to satisfy your sweet tooth in 30 minutes or less.

Go to: Who Was Ben Franklin or The OReilly Factor

New Way to Cook

Author: Sally Schneider

Sally Schneider was tired of doing what we all do—separating foods into "good" and "bad," into those we crave but can't have and those we can eat freely but don't especially want—so she created A New Way To Cook.

Her book is nothing short of revolutionary, a redefinition of healthy eating, where no food is taboo, where the pleasure principle is essential to well-being, where the concept of self-denial just doesn't exist.

• More than 600 lavishly illustrated recipes result in marvelous, vividly flavored foods. You'll find quintessential American favorites that taste every bit as good as the traditional "full-tilt" versions: macaroni and cheese, rosemary buttermilk biscuits, chocolate malted pudding. You'll find Italian polentas, risottos, focaccias, and pastas, all reinvented without the loss of a single drop of deliciousness. Asian flavors shine through in cold sesame noodles; mussels with lemongrass, ginger, and chiles; and curry-crusted shrimp. Even French food is no longer on the forbidden list, with country-style pâtés and cassoulet.
  
• Hundreds of techniques, radical in their ultimate simplicty, make all the difference in the world: using chestnut puree in place of cream, butter, and pork fat in a duck liver mousse; extending the richness of flavored oils by boiling them with a little broth to dress starchy beans and grains; casserole-roasting baby back ribs to render them of fat, then lacquering them with a pungent maple glaze.
  
• Scores of flavor catalysts—quickly made sauces, rubs, marinades, essences, and vinaigrettes—add instant hits of flavor with little effort.Leek broth dresses pasta; chive oil becomes an instant sauce for broiled salmon; a smoky tea essence imparts a sweet, grilled flavor to steak; balsamic vinegar turns into a luscious dessert sauce.
  
• Variations and improvisations offer infiinite flexibility. Once you learn a basic recipe, it's simple to devise your own version for any part of the meal. "Fried" artichockes with crispy garlic and sage can be an hors d-oeuvre topped with shaved cheeses, part of a composed salad, or as a main course when tossed iwth pasta. It's equally happy on top of pizza or stirred into risotto. And by building dishes from simple elements, turning out complex meals doesn't have to be a complex affair.
  
• A wealth of tips and practical information to make you a more accomplished and self-confident cook: how to rescue ordinary olive oil to give it more flavor, how to make soups creamy without cream, how to freshen less-than-perfect fish.

So here it is, 756 glorious pages of all the deliciousness and joy that food is meant to convey.

Chicago Sun Times

The book has so much solid, practical information-and some truly revolutionary ideas-it deserves attention.

New York Times Book Review

This is the "Silver Palate" for the new generation of sophisticated eaters but unconfident cooks.

Publishers Weekly

Every era must have its cookbook, and the cookbook for the early 21st century has arrived. It is not that the recipes Schneider, a columnist for Food & Wine, has included are particularly or innovative. These are recipes that reflect the way Americans cook and eat today, or perhaps the way we wish we cooked and ate. Schneider sets forth a list of techniques for cooking healthful and tasty food, then presents 600 recipes that follow these guidelines. She includes nutritional information charts at the back of the book. Introductory material to each chapter is comprehensive, e.g., a chapter on beans opens with a guide to buying, soaking and cooking dry legumes and combining beans and grains, then follows up with Chickpea Stew with Saffron and Winter Squash and Fat Beans with Mole. Asian, Italian and other multiculti fare typifies modern American cuisine, which means that Oven-Steamed Whole Fish with Chinese Flavors, Thai Seafood Salad with Lemongrass Dressing, and Salmon Cured with Grappa coexist happily in a chapter on fish and seafood. Often Schneider provides a jumping-off point for variations, as in Open Ravioli with a list of possible fillings and sauces. A chapter on desserts tantalizes with such treats as Rustic Rosemary-Apple Tart. Final chapters on flavor essences, flavored oils, sauces and more, as well as instructions for doing anything from peeling citrus fruit to seasoning a cast-iron pan, round out this impressively substantial effort. (Nov.) Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information.

Shirley Reis - KLIATT

Move over, Joy of Cooking and Silver Palate-here is a cookbook for the future! Over 600 recipes are included in this highly informative book, which is sure to be read and reread many times by both novice and veteran cooks. Schneider offers a wealth of essential techniques and strategic ingredients in addition to innovative recipes that reflect our global society. Each chapter is organized in a logical progression of simple approaches or techniques, followed by recipes that illustrate them. Many recipes in each chapter can also be made as component parts of dishes that are more complex. For example: Rustic Garlic Toasts may be topped with Slow Roasted Tomatoes. Enhancing dishes by use of various components is a recurring theme in this book. Located in the back of the book is a section of highly comprehensive basic techniques, and there are comparative nutritional analyses of all the recipes in addition to comprehensive menus for every occasion along with additional books and Web sites for further information. Some of the recipes are: Scaloppine Marsala, Pan Smoked Fish, Crispy Saffron Noodle Gratin, Coriander and Orange Scented Scones, Fresh Corn Polenta, Baked Penne With Wild Mushroom Ragu and Ricotta Salata, Curry Crusted Shrimp, Herb Scented Tuscan Pork Roast, Rustic Free Form Fruit Tarts, and many more. Schneider is an award-winning food writer who has been a professional chef. She currently contributes to Food and Wine in addition to NPR. This book is destined to become a classic. KLIATT Codes: SA*-Exceptional book, recommended for senior high school students, advanced students, and adults. 2001, Artisan, 737p. illus. bibliog. index., Ages 15 to adult.

Library Journal

Schneider's motto could be everything in moderation. Her ambitious new cookbook contains over 600 recipes for healthy and delicious eating. Schneider (The Art of Low Calorie Cooking, LJ 9/15/90) eschews dieting dogma and fake foods for a cuisine in which no ingredient is taboo, intense flavors dominate, and preparing food is considered rewarding, not drudgery. A quick look at the recipes Honey-Cured Pork Loin with Peppery Juniper and Fennel Seed Rub, Savory Rosemary Biscotti, and Mussels with Lemongrass, Ginger, and Chilies shows that most dishes rely on high-flavor ingredients for their impact, but Schneider also offers techniques that maximize the judicious use of flavorful fats and sugar. Several recipes are blueprints for improvising new dishes, in keeping with Schneider's desire to encourage creativity in the kitchen. Though she explains basic techniques throughout the book, experienced cooks will best appreciate this collection, which calls upon myriad ingredients and sophisticated flavors. Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information.