The Bottom Line
Besides being a useful cookbook, this one is a fascinating read on the history of cuisine in America.
Pros
- Great coverage of the new American standard recipes.
- Excellent background on the the origins of each cuisine in America.
- A very instructive book for the specific techniques or ingredients required.
Cons
- None found.
Description
- Contains more than 400 recipes.
- Recipes cover 18 ethnic cuisines and 14 regional cuisines.
- There's also a selection of recipes that cut across all ethnic and regional groups in America.
Guide Review - It's All American Food by David Rosengarten
I love how David Rosengarten turns the common perception of American cuisine on its head in this delicious cookbook. Instead of the steak and potatoes that once characterized typical American fare, he opens up the menu to a multiplicity of cuisines that have been transformed on these shores. Whether it's Chinese American food, Italian American food or Philadelphia Cheesesteaks, it's all American food in this book. Rosengarten makes the very persuasive argument that although the recipes for our favorite foods may have originated far from here, they were adapted to the local American conditions and turned into something that is now indigenous to America.
Rosengarten writes with an obvious passion for these American favorites, and readers will find themselves nodding their heads in agreement as he writes about one favorite food after another. In a sense this book is a "best of" for many ethnic and regional cuisines, while at the same time it's a compendium of the one great American cuisine.
