Weekend Cooking- Twelve Recipes by Cal Peternell

This post is part of Beth Fish Reads' Weekend Cooking.  If you have anything related to food, cookbook reviews, novel or non-fiction book reviews, recipes, movie reviews, etc., head over to Beth Fish Reads and add your post. Or, if you want to read food related posts, head over to read what some interesting people have to say about food.

Twelve Recipes by Cal Peternell
Published by William Morrow ISBN 9780062270306
Hardcover, $26.99, 304 pages

When chef Cal Peternell was getting ready to send his son off to college, he decided to create a small cookbook of the twelve recipes that he felt were most important for his son to have. They were for food he had made for the family, his son's favorite dishes, things everyone should be able to make.

The book turned into Twelve Recipes, simple but standard dishes that everyone should be able to make and enjoy. Each chapter also has variations on those recipes, something that you can add to the repertoire to kick things up a notch.

Peternell is a chef at Alice Waters' famed Chez Panisse, so his food is clean, fresh and flavorful. He divides his twelve categories in this way:

• Toast
• Eggs
• Beans
• Salad Dressings and What To Dress
• Pasta With Tomato
• Pasta Otherwise
• Rice, Polenta, and Mashed Potatoes
• Only The Best Vegetables
• Roasted Chicken
• Braises
• Sauces
• Cakes

In addition to recipes, Peternell shares his best tips- when cooking in a skillet the pan should be dry until hot then add the oil, have two kinds of olive oil on hand, use sea salt, when cooking with garlic add something wet (wine, chopped tomatoes, stock) to prevent it from burning.

Twelve Recipes is a wonderful book not only for the new cook, but even as someone who cooks often, I found it very enlightening. I made many notes from the book, got great tips and recipes that seem simple and flavorful. 

His recipe for Shallot and Sherry Viniagrette is a terrific example:

1 small shallot

1 teaspoon sherry vinegar

good pinch of salt (1/8 teaspoon)

1 teaspoon red wine vinegar

1/2 teaspoon Dijon mustard

fresh ground pepper

3 tablespoons olive oil

Peel and mince the shallot, like you would an onion. Mix with the salt, vinegars, mustard and pepper and let sit for 5 minutes to marinate and temper the shallots. Stir in the olive oil with a fork or whisk. If it thickens and emulsifies, fine. If not, also fine- just stir before using.

Peternell also sprinkles some family stories throughout, and you can feel the love he has for his family in this wonderful book. It makes a terrific gift for a new cook, and yet the experienced cook will also get some great recipes to add to their collection.

Cal Peternell's website is here.

Weekend Cooking- Emeril's Cooking With Power by Emeril Lagasse

This post is part of Beth Fish Reads' Weekend Cooking.  If you have anything related to food, cookbook reviews, novel or non-fiction book reviews, recipes, movie reviews, etc., head over to Beth Fish Reads and add your post. Or, if you want to read food related posts, head over to read what some interesting people have to say about food.

Emeril's Cooking With Power by Emeril Lagasse
Published by William Morrow Cookbooks ISBN 9780062300171
Hardcover, $25.99, 272 pages

While on the treadmill a few weeks ago, I found Emeril Lagasse on Good Morning America making lasagna in a slow cooker. "Hmm," I thought, "Maybe I should try this in my new crock pot." My only worry was that the noodles would be mushy, but I remembered that my husband saw a recipe for Crock Pot Lasagna on my Facebook feed and mentioned that he would like me to try it, so I did.

Everyone raved about it, and although I personally thought the noodles were a little mushy, I was clearly in the minority on this one. (I'm making it again tomorrow by request.) Then I remembered that I had an ARC of Emeril's Cooking With Power on my Kindle, so I flipped through it to see what else was there.

The subtitle of the book is 100 Delicious Recipes Starring Your Slow Cooker, Multi-Cooker, Pressure Cooker and Deep Fryer. Now as many of you know, I live in an NYC apartment and my kitchen is not big, so I don't have the space for all those electrics. But for those of you who do, this is a book you may want to pick up.

At the beginning of each section Emeril lists the gadget he cooked in, all of them available from his line of cookers, but if you don't own his brand, he helpfully lists the requirements you will need- size, timers, warmers, etc.- in your own electric appliance.

This book is for the more sophisticated cook; it's not a throw-it-in-the-crockpot-and-forget-it type of cooking. Many of meat recipes call for browning in a skillet, and some vegetables have to be sauteed before going in. There are multiple steps before placing in the cooker.

I liked that there are so many varieties of ethnic dishes here, perhaps because Emeril is from the melting pot of New Orleans. In the slow cooker section, he has recipes for Risotto Milanese, Cuban-Style Slow-Cooked Black Beans, Colombian Chicken, Corn and Potato Stew, and Duck Confit.

The Multi-Cooker recipes includes Seafood Soup with Coconut Milk and Tamarind, Baby Bock Choy with Black Bean-Garlic Sauce and S'mores Pudding.

He makes Lamb Stew with Israeli Couscous, Sweet Potatoes and Preserved Lemon, Quick Osso Buco, and Korean-Style Beef Stew in the Pressure Cooker section.

Classic Crab Rangoons, Crabmeat Beignets, Southeast Asian Egg Rolls and Natchitoches Meat Pies can be found in the Deep Fryer section.

If you are an adventurous cook who owns these electrics and likes ethnic foods, I would recommend Emeril's Cooking With Power; I think it could expand a cook's palette.

If you want to see Emeril's segment on Good Morning America, the link is here.
His recipe for Slow Cooker Lasagna is here.

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