| | |  |
Indian Cookbooks | Home » » 5 Spices, 50 Dishes: Simple Indian Recipes Using Five Common Spices | | | | | | | Description: | | The premise is simple: with five common spices and a few basic ingredients, home cooks can create fifty mouthwatering Indian dishes, as diverse as they are delicious. Cooking teacher Ruta Kahate has chosen easy-to-find spicescoriander, cumin, mustard, cayenne pepper, and turmericto create authentic, accessible Indian dishes everyone will love. Roasted Lamb with Burnt Onions uses just two spices and three steps resulting in a meltingly tender roast. Steamed Cauliflower with a Spicy TomatoSauce and Curried Mushrooms and Peas share the same three spices, but each tastes completely different. Suggested menus offer inspiration for entire Indian dinners. For quick and easy Indian meals, keep it simple with 5 Spices, 50 Dishes. | | | Product Details: | | | Author:
| Ruta Kahate | | Paperback:
| 132 pages | | Publisher:
| Chronicle Books | | Publication Date:
| May 31, 2007 | | Language:
| English | | ISBN:
| 081185342X | | Product Length:
| 8.53 inches | | Product Width:
| 8.09 inches | | Product Height:
| 0.6 inches | | Product Weight:
| 1.12 pounds | | Package Length:
| 8.7 inches | | Package Width:
| 8.0 inches | | Package Height:
| 0.6 inches | | Package Weight:
| 1.1 pounds | | Average Customer Rating:
|  based on 73 reviews |
| | | | Customer Reviews: | |
Average Customer Review:
 ( 73 customer reviews )
Write an online review and share your thoughts with other customers.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
114 of 114 found the following review helpful:
Brilliant Indian Home CookingJul 14, 2007
By Bay Area Reader
This is a great book. It's premise is simple, but not simplistic - take 5 spices combined in various ways and produce a variety of Indian dishes for any occasion. Everything I've made from it has succeeded, and I will certainly make again. The coverplate (chickpeas with dill) is total comfort food, and uses dill as a vegetable in a new and surprising way. I've also made and enjoyed the Cabbage Salad (a fresh take on slaw), Indian Fried fish (tasty and savory), Sweet Potato with Ginger and Lemon, Corn with Mustard Seeds, and the fantastic Mussels in a Green Curry. And anyone who thinks they don't like okra NEEDS to try the Okra Raita - my favorite of all favorites in the book.
Recipes are well-presented, clear and easy to follow. I cook a lot of Indian food, but in no way felt that these recipes were dumbed-down at all. Kahate wisely confines her recipes to simple, practical ones with accessible ingredients. Does Indian food offer complex biriyanis with 15 spices and many ingredients? Sure. But that's not what is offered here. This is fresh home cooking, bursting with flavor, yet able to be cooked quickly. The flavors of the ingredients is prominent. And Kahate is a good guide to ingredients and techniques.
Highly recommended. Mine is already stained from much use!
36 of 36 found the following review helpful:
 Great recipes, poor quality bindingJan 26, 2009
By D. Montgomery
I've really enjoyed exploring some of the recipes in this book and getting a feel for the simple spice combinations. It's been a great addition to our broad ambitions for cooking styles to have learned, from this book, how to use these spices effectively. The shrimp and fish marinades alone are worth the price of the book.
The only problem is the binding. The pages totally fell out of the cover after about a dozen uses. Quite poorly made. 5 stars for content, 1 star for printing = 3 stars.
32 of 32 found the following review helpful:
Easy Recipes and Delicious ResultsOct 17, 2007
By Steven Muni
"Foothills Bear"
I have made several recipes from this book and have been delighted with all so far. I cook a lot of Indian food, and am a fan of the books of Mahadur Jaffrey and Julie Sahni, but this book is going to be used as much as their books. The premise is simple but not simplistic. The recipes are easy to follow and the results are delicious. Particular raves at my house go to the carrot raita, with it's inclusion of walnut pieces and raisins, (I used dried cranberries.) And the Goan eggplant and shrimp curry is a winner, although I used a little more shrimp and eggplant than called for in the recipe and used a full can of coconut milk instead of the cup of water and cup of coconut milk called for. This is a worthy addition to anyone's collection of cookbooks.
29 of 30 found the following review helpful:
Indian Cooking Made AccessibleJul 06, 2007
By S. Dowling
I love to cook but am intimidated by many ethnic recipes as they seem complicated and require far too much work given my crazy schedule. This book is different. I love the fact that I'm not buying millions of ingredients that I'll only use once and I've found it helpful to have a picture of what the dish should resemble. Oh, and most importantly, the end results are delicious!! It doesn't hurt that this is a gorgeous cookbook - the photos are mouthwatering. Enjoy!
18 of 19 found the following review helpful:
A great Indian cook book for both the gourmet cook and professional chefJul 02, 2007
By Alison Negrin
This fine little treasure of a cookbook can be a great introduction for gourmet cooks who are unfamiliar with Indian cuisine. For the professional chef it contains creative, seasonal and well tested recipes that can offer new possibilities for any restaurant menu. I am particularly attracted to the array of vegetable recipes, for example corn with mustard seeds or butternut squash and green beans in coconut-milk curry. The clever lay-out of the book as well as the number of recipes(50) and beautiful photos make this a must-have cookbook to add to your shelf.
See all 73 customer reviews on Amazon.com
| | |
|
