Synopses & Reviews
Portobello, Cremini, Shiitake, and Enoki mushrooms—and even morels and chanterelles—are commonly showing up in supermarkets and specialty stores these days. Advances in mushroom cultivation have made varieties that were once available only to experienced mushroom hunters now easy for all to find, and a number of mail-order sources provide more exotic kinds.
But what should a cook do with all these mushroom varieties? How do you bring out their most distinctive characteristics in the kitchen? In A Cook's Book of Mushrooms, Jack Czarnecki, chief proprietor of Joe's Restaurant in Reading, Pennsylvania, provides the answers. Czarnecki gives an account of his life-long fascination with mushrooms—hunting them, cooking them, and eating them. He describes the characteristics of the principle edible mushrooms and provides 100 tasty recipes for both the widely available "wild" mushrooms as well as the more exotic varieties.
Seven chapters cover the major mushroom families—Buttons and Saucers: The Genus Agaricus; Aristocrats of the Forest: Morels and Truffles; The King and Lesser Nobility: Cepes and Their Cousins; Flowers or Fungus?: Chanterelles; Mushrooms from Wood; From the East; and The Best of the Rest. The recipes include appetizers, main courses, salads, and even breakfast dishes that use mushrooms in starring and supporting roles, such as Morels with Ruffled Pasta, Wild Mushroom and Onion Soup, Barbecued Oysters and Shiitake Mushrooms, and Salmon with Chanterelles and Red Pepper Puree. The author—whose knowledge of wine rivals his knowledge of mushrooms—includes wine or beer suggestions for most dishes.
Description
Includes bibliographical references (p. 197-199) and index.
About the Author
Louis B. Wallach is a photographer specializing in food and still life photography who lives in New York with his wife and two children. Among the many cookbooks he has photographed are Kevin Graham's Fish and Seafood Cookbook and The Jewish-American Kitchen.Jack Czarnecki's previous book, A Cook's Book of Mushrooms (Artisan, 1995), received a 1996 James Beard Cookbook Award. He was the proprietor of Joe's Restaurant in his native Reading, Pennsylvania. He lives with his wife and three children in Dundee, Oregon.
Table of Contents
Introduction
Buttons and Saucers: The Genus Agaricus
Aristocrats of the Forest: Morels and Truffles
The King and Lesser Nobility: Cepes and Their Cousins
Flower or Fungus? Chanterelles
Mushrooms from Wood: The Ultimate Recyclers
From the East: Asian Mushrooms
The Best of the Rest
Acknowledgments
Conversions
Mail-Order Sources
Bibliography
Index