Recipes: Cooks, Chefs and CookBooks

I am no "chef de cuisine"...but I do follow a good recipe.  After I've followed the recipe a few times, I can then experiment from there.....do you do the same?  Add a little of this, substitute a bit of that and voila!  Something else my husband and I like to do: "de-construct" a dish prepared by a chef!  When we dine out, we secretly savor the taste and try to figure out what ingredients were used and, hopefully, remember it when we get home.

My favorite person to follow (and watch on the Food Channel) is Ina Garten aka "Barefoot Contessa".  Her recipes are easy to follow.  And like she says, "How easy was that"?

I will admit to having printed many of her recipes: some I've tried and some I hope to try.  Every meal I've served up following her recipe has been a hit.  I've purchased some of her books and some of the pages bear splatters and oily fingerprints as I cook and read.

When we were on the low-carb diet 10 years ago (and we lost lots of weight) I used a cookbook that was so very helpful:  500 LowCarb Recipes by Dana Carpender.  I still use this cookboook since many of the recipes are so delicious.  (Later on a follow-up book was printed, but for me, nothing was as good as the original.)  It took 7 years for some of the weight to come back...beaucoup du vin, pain et frommage in France, molto vino e pasta in Italy, mucho paella y vino in Spain and too much good living in South Florida, my "other" home.

There is another chef I like to watch on TV is Tyler Florence.  He has a nice way of cooking and explaining as he goes along.  And he seems to enjoy cooking diverse dishes: Spanish, Italian, British, etc. etc.

And who doesn't love Jaime Oliver?  He has such a delightful way about him and he shows you how to prepare a gourmet meal (simple steps) from starter to dessert.

When I can catch her on reruns, Daisy Martinez made some great meals, too.  She always added a little "zip" to cooking with aromatic spices and herbs.

Well, hope you decide to check out some recipes and get cooking!

Buon Apetito   Bon Appetit   Buen Provecho    Enjoy Your Meal