Cookbooks: Grill Every Day and Patio Daddy-O at the Grill

For the busy household with no extra time for fussing in the kitchen, the importance of grilling food can not be overstated. Though it’s possible to spend a lot of time preparing the food that will end up on your grill, as Diane Morgan shows us in Grill Every Day (Chronicle Books), quite often the very best foods are the simplest to prepare.

Take, for example, Lemongrass-Grilled Lamb Loin Chops. Basically, you get the grill hot, massage the chops with pre-prepared lemongrass paste, grill four minutes per side for medium-rare and -- voila -- a meat course for four.

But wait: man (and woman) does not live by meat course alone. There are loads of great vegetable and starch recipes for the grill here, as well. Some of them just as simple. Asparagus Spears would be a natural with those lamb chops. The book has us grab 28 spears, prep as instructed, toss them in olive oil, salt and pepper, grill and -- voila again! -- dinner is served.

Grill Every Day is a great book. Subtitled 125 Fast-Track Recipes for Weeknights at the Grill, the recipes here range from super easy to super, duper impressive and accommodate every taste and food restriction. I’ve seen a lot of grilling books in my time. Grill Every Day ranks with the best of them.

The same can not be said for Patio Daddy-O at the Grill (Chronicle Books) by Gideon Bosker, Karen Brooks and Tanya Supina. A sequel to a seminal food and lifestyle book published in the mid-1990s, Patio Daddy-O at the Grill offers up the same self-conscious cool that the original Patio Daddy-O brought to the table, only now it feels like more of the same: only with fire.

Lines like, “At heart, every guy is a pyromaniac, and the outdoor pit is where you get away with it,” seemed funny in 1996. Now it just seems tired. “Don’t get hung up on designer grills. A grill is just a grill.” Yeah, yeah. You see what I mean?

Ditto the art, which is sharp, well done, yet seems not to have evolved very far from the original. Most painful, I think, is that there has been a cookbook revolution over the last dozen years but you can’t tell from Patio Daddy-O at the Grill. Recipes seem overly wordy and even simple things are much more complicated then they need to be.

If you can work your way through all of that, a few of these recipes are absolutely top-notch. I really love the Tropical Fruit Salsa Tuna Sticks: and they’re not as difficult to prepare as would first appear to be the case. And the Emergency Grilled Pound Cake Extravaganza is very good… you can just call it something else.

Cookbooks: Postcards from Portugal by Tessa Kiros

If I were going to dream up a an author of rich and gorgeous cookbooks with international flair, her background would look just like this: I’d have her born in London, for the flavors you can find there. (So many. And from everywhere.) I’d stick needles in a globe and say her mother should be from Finland and her father? Let’s make him a Greek-Cypriot. Then, when she was just a little kid, I’d have the whole family pack and move to… let’s say South Africa, just to blend still more flavors into the mix.

Tessa Kiros is, of course, the author described. She is at an early point in her career. Three previous books have been well received and widely acclaimed: Twelve, Falling Cloudberries and Apples for Jam. But Postcards from Portugal (Whitecap) is showstopping and though we’re only in the four month of 2008, I can’t imagine that it won’t be one of my picks for best of the year.

This is the whole package: a literary visit to a country via wonderful photos, a talented author’s carefully crafted musings and -- most important in a cookbook -- well considered recipes across the full table spectrum -- from essential basics of the cuisine to appetizers to dessert after a wonderful meal -- brilliantly photographed and shared with us in a way that is clear and easy to follow.

Highlights for me: the Coffee Steak is so simple, anyone could prepare it. But the balance of flavors make for a memorable meal, especially with Batatas A Murro (squashed potatoes) on the side. I adored the Gratineed Mussels and think they may well become one of my cocktail party standards. (Elegant, relatively easy and inexpensive, even for a crowd.) And the Tuna or Sardine Pate, which I initially thought fairly bizarre, but now can’t get enough of.

In all ways, Tessa Kiros’ Postcards from Portugal meets my criteria for a truly successful cookbook.

Further Adventures in Search of Perfection by Heston Blumenthal

In this gorgeously produced and surprisingly thick book, Blumenthal looks at the preparation of exactly eight dishes: hamburger; fish pie; chicken tikka masala; risotto; peking duck; chilli con carne; baked alaska and trifle. However, he looks at the them so closely, there are times that they probably want to squirm. Blumenthal’s risotto, for example, takes only about 35 minutes to prepare... once you’ve dealt with the 10 hours of prep time required to make it in his way. While it’s likely that very (very, very) few people will make risotto in exactly the way Blumenthal recommends, on the way to the recipes, you’ll learn an awful lot about rice and starch and many other things you’ve probably never considered deeply until now.

Picking off where he left off in 2006’s In Search of Perfection, Further Adventures in Search of Perfection (Bloomsbury), Blumenthal goes to excessive (some would be say crazy ass) lengths to deconstruct a handful of favorites. “Ultimately,” writes Blumenthal, “that’s what this book is about the excitement and enjoyment of discovering new routes to the cooking of old favorites.”

The routes are extreme, to say the very, very least. For example, in order to determine if marinades actually do tenderize meat, at one point Blumenthal sticks chicken breasts into an MRI (this on the road to finding the perfect chicken tikka masala). If you’ve seen him on television, you know that some of the effort he goes through in his endless search for the perfection is… well… a little silly. Same here. But, at the same time, it’s a deeply interesting tour through a surprising number of ingredients and techniques by a man whose internationally acclaimed restaurant -- Fat Duck -- and OBE attest to the passion he brings to his quest.

“Increasingly,” Blumenthal writes, “I’ve realised that culinary perfection means not only mastery of technique, but also consideration of the sensory and psychological aspects of a dish.” If that’s a line that hits you where you live, you will love Further Adventures in Search of Perfection.

Review: Shellfish: The Cookbook by Karen Barnaby

Today in January Magazine’s cookbook section, Linda L. Richards looks at Shellfish: The Cookbook by Karen Barnaby. Says Richards:

The title of Karen Barnaby’s ninth cookbook puts me in mind of the first time I encountered this chef’s food. It was my first visit to Vancouver’s Fish House in Stanley Park and it was deep in the 1990s. In retrospect, at the time Barnaby could only have been executive chef there for a couple, three years, at most. I ordered the cioppino, a special favorite of mine and one I’ve discovered is a good test of a chef whose work is new to you. It seems to me that a cioppino will show you something of a chef’s soul.

When my cioppino arrived that first night it took my breath away. For starters it was, quite simply, the loveliest food that had ever been set in front of me. At a glance it all looked perfectly cooked. But more: it was artfully presented. It was beautiful. Eating it brought no disappointments. I instructed my server to send compliments to the chef and after a while Barnaby appeared at our table. I supplicated accordingly, telling her just what I felt: that no one had ever served me food quite so lovely. She took these compliments as was her due: pleasantly but without surprise. One got the feeling she’d heard these effusions before.

The full review is here.

Holiday Treats: Green & Black’s Chocolate Recipes

Almost everyone knows that the true meaning of Easter is… chocolate. (If this interpretation shocks you, you’ve seriously come to the wrong place.)

A lifetime of Easter Creme Eggs; of annual garden hunts for chocolate treats of various description; of family meals focused on all sorts of action, but hinged on a chocolate-laden dessert has taught many of us everything we need to know about Easter: the holiday is the celebration of spring in many cultures and it culminates in the exchange and enjoyment of that sweet, dark, sensuous treat.

The beauty of this reading of the holiday is obvious: if Easter is really about chocolate, there is no religious axe to grind, no debts to pay, nothing to prove. There is only the celebration, and chocolate is on our minds. And if all of this is true, there is no better book for this particular celebration than Green & Black’s Chocolate Recipes (Kyle Books), first published (to great fanfare) in 2004, now available in a revised edition. If you’re a chocolate fan, or even have a strong sweet tooth, a single trip through the book will push all the other Easter silliness right out of your head. Perhaps for good.

My favorite recipe for the season is Mayan Gold Stolen. This is rich, decadent, beautiful: dried fruit, marzipan, yeast dough and chocolate and chocolate and chocolate. I was blown away by the easy no-bake elegance of Konditor & Cook’s Chocolate Cookie Cake. The over-the-top complication of Sunday Chocolate Cake (complicated enough, I admit, that I’ve not tried this one: just drooled over it).

And though the sweet’s are the highlight, it would be possible (a stretch, but possible) to do your entire Easter menu from these pages: especially if you’re not that into vegetables. How about Swedish Chocolate Coffee Lamb; Italian Venison Agrodolce or Mole Poblano de Guajolote (dark chile, nut and chocolate mole with turkey)?

The book is beautifully executed and while the recipes aren’t necessarily for beginning cooks, all of them are manageable.

Not a Peep

I was recently washed away in a brightly colored flood of fun by Peeps!: Recipes and Crafts to make With Your Favorite Marshmallow Treat (Chronicle Books). Let’s face it: this is a ridiculous book. In a world of serious cookbooks filled with recipes for all sorts of important and self-important foods, who needs a book on what to do with those weird marshmallow treats you possibly haven’t thought about since childhood? Yet Peeps! Is a merry blast of happy colors tinted all the more bright by nostalgia.

If you do not know what Peeps are, I am not going to explain them, but these people can. Calling them “sugar dusted chicks and bunnies” really doesn’t quite cover it, yet that’s just what they are. And though Peeps! tells us the confection has been around since the 1950s, like the author, I strongly associated them with the mad sugar rush that was growing up in the 1970s. The author sums this up quite sharply:

Like most kids in the 1970s, I had a sweet tooth that could not be sated. The sweeter – and more brightly colored – the better, was my motto.

And, certainly, Peeps fit that bill on all counts.

So it’s one thing to wax poetic about an odd confection from your childhood. After all, no matter where or when you grew up, you certainly have one of those. But to write a whole cookbook about it? That’s another thing altogether. And yet, here we are.

And so we have Peeps Fondue (bring on the chocolate), Peeps Affogato (bring on the espresso) and even Peeps in a Blanket (bring on the crepes). A different section brings us crafts featuring Peeps, including a Peeps printed tote, a Peepiñata (I’m not even going to explain. I don’t need to) and a Sugar Cookie Peeps Coop.

As I said earlier, this is a ridiculous book. It works, though. And it only works because author Charity Ferreria has the food and creative chops to pull it off. Her projects -- both food and craft -- are often sweet but never to the point of cloying and even if you don’t, for instance, care one whit about a Garland of Peeps or a Peeps Wedding Cake Topper, you can’t help but admire the panache with which she puts together these Peepsish dreams.

Review: Good Food Tastes Good by Carol Hart

Today, in January Magazine’s non-fiction section, contributing editor Diane Leach reviews Good Food Tastes Good by Carol Hart. Says Leach:

Where the self-help market was once awash in love books -- how to fall in, how to fall out, how to survive or thrive, we are now deluged with treatises dwelling on another unavoidable human pastime: eating. The average reader cannot walk into a bookshop, open a paper, or log online without falling over the latest gastronomic advice. Eat organic. Eat local. Eat low-fat. No butter! Margarine is poisonous! Eat carbs. Avoid carbs. No sugar! No red meat! Eat more leafy greens, except the bagged ones contaminated by e.coli. Eat more fish, but memorize your Monterey Bay Aquarium do’s and don’ts card, lest you buy fish nearing extinction, high in mercury, or otherwise toxic.

No question about it: food is a fraught issue.

Science writer Carol Hart enters the fray with Good Food Tastes Good. She contends that Americans are conditioned to ignore fresh, tasty foods in favor of boxed, canned, ultraprocessed products manufactured by a handful of megacorporations. The evil media has drilled into us that fresh foods like spinach or peas are just plain yucky, that the fresh ham from your local farmer is bad for you (ham fat!), that life is better if you never cook at all. Off you go to Food Mart, where, ever gullible, you buy wilted, sprayed produce shipped from Chile or February’s pallid greenhouse tomatoes.

The full review is here.

Holiday Gift Guide: Cookbooks

Eat, Drink & Be Vegan: Everyday Vegan Recipes Worth Celebrating by Dreena Burton (Arsenal Pulp Press) 243 pages
You don’t have to actually be a vegan to enjoy Dreena Burton’s cookbooks and to make them a part of your usual kitchen library. This is healthy, nutritious cooking suitable for a family or anyone interested in eating for optimum health. So, OK: all of that you can get other places, as well. The magic that Burton weaves into her cookbooks is that she treats food in a sane and normal way and prepares her delicious and completely vegan family meals without fanfare or weird and convoluted steps and preparations. The resulting food looks more like what some kids (and even adults) insist on calling “normal food” than anything you’ve ever seen come from a vegan kitchen. And so you have Pumpkin Cheese Pie (made with soy cheese) and Rosemary Cornmeal Polenta Fries, there are all manner of curries and pestos and soups and stews. This is healthy eating, simply enough told that even the most amateur of chefs can follow Burton’s healthy and delicious recipes.

Fire Hall Cooking with Jeff the Chef: Surefire Recipes to Feed Your Crew by Jeff Derraugh (Touchwood Editions) 230 pages
In his introduction to Fire Hall Cooking, cookbook author and genuine fire guy tells a story that illustrates exactly where his head -- and his heart -- are at. Derraugh tells of putting in a shift at a firehall across town from his own. Someone called the guys for breakfast, and they all descended, fire guy style, to tuck in. Someone asked how many pieces of bacon each man was allowed. The cook responded “Nine.” And when Derraugh restrained himself, someone asked if he could have Derraugh’s. “That man had 14 pieces of bacon,” Derraugh writes. “That’s why our fire trucks now carry defibrillators, so that we can jump-start each other after we send that breakfast barge of cholesterol to our hearts.” So here’s what we can understand about this author: he knows from feeding hungry guys, he is concerned about health, he likes variety. And, additionally, he’s funny and he can write. The recipes in Fire Hall Cooking are mostly solid, well thought out versions of classic dishes, though some of them have been given funny names. (Funky Fire Hall Chili, Mozzasaurus Chicken, Scorchin’ Lasagna and so on.) This is a fun cookbook with lots of easy-to-follow recipes featuring the type of food most families will enjoy.

Gentleman’s Relish: And Other English Culinary Oddities (National Trust Books) 143 pages
For such a tiny book -- and it really is tiny -- Gentleman’s Relish packs a very solid punch. The introduction explains the book slightly: “The recipe for Patum Perperium, The Gentleman’s Relish®, has remained a closely guarded secret from the moment it was first devised by John Osborn in 1828. Since then this unique blend of anchovies, butter, herbs and spices has become established as one of the quintessential treats enjoyed by British gentlemen all over the world.” While the book never does get around to telling us how to make Gentleman’s Relish (I suppose some things are best left secret, after all) many other things are explained. Actually -- and again -- a surprising number of things, considering the diminutive dimensions of the book. For example, traditional recipes for Tipsy Cake, fudge, butterscotch, Mulligatawny Soup, pickled walnuts, kedgeree, bakewell tart, shepherd’s pie, barley water, spotted dick and many other things that a gentleman’s table had best not be without. Some items -- kippers, porridge, chelsea buns, boar’s head and good old gentleman’s relish itself, to name just a very few -- don’t include recipes, just information about the thing and how it fits into a proper gentlemen’s style of life. A well executed little book that would easily fit into a stocking, were one so inclined.

Menus from an Orchard Table by Heidi Noble (Whitecap Books) 320 pages
Heidi Noble’s first cookbook is a stunning personal reflection of her culinary art. While you can read about the 100 mile diet in other books, here we see it not mentioned, but certainly -- in most regards -- in action. There is nothing not to love in Menus from an Orchard Table, from Noble’s passionate and single-focused view of food, her artistic and uncompromised application, original recipes properly shared and wonderful and appetizing photographs by Chris Mason Stearns. My highlights: these two altered the course of summer 2007 for me. Noble’s Red Onion and Thyme Tarte Tatin and her Chickpea Soup with Fontina Finished with Lovage Pesto. -- Aaron Blanton

My Last Supper: 50 Great Chefs and Their Final Meals by Melanie Dunea (Bloomsbury) 218 pages
The structure and execution of My Last Supper is such that it’s perfect for this particular roundup of books. While it makes a fabulous gift -- it’s impressive, interesting, lovely -- I can’t imagine too many people actually purchasing it for themselves. And again, it’s impressive, but who needs to impress themselves? What we have here are themed photos by Melanie Dunea, whose work has appeared in Vanity Fair, Town & Country, Gourmet and many other magazines known for gorgeous photos and good ideas. Here Dunea asks 50 of the -- bar none -- top chefs in the world what sort of vittles they’d fix themselves if they were on their way out the big door. She publishes their replies without comment, accompanied by a striking, creative photo of each. Then, in a separate section, she hits the highlights of the last stated meals with a recipe or two from the final menu of each chef. And so you have Raymond Blanc talking about “something humble and simple” and Scott Conant “seated at a large table, covered with platters, spending time with the ones I love,” and Tyler Florence with “a great New Orleans jazz band playing a dirge” while on the table there’s “No froufrou French. No snout-to-tail. No fucking foie gras. On the table would be the classic Southern feast of my childhood.” But don’t take my opening words here as a negative criticism: the very fact that My Last Supper is so impractical and lush that few people would buy it for themselves makes it a fabulous gift for the foodie in your life.

New World Provence: Modern French Cooking for Friends and Family by Alessandra and Jean-Francis Quaglia (Arsenal Pulp Press, 215 pages)
Alessandra and Jean-Francis Quaglia met in Nice, at a restaurant where both were working in the kitchen. In the foreword to New World Provence, Dominique LeStanc, the chef and owner of Nice’s La Merenda touchingly tells their story. At the time LeStanc was chef de cuisine at an important hotel in Nice. LeStanc hired the passionate young French chef, son of an accomplished chef, Suzanne Quaglia. Not long after, she hired a young Canadian chef, named Alessandra. LeStanc noticed they shared similar sensibilities about food. “Their chemistry flourished,” writes LeStanc, “and soon they were never apart.” In 1997, five years after leaving Nice, they opened Provence Mediterranean Grill in Vancouver. A few years later, they followed up the neighborhood bistro with the posher Provence Marinaside. The restaurants, and the Quaglias (four of them now: the couple have two young sons) continue to flourish. But all of this is, in a sense, backstory and you don’t need to know any of it to enjoy New World Provence, a cookbook that, like the Quaglias, takes old world Provence-style cooking and retools it for North American markets and sensibilities: that is to say, the fare is lighter and more health conscious than the traditional versions might be, yet without loss of substance or flavor. A neat trick. A few of the recipes from the book have become fast favorites -- the Coco Bean and Wild Mushroom Ragout was comforting and surprisingly delicate, the Bouillabaisse was so easy, it practically made itself, the whole section on sauces alone makes the book worthwhile: all the classics, lucidly shared -- but everything looks wonderful. And everything we tried was a success.

Nigella Express by Nigella Lawson (Hyperion) 391 pages
Oh, Nigella. My love. My fantasy chef. If there’s one woman out there who represents everything there is to love about the world, it’s Nigella Lawson. Food goddess and self-proclaimed purveyor of food porn. This is Lawson’s sixth book of recipes, and everything looks good enough to eat. Arranged into somewhat arbitrary chapters -- why does Blackberry Crisp belong in Workday Winners rather than Razzle Dazzle? -- you’ll find appetizers, main dishes, side dishes, desserts, you name it. We’re talking about Caramel Croissant Pudding. We’re swooning over Pear and Ginger Muffins and Warm Potato Salad. We’re salivating over Roly-Poly Pudding, Broccoli and Stilton Soup and Caribbean Creams. As in all her books, Nigella’s signature style comes popping through in her highly dramatic and full-on delicious writing. Frankly, she writes just like she talks, in prose peppered (if you will) with allusion, alliteration and all-consuming (if you will again) passion. This new book is a confection of splendid ideas, and I defy you not to fly to the market to get some key ingredients the moment you open it. Nigella, I pray you read this. And after you’re done with whatever you’re making, that you let me lick the bowl. -- Tony Buchsbaum

River Cottage Handbook No. 1: Mushrooms by John Wright (Bloomsbury) 256 pages
River Cottage Handbook No. 1 is a wonderful book. I can’t imagine I will ever part with it. And, in the autumn, if you find me out of doors anywhere near my home, I’ll likely have the Handbook somewhere on me: in a good-sized pocket, or a medium-sized bag. That is, it’s small enough to be a field guide, but not as ridiculously small as some where you can’t really get a proper look. I should explain: though I imagine there will be over River Cottage handbooks, at present as far as I know, there is just the one. And it’s on mushrooms. But it isn’t just another mushroom book: it is the mushroom book I’ve always dreamed about but did not, as far as I know, exist before. That is, it’s like a field guide that concerns itself only with edible species as well as the few poisonous species that look like edibles. (Which, arguably, is just as important.) There’s also a very strong cookbook component, just in case you find a bunch of wild edibles and then don’t know what to do with them. Most of the recipes are simple, some are ingenuous and many would work with plain old get-them-at-the-market button mushrooms. The photos are all very good, as are the reproductions and, as far as I can tell, there are no color shifts. In other words, when you find them in the wild, they look just like the mushrooms in the book. (A no-brainer you say? Yet it’s not always the case.) I don’t know where River Cottage is, though I’m guessing the UK, since it’s obviously an Anglo book. However I live on the west coast of North America and recognized almost all the species mentioned. The habitats and seasons worked, as well. And, finally, I would imagine there will be a River Cottage Handbook No. 2 through some higher number and, when there is, I also imagine it will cover what it sets out to very well. But, honestly? I’m good to go. I’ve got my field guide to edibles and some new recipes: let me know when it’s morel season. Maybe we’ll talk then. -- Linda L. Richards

Review: Alone in the Kitchen With an Eggplant edited by Jenni Ferrari-Adler

Today, in January Magazine’s non-fiction section, contributing editor Diane Leach reviews Alone in the Kitchen With an Eggplant edited by Jenni Ferrari-Adler. Says Leach:

The adage of making silk purses from sow’s ears has lost its oomph for a generation of foodies raised on Fergus Henderson. Instead we might say a crispy pig ear salad cannot be got from the frozen foods section. So it is with Jenni Ferrari-Adler’s anthology, which borrows both concept and title from the late, great Laurie Colwin’s essay, which you can find in the magnificent Home Cooking. If you haven’t read Home Cooking, or its sequel, More Home Cooking, I suggest you drive to your nearest independent bookseller and purchase both books immediately. Now. This minute.

The full review is here.

Review: The Tenth Muse: My Life in Food by Judith Jones

Today, in January Magazine’s biography section, January contributing editor Diane Leach reviews The Tenth Muse: My Life in Food by Judith Jones. Says Leach:

Judith Jones hails from another era, one where garlic-fearing bluebloods hired cooks who served fish on Fridays and no upright person consumed French food, a cuisine that, with all those sauces, surely had something to hide. Daughters, after educations at Spence and Barnard, were expected to make good marriages and carry on the family lineage. Jones managed to escape this almost-forgotten mold, moving to Paris after college, where she hung out with an artistic crowd who loved foods that gave her mother fits: oysters (which, young Jones assures writes her parents, “had no ill effects”), entrecote, chicken liver pate, and the unpasteurized cheeses still widely feared on North American shores.

The full review is here.

Review: Crescent City Cooking by Susan Spicer

Today, in January Magazine’s cookbook section, contributing editor Diane Leach reviews Crescent City Cooking by Susan Spicer. Says Leach:

Susan Spicer is proprietor of New Orleans restaurants Bayona and Herbsaint. With her long-awaited cookbook, I was hoping for a taste of a now lost New Orleans. I opened Crescent City with a mixture of sadness and anticipation. What was still there? What had been lost?

The full review is here.

Review: A Year of Spicy Sex by Gabrielle Morrissey

Today, in January Magazine’s cookbook section, contributing editor Cherie Thiessen gets us ready for some holiday fireworks with A Year of Spicy Sex by Gabrielle Morrissey. Says Thiessen:

My apologies for the length of time it has taken to review this book. But you have to realize there are 52 recipes tucked between these licentious covers and they all have to be tried in order to give an honest evaluation of their worth. My hunk and I are not 30 anymore; we sacrificed quantity for quality some years back.

The full review is here.

Review: Heat by Bill Buford

Today, in January Magazine’s cookbook section (though it could have just as easily slotted into biography), Diane Leach looks at Heat by Bill Buford. Says Leach:

I learned many things from Bill Buford’s Heat. The first is that I could never cook professionally. The second is how to prepare polenta correctly. But let us begin with the first. Bill Buford arguably already led a life many would find enviable. Having started Granta magazine in the UK, he came to the United States and began working at The New Yorker, where he held the powerful post of fiction editor. But like many of us approaching middle age, he found himself longing to do something else. In his case, this something else was cooking for Mario Batali, he of Iron Chef, Molto Mario and a few dozen famous restaurants.

You can read Leach’s review here.

Review: Halibut: The Cookbook edited by Karen Barnaby

Today, in January Magazine’s cookbook section, contributing editor Adrian Marks cooks from Halibut: The Cookbook edited by Karen Barnaby. Marks says:

The recipes range from ultra-simple -- suitable for an after work slap together or for the home chef with only the most rudimentary kitchen skills -- all the way up to complicated meals for friends that will take hours of pleasurable concentration to prepare. Appropriately enough, most fall somewhere in between.

The full review is here.