Food Network Kitchens Making It Easy

Although I ended up returning this book, as I bought too much for one person for XMas, I did consider keeping it for myself. It has a lot of recipes & I am a Food Network fan. I honestly didn't really go through the pages when it arrived, as I already had decided it had to be returned. I bought it originally because it was for a Food Network fan, a bachelor who likes to cook easily & quickly and it seemed to be written simply.

This book is awesome . I love it the recipe are simple and really delicious ! I will defenitly recommend it. I also bought simple and simply delicious by sylvie rocher which is also great !

That's the goal of these cookbook authors, the behind the scenes chef staff of the infamous Food Network for all us culinary junkies. Each recipe in their collection relies upon one of four strategies to help one cook better and faster with max results: Pantry Picks; Double Duty; Real Quick; Cool Tools. In addition, each recipe usually includes: Game Plan for organization tips; ShopSmart and Know-How. These will help all cooks to heighten their skills and make it more enjoyable for cook and cookees. Their is some really cool recipes here, which as one who has large and growing cookbook collection has not seen before: Goat Cheese Nut Log with Chile; Blasted Balsamic Chicken; Anipasta Pizza; Grilled Trout in Grape Leaves; Steamed Sea Bass with Citrus and Herbs; Turkey Enchilada Casserole; Crispy Pork Medallions with Apple-Horseradish Sauce; Saucy Orzo with Summer Squash; Quick and Easy Berry Tart; Cocunut-Lime Pudding Cake; Little Cheesecakes with Strawberry Sauce. This won't fill the bill likely if you're looking for exotic, multi-layered, most-of-the day consuming and most-of-your kitchen tools consuming recipes. But for those other moments when you want to provide wholesome, creative, delightful and minimal effort with max results food, this would be a great volume to own or give, or better yet, do both. Photos are nice, and the nice Two-Color spreads e.g. Ice Cream sundae bar, et al pages are neat and clever idea, just for the thought starters unless you just follow their advice.

`making it easy' is the second cookbook from the kitchen staff of the `food network'. Like the first volume, none of the Food Network's celebrity chefs are even mentioned in the book, and there is no reference to any of their programs in any of the recipes. And, as a religious watcher of Food Network shows, I see no celebrity chef fingerprints on any of the recipes. Making food fast is a very popular topic for cookbooks and for culinary personalities, lead by the Food Network's own Rachael Ray who, I believe, does this subject as well or better than anyone else. It is important to note that this book is not about `fast', it is about `easy', which seems to me to be a much more realistic subject, as one of the requirements to doing `fast' cooking at home is that you have good kitchen skills, especially with a knife, which will cut down on prep time and especially cut down on tracking down your mandoline, food mill, or stick blender from behind the flour canister or the salad spinner. The book does not turn its back on special equipment. In fact, `cool tools' is one of the four primary categories, joined by `pantry picks', `double duty', and `real quick'. Each recipe is identified as falling into one of these four categories. I think it is extremely odd that every recipe would fall into one and only one of these categories. A slow cooker recipe will easily do `double duty' recipes and a pressure cooker recipe would certainly be a good candidate for `real quick', unless the authors considered that breaking out, cleaning, and stowing this special equipment disqualifies recipes from `real quick'. Anyway, this is just a missed opportunity for carrying a theme to its logical conclusion, not a demerit against the recipes in the book. The `pantry picks' recipes are meant to be made from items the authors expect you to keep on hand in the cupboard, fridge, or freezer. Pastas, canned fruits and vegetables, nuts, durable vegetables, and frozen staple meats are the stars of these recipes. The `double duty' recipes are meant to create two meals from a single session in the kitchen, or, recipes to make the best use of leftover protein such as the 8 pounds of white meat left over from your 20 pound holiday roast turkey. For these situations, the authors provide recipes for a casserole, a Hoppin john, and turkey turnovers. The `real quick' recipes are meant to go from the fridge to the serving table in 30 minutes or less. The stars of these meals, as with every fast cooking protein dish, are seafood, boneless chicken breasts and beef and pork filets. For the penny pinchers, there are no veal recipes in this book. The `cool tools' label is applied to recipes using the slow cooker, the pressure cooker, and the microwave, all tools which can either reduce cooking time or at least reduce the time you have to spend fussing with the food as it cooks. All of this reminds me that I have yet to see any recent cookbook done on cooking economically. I think this is a