Caribbean Cooking or Chocolate

Caribbean Cooking

Author: John DeMers

From drinks and appetizers to entrees and desserts, here are irresistible recipes that take you through the islands, from Jamaica to Guadaloupe, to Martinique, to Barbados, to Cuba, and beyond. You'll find easy-to-follow instructions using foods found in most supermarkets, plus origins of dishes, for an outstanding array of cooking a la Caribe... Smoked Marlin Salad, Conch Fritters, Black-Eyed Pea Salad, Shrimp & Banana Broth, Tomato & Peanut Soup, Bridgetown Flying Fish, Lobster Tails with Tangy Rum Sauce, Jerk Pork, Spareribs Caribe, Eggplant Port-au-Prince, Coconut-Banana Corn Bread, Pina Colada Bread Pudding, Banana Puffs with Coffee-Rum Sauce, Papaya & Strawberry Daiquiri, Planter's Punch and more.

Publishers Weekly

DeMers's use of accessible ingredients and familiar techniques makes these recipes a boon for North American cooks. The collection merely hints at the myriad roots of Caribbean cuisine by including brief introductory material and the origins of a few dishes. Rice salad shows Indian influence, red stripe chicken comes from Jamaica and templeque is a Puerto Rican version of Spanish flan. However, most dishes are identified only as ``Caribbean.'' Soups like shrimp and banana broth or yam bisque, and an ample supply of seafood recipes, such as swordfish steaks with tomatillo sauce, snapper wrapped in callaloo, and shrimp with roasted garlic and papaya, provide their own interest regardless of national derivation. Meat-based main dishes include keshi yena (a ball of Edam cheese stuffed with seasoned chicken), roast veal with black sauce, curried goat and turkey and peppers on saffron rice. Green-banana ceviche and Mt. Diablo grilled corn, flavored with peppers and herbs, are among the side dishes. Beverages such as planter's punch and cafe trade wind also lend an exotic flavor. DeMers wrote Complete Guide to Gourmet Coffee. Photos not seen by PW. (Mar.)

Library Journal

The second Caribbean cookbook in several months, this one is more comprehensive than Dunstan Harris's Food from the Islands ( LJ 12/88). DeMers's international mix of recipes includes island specialties ranging from appetizers such as Stamp & Go to sweets like Tie-A-Leaf. He provides both a glossary of ingredients and a list of mail order sources, but most dishes call for readily available ingredients. Caribbean food is popular now; for most collections.-- JS

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Chocolate: From Simple Cookies to Extravagant Showstoppers

Author: Nick Malgieri

Nick Malgieri, who taught us everything we need to know about baking in How to Bake, takes on chocolate, the world's favorite food. With the authoritative accessibility he brings to his teaching, Nick bridges the gap between the professional baker and the home cook. He knows techniques and ingredients and he teaches them with hand-holding efficiency. In ten chapters, Nick offers a primer on basics and every kind of chocolate from coca to chips and white chocolate (and why it isn't really chocolate in the strictest sense) to big dark slabs of the world's favorite luxury food and the many, many ways to enjoy it.

Information on storage, handling, and the fundamentals needed to create chocolate confections is clear and concise. Recipe sections include everything you need to know to turn the food of the gods into desserts for us mortals: cakes and cookies, creams and custards, ice creams, pies and pastries, sauces and beverages, truffles and pralines, dipped and molded chocolates, all adapted for the home cook.

Illustrated with four-color photographs throughout, all 380 luscious recipes will send a shiver of delight down the spine of every chocolate lover. Chocolate is definitive without being intimidating; it is a true home companion for anyone who wants to cook with chocolate.

Publishers Weekly

Malgieri's paean to the cocoa bean collects just about every classic chocolate dessert. A thorough introduction to chocolate offers not just the history of the magic bean, but definitions of the various types and explanations of their uses, tips on storage and equipment and clear instructions for melting and tempering. As in his earlier How to Bake (1995), Malgieri, who is chairman of the baking department at Peter Kump's Cooking School, takes a gentle, educational tone in both homegrown recipes (Easy Fudgy Loaf Cake and Chocolate and Vanilla Pinwheels) and more sophisticated ones (Chocolate Paris-Brest, Chocolate Orange Trifle, and Chocolate Souffle Roll with Striped Chocolate Filling). Malgieri doesn't experiment with a lot of exotic ingredients (an exception is Warm Chocolate-Chile Cakes with Caramelized Bananas). When he does wax inventive, it's with regard to presentation: Individual Chocolate Cheese Tartlets have white filling in chocolate crusts, and each is dotted with chocolate batter in the center, while White Chocolate Strawberry Tart is topped with whole strawberries dipped in white chocolate. The pieces de resistance here are the challenging projects that close the book. These include a Chocolate Basket made by weaving strips of Chocolate Plastic; a Chocolate Flowers Wreath Cake topped with hand-fashioned flowers; and a cunning Chocolate Victorian Cottage Cookie Box complete with white chocolate cornices. Photos. (Oct.)

Library Journal

In the style of Malgieri's authoritative How To Bake (LJ 8/95), here is a comprehensive guide to chocolate, with more than 300 recipes for cakes, creams and mousses, pies and tarts, sauces, and more. The introduction covers the basics, and each succeeding chapter elaborates on specific desserts and confections, with recipes usually organized from easiest to most elaborate. Instructions are clear though fairly concise (Malgieri's no Maida Heatter), but there are detailed directions for working with chocolate and other trickier techniques. Marcel Desaulniers's chocolate books (e.g., Death by Chocolate Cookies, LJ 12/97) are flashier, but Malgieri covers a lot more ground. Highly recommended.