Fresh and Seasonal

There were a lot of "farm to table" cookbooks this year, but this is the only one I am keeping. It balances the voice of farmers, chefs and artisans. The book is filled with contemporary American recipes that are genuinely appealing and unique.

Bookmarked recipes: Angel hair pasta with oyster butter cream sauce and caviar, Creme fraiche galette with heirloom tomatoes, Goat cheese panna cotta with caramelized figs

Why?
I always get nervous with "chef" recipes. But in this case seasoned test kitchen director from Saveur, Kelly Kochendorfer has clearly made sure these recipes will WORK in a home kitchen. They are straight-forward and don't have a million ingredients.

Who?
This is for creative cooks looking for new flavors and excited to use the best ingredients but who don't see the point of torturing them.

It doesn’t seem that long ago that I visited with Janice Cole at an International Association of Culinary Professionals (IACP) conference when she told me she was working on a cookbook. She explained that this book would not be  just a collection of recipes. It would also tell the story about her experiences during her first year of raising her own hens. I was intrigued. I had no idea Janice Cole had chickens. She lived in the city, for heaven’s sake, in a suburb of St. Paul, Minnesota. Yet she was raising chickens in her back yard.

Now, I have the just-published book, “Chicken and Egg: A Memoir of Suburban Homesteading with 125 Recipes,” by Janice Cole. It’s like a good novel that you just can’t put down once you start reading. Cole’s book holds nine chapters, following the seasons of the year, broken down by early spring, mid-spring, summer, late summer all the way through late winter.

Did your New Year's resolution include losing weight or eating more healthfully? You're not alone. Millions of Americans have made the same resolutions. I just hope you don't go on a diet. Because if you go on a diet, you'll eventually go off a diet.

Here's my advice: skip the diet and buy a book instead, specifically Cooking Light The Complete Quick Cook by Bruce Weinstein and Mark Scarbrough. Having written more than 20 cookbooks together, Weinstein and Scarbrough know how to develop recipes that work. If they say a recipe takes 30 minutes or less, is good for you, and tastes great too, then you can believe them.

In The Complete Quick Cook, you'll learn how to be a savvier shopper, faster cook, and healthier eater, all of which will help you lose weight and keep it off. The book includes over 200 healthy, quick-cook recipes organized into chapters including Fast & Fresh Salads, Convenience Cooking, Stir-Fry, Fast & Fancy, and Sweet Endings. Most are written in short, clear sentences, and have relatively short ingredients lists with easy-to-find ingredients. Nearly all recipes are accompanied by a color photo.

When Heather Christo asked me if I would be interested in checking out her new book, Generous Table, my answer was an exuberant, YES! Heather and I have been reading each other’s blog for years and witnessing the birth of her new “baby” was a wonderful journey to watch her go on.

After drooling over her recipes, it was a toss up as to what I was going to make first. It was between the Chocolate Caramel Mousse, Blackberry Jalapeno Margarita, and this caramel sauce.

Anyone who knows me, knows that caramel “anything” is my drug of choice. On the dessert menu it is the dessert with the word caramel in it that I gravitate toward and a Sees Scotch-Mallow is all I really need to take me to that happy place.

With some homemade ice cream in the freezer and a batch of freshly made dark chocolate almond bark, caramel sauce seemed like the perfect accessory. And the perfect accessory it was, especially with that little bit of a tequila kick!

I am so in love with Heather’s book, which is filled with stories, rich recipes, and super easy entertaining ideas.