The Food You Want to Eat: 100 Smart, Simple Recipes

I bought this book for my son and he has really enjoyed it. The recipes not the usual hamburger and mac/cheese. These are good recipes for people who like more sophisticated food but can get intimidated by long recipes.

`The Food You Want to Eat (100 Smart, Simple Recipes) by foodie `Queer Eye', Ted Allen fits the mold of several other `celebrity non-chef' cookbooks where fame rests more on culinary journalism or TV presence or both. Never having seen a `Queer Eye for the Straight Guy' all the way through, my best exposure to Mr. Allen's culinary acumen has been as a judge on the Food Network's `Iron Chef America', and Mr. Allen gives much thanks to his fellow judge, Jeffrey Steingarten, Iron Chefs Bobby Flay and Mario Batali, and culinary commentator extraordinare, Alton Brown. Flay, Batali, and Brown have returned the favor by providing laudatory blurbs to adorn the cover of this book. Speaking of covers, this book has the distinction of sporting a clear vinyl protective cover over its usual trade paperback. This gimmick encourages us to think of the book as less pervious to foody smudges on the book's pages as we make the luscious recipes contained herein. I'm sorry to say I believe the effort may be wasted, as it makes it more difficult to have the book lay flat, open to a particular page, which is a far more useful physical attribute of a cookbook. Well, the thought was there. At least it does seem as if the paper on which the pages are printed are just a bit more robust than your average trade paperback meant for nothing more strenuous than reading. The titles of the book sets us up to expect a book of recipes for comfort food, trendy food, and easy to make food. My hero Alton's blurb offers the opinion that Mr. Allen has succeeded in both offering recipes for desirable dishes and in telling us the proper way to make these recipes. To a great extent, I have to agree with AB, with the comment that while Alton Brown gives us some of the ultimate foodie books, Allen's book is specifically NOT a foodie book. In that regard, it is much closer to what I understand his role on the `Queer Eye' show, where he and his colleagues give advice on living to people who are neither foodies, fashionistas, or any other flavor of obsessive / compulsive behavior. I am happy to say that in fact, Ted Allen's book is better than several recent efforts by Food Network faves such as Giada De Laurentiis or Dave Lieberman. I agree completely with Alton in that these are indeed the kinds of recipes the average person will like to make on Saturday or Sunday or a holiday on the grill. He opens with a few `top ten' recipes for macaroni and cheese, roast chicken, grilled steak, braised short ribs, fried chicken, and caramel brownie sundaes. His procedures for these and all his other recipes are thoughtful and not necessarily `quick' versions, but then he didn't promise us fast, he only promised simple. For example, the fried chicken recipe calls for an overnight marinade in buttermilk. This is a step used by all the best southern cookery writers I've read, so he is off to a very good start. He also recommends frying in shallow oil rather than deep oil, exactly as recommended by our mu

From the steak 101 section to the veggie stuff, I've loved everything I've cooked out of this book so far! But I'm especially psyched about the suggested wine pairings for every dish--that is such a great way for a new cook to get into the (not neccessarily) scary world of wine. And there's a salmon recipe that Ted made on the Today Show that has totally won over my non-fish-loving household, so that makes him heroic in my book!

I'm kinda new at cooking, and I don't have a lot of time to do it, so I really appreciate cookbooks with recipes that aren't too difficult. At the same time, especially when I'm having friends (or dates!) to dinner, I want to serve food that's interesting and real--the microwave is fine, but not for company! I've tried the prime rib, one of the pizzas, the salmon with tomato vinaigrette, and the creme brulee so far, and everything has come out AMAZING!

With 3 small children it is often hard to find simple yet delicious meals to cook that satisfy everyone. This book offers both easy and delicious meals to choose from. I would recommend it to everyone of all ages.