Feb 22, 2009
Eater's Digest
By Serene Luo
'Tis the season for students studying overseas to return to school. Here are some easy-peasy cookbooks that could help them eat like kings while living like paupers.
Student Food In Colour
By Catherine Atkinson
2007/Foulsham/128 pages/Paperback/$21.31/Kinokuniya
This book is handy and light, and I love the layout. Recipes go on the left and full-colour pictures go on the right, so you know exactly how each dish is supposed to turn out.
Offering a good range of recipes, from Continental fare to Asian dishes, it is classified by its main ingredient, be it poultry, seafood or vegetables. This makes it easy for the budding cook to pick a main course.
Very few condiments are called for in a number of recipes. For instance, when I tried making the Thai green curry, it asked only for green curry paste on top of the main ingredients of chicken, bamboo shoots, baby corn and coconut milk. Good idea - because the fewer the ingredients, the less scary it is for an inexperienced cook.
Also, the fewer the condiments, the cheaper it is for a student, who would not have to spend money buying all kinds of sauces or spices he will probably use only once.
Another plus point: The book, published in Britain, is not shy about using short cuts such as ready-made potato waffles or fish fingers.
But this book's strength is not in the Asian segment. The Asian recipes are almost too simplistic in their approaches, missing essential ingredients such as shallots and garlic.
Make It Super Simple With G.Garvin
By Gerry Garvin
2008/Meredith Books/223 pages/
Paperback/$35.23/ Books Kinokuniya/National Library ISBN: 978-0-696-23829-1
One word sums up this book's food: rich.
From the mushroom ragout to the cheesy cauliflower soup, all I could think about when tucking in was how creamy it all was.
For instance, in the mushroom ragout I made, there was a half cup of butter, a cup of white wine and a quarter cup of olive oil.
The mixture of alcohol and butter was heady and smelled heavenly, but I could feel my arteries clogging up.
Television chef Gerry Garvin's recipe portions are more for families than singles, so students can share the food with their dormitory mates and split up cooking chores.
The chef with a cooking show in the United States divides his recipes into categories such as lunches, barbecues, salads and pastas, which is a little confusing because it does not inform immediately the main ingredients I would need.
However, the index at the back of the book is more helpful as it lists the recipes by its main ingredients.
The recipes promise to be easy and simple to follow and I found it quite true.
But it offers only a grand total of 10 cooking tips from Garvin - too few, I feel, for new cooks.
My other beef is the lack of pictures. There are only 23 or so full-colour photographs of the food. The rest are of Garvin, his children or artistic photographs of kitchen paraphernalia such as pepper grinders.
The pictures also do not correspond to the recipes but are clustered in two sections in the book instead.
Sorry, but I am a newbie cook who needs pictures to get my taste buds and imagination going.
Cooking - A Commonsense Guide
Editors: Jane Price, Justine Upex
2008/Bay Books/384 pages/Paperback/$9.95/Borders
With its column-style layout and bookish fonts, this book, from an Australian publisher, looks more like a travel guide or a teenager's non-fiction encyclopaedia. But it turns out to be a very useful guide for the first-time cook.
I love its identification charts for meat cuts, herbs and vegetables. Any budding cook who has ever stood clueless in front of a butcher's stall will know how useful this is.
There are also step-by-step instructions with pictures for chopping a chicken or deboning it, and even how to tie it with a string for roasting.
Recipes are classified under soup, breakfast and meat dishes, and there is a huge section for sweets or baked goods.
There are categories for bread and buns, cakes and biscuits, desserts, sweet treats and jams and pickles - practically more recipes than those for main courses.
The recipes were easy to follow. I made Thai Fish Cakes, which were rated medium in difficulty, but I found the recipe fairly straightforward. They also turned out well and looked just like the picture in the book.
And yes, there is one picture for each recipe.
I would recommend that readers watch the seasoning though, which can be inconsistent.
For instance, some recipes ask that you add salt to taste, while others tell you exactly how much fish sauce, salt or soya sauce the dish needs.
In some cases, the recipe simply says to 'season well', but does not tell you what to season with.
Overall, I like the spread and variety of recipes and I would refer to this book often, especially when I want to try something new but not too daunting.
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