Mary-Frances Heck

Sweet potatoes add much flavor, texture, color, and nutrients to any dish in which they are featured. Dress ‘em up, dress ‘em down, they work wonderfully in recipes sweet or savory like appetizers, main courses, soups, sides, breads, and of course, desserts. “Sweet Potatoes: Roasted, Loaded, Fried, and Made into Pie”, by Mary-Frances Heck enthusiastically opens up a world of sweet potato possibilities with 60 recipes such as: Creamy Cacio e Pepe; Fluffy Biscuits; Hearty Meat-Free Tacos; Orange-Glazed Cake Doughnuts; Ultimate Cream Cheese Cinnamon Rolls, Trail Mix Cookies; Ice Cream with Browned Meringue; Savory Egg-Topped Galette; Indian Palak Aloo; Chinese Black Date Chicken; and Spanish Huevos Rotos. Sweet Potatoes are plentiful, affordable, and easy to prepare. I have long been a fan of simple baked sweet potatoes, sweet potato pie, and sweet potato fries, but this book from Mary-Frances Heck offers insight into the way sweet potatoes are used in the cuisines from cultures around the world. It’s good fun, and good for you too, to “cook outside your recipe box”—especially with a favorite “superfood” like sweet potatoes. Mary-Frances Heck is a freelance food editor and contributor to Lucky Peach. Her recipes and writing have appeared in numerous cookbooks and magazines including Bon Appetit, Saveur, Cooking Light, Redbook, Rodale's Organic Life, Fitness, Rachael Ray Every Day, SELF, and SHAPE.

Book Copy Gratis Clarkson Potter Publishers via Blogging for Books… (lisätietoja)

Sweet potatoes are one of my very favorite foods and always has been. So I was delighted to get a copy of this cookbook, featuring nothing but sweet potato recipes.

The book starts off with the basic cooking of sweet potatoes – steaming, roasting, boiling, pureed and fried. The only recipe I’ve tried so far is the fries. The author offers two recipes – the hard way and the easy way. I have to admit I took the easy way and the result was delicious! I know, all of these delicious recipes and the first thing I do is make fries! But I had some veggie burgers that I wanted something good with and these were perfect.

Next up, I’ll be making Sweet Potato Risotto. The book says that in this recipe, sweet potato puree flavors and lightens the risotto while keeping it saucy and reducing the amount of dairy traditionally used. Sounds great to me!

And how can I resist Grilled Sweet Potatoes with Garlic-Maple Glaze? And being a vegetarian, I have to try the Sweet Potato “Big Macs”.

There are so many of the breads and backed goods that I’ll be trying this winter, such as the sweet potato biscuits, maple pecan sticky buns and the cake donuts. Oh, and the sweet potato waffles!

But is the book finished with all of that? Of course not, there has to be dessert! And such desserts they are: Black-Bottom Sweet Potato Pudding Pie, Sweet Potato Ice Cream, Sweet Potato and Sherry Flan and Summer Fruit Cobbler.

There are quite a few recipes that contain meat which I won’t be making but there are plenty here for me to try. Some of the recipes are a little daunting with ingredients that I’m not familiar with or needing certain appliances that I don’t have. Also, not all of the recipes contain photos. But the photos that are included are gorgeous.

I know sweet potatoes will make their way to my table a lot more than they used to!

Recommended.

This book was given to me by the publisher in return for an honest review.… (lisätietoja)

I was really excited to get this book from Blogging for Books. That my enthusiasm wasn't sustained was more a factor of the dietary restrictions in my household than that of the book. (Two people: one with an allergy to wheat, the other with an allergy to eggs, and has dietary restrictions to dairy, garlic, and onions. Cooking for us is a real treat, she lied.)

Anyhow, there are some delicious looking recipes in here, that, unfortunately, are off limits to us. Others also look great, but require either substitutions of ingredients, or trips to specialty stores. I think the weakest section is the one for main courses, because the sweet potato is usually an ingredient in the dish, not the focus. Nevertheless, I shall persist, and try to adapt some of these to fit our quirky needs.

Thank you to Blogging for Books and the publishers for sending a copy my way.… (lisätietoja)