The Bread Baker's Apprentice
Mastering the Art of Extraordinary Bread

Peter Reinhart

Hardbound

$35.00

One of our daughters requested this book as a birthday gift one year. Off it went and soon we were hearing about dinner after dinner that she hosted for her friends, and all the bread she was baking in her very minimalist student kitchen.

And that's the point - this is not only the quintessential book on the art of making bread, it is the only bread baking book that doesn't presume that you have a professional kitchen at your disposal (though our daughter said she didn't find tips on how to handle an oven whose door couldn't be opened fully because it hit the refrigerator . . .). At the same time, it doesn't skimp at all on the quality of bread it teaches you to bake .

In addition to learning how to handle an oven that heats unevenly, and other real-life possibilities, you'll find a fully illustrated introduction to what bread is, and how some of the things we do during baking make the staple we all love so much.

You'll also find some of the best recipes ever for artisan breads of all kinds - and discover in the process that you really can make them at home, regardless of your means or your kitchen. This is one of those rare books that is as valuable to the beginner as it is to the most experienced cook - I predict it will become one of the most-used cookbooks you own.

A book to love - a must for any cook's bookshelf.

The Gourmet Slow Cooker
Simple and Sophisticated Meals from Around the World

Lynn Alley

Softbound

$18.95

Slow cookers can be lifesavers in the whirlwind that our daily lives can become. I remember a recipe I found in the LaLeche League cookbook -- "Fussy Day Chicken" -- which consisted of putting a whole chicken in the slow cooker, pouring barbeque sauce on it, turning the machine on, and then getting back to your teething baby until it was time to feed the family supper. It was in no way gourmet, but it worked, and I was grateful.

Since those days, I've seldom used a slow cooker, mostly because I have come to appreciate fresher flavors and resist the overcooked comfort food that has become the hallmark of slow cooker recipe collections. The Gourmet Slow Cooker changes all that! It is everything any busy, flavor-loving person could want, and resembles other slow cooker recipe collections hardly at all.

Lynn Alley has not only travelled the world collecting traditional one-pot meals (and includes a short chapter on the anthropological evidence that suggests one-pot meals are among the earliest forms of cooking), she has developed recipes that are fast to set in motion, cook without your assistance while you take care of other things you need to do, and (most importantly) offer up fresh, mouth-watering flavor at the end of the day.

A sampling of recipes includes:

• Lamb Shanks in Tomato Sauce from Greece
• Apricot Chicken from India
• Chicken Mole from Mexico
• White Truffle Risotto from Italy
• Provençal Chicken Stew from France
• Potato, Cheddar and Chive Soup from the United States

The Gourmet Slow Cooker - Volume II
Regional Comfort-Food Classics

Lynn Alley

Softbound

$18.95

Lynn Alley has done it again! Here is a second volume of nutritious, supremely tasty meals which come to the rescue of modern families everywhere. In this volume she focuses on delicious regional favorites throughout the United States, and offers up some of the most mouthwatering renditions ever to be conceived for slow cooking. Her offerings range from simple soups to succulent feasts and will make family mealtime a joyous event even when time is short and of the essence.

I also found her updated information about choosing a slow cooker to be invaluable - I learned what I needed to be much more successful in all my slow cooking efforts, and came to the conclusion that equipment matters, but knowing your equipment matters more. She tells you both which brands she has found to be reliable and also what to watch for in the slow cooker you now own.

I consider this another must-have for my own cookbook shelf - and believe you will agree once you try it. Buono appetito!

A small sample of her recipes includes:

• Santa Fe Sweet Potato Soup
• San Francisco Cioppino
• Korean-Style Ribs
• Simple Poached Salmon
• Bacalhau
• Sun-Dried Tomato Risotto
• Lima Beans and Ham Hocks
• Braised Onions with Raisins and Almonds
• Apricot Gingerbread Upside-Down Cake
• Georgia Peach Cobbler
  

The Gourmet Toaster Oven
Simple and Sophisticated Meals for the Busy Cook

Lynn Alley

Softbound

$18.95

As with Lynn Alley's Gourmet Slow Cooker, her The Gourmet Toaster Oven can become a lifesaver for those who are too busy, are on a tight budget, have lots of people to feed, or cook for only one or two. I learned so much from this cookbook that my toaster oven, once a neglected appliance that best known for the items I tended to stack on top of it, has become my best friend. There is seldom a day when I don't make excellent use of it, and now there is never anything stacked on top of it (for which family and friends have expressed enormous gratitude).

Lynn Alley takes you through the ins and outs of types of toaster ovens and describes the features she finds the most helpful. Although she recommends some brands, I personally found that with her descriptions I was able to find a highly functional convection toaster for less than $50. We've been happily following her methods with it for over a year and don't in the least feel the need for a higher priced model.

She also discusses types of cookware to use with toaster ovens, and here her recommendations led me to bakeware that I love so much I use both in and out of the toaster oven. Her techniques transfer straightforwardly to your own favorite recipes, also.

Because Alley is very committed to whole foods and fresh produce, her recipes are alive with flavor and robust in nutrients.

Those of you who are very pressed for time will discover that a small oven heats faster and small batches cook more quickly. You'll also discover that Lynn Alley must be a busy lady, too, because her recipes are almost all very quick to put together, even the ones that are absolutely from scratch.

If you're on a tight budget, you'll discover that small batches mean no waste and better portion control, along with lower utility bills. Those with lots of people to cook for can discover the joys of a second oven and the possibility of cooking two things at different temperatures at the same time. Those with only one or two people to cook for will find that they hardly ever need their larger oven at all.

Here's a very small sample of the type of recipe you'll find in The Gourmet Toaster Oven:

• Basic Breakfast Bread
• Huevos Rancheros
• Chicken and Basil Calzone
• Mediterranean-Style Pizza
• Festive Scones
• Savory Cheesecakes
• Chicken Pot Pies
• Macaroni and Cheese with Tapenade
• Grilled Salmon with Garlic Butter
• Carrot Cakes with Lemon Glaze

There's much more -- all delicious, all fresh, all easy and fast to create. Bon appetite!

The Biodynamic Food & Cookbook
Real nutrition that doesn't cost the earth

Features over 150 delicious recipes

Wendy E Cook

Softbound

Regular Price: $39.00

Introductory Price: $36.95

Biodynamics is about respect for nature, sustainability, and spiritual ecology. But most of all it is about flavorful, nutritious, enjoyable food! The Biodynamic Food & Cookbook is a rich book of information, beautifully illustrated and packed with delicious and healthy recipes.

The biodynamic movement is supported by top chefs, master winemakers, and numerous celebrities—Prince Charles introduced biodynamic methods at his Gloucestershire farm. Nonetheless, biodynamic agriculture had a humble beginning in 1924, with a small group of farmers and gardeners gathered to hear Rudolf Steiner give a series of lectures on revitalizing agriculture. It was a time of growing interest in industrial farming and mass production, and Steiner spoke of the need to preserve and nurture the qualitative aspects of food. He outlined an agricultural method based on a holistic perception of nature.

Illustrated with hundreds of color photographs, The Biodynamic Food & Cookbook explains the principles behind biodynamic methods and places it in the context of food and cooking through the ages. Wendy Cook, author of the bestselling Foodwise, takes us on a journey through the four seasons with more than 150 delicious recipes based on many years of working with biodynamic nutrition. She considers the ethics of food, the foundation of a balanced diet, and conjures up the color and vibrancy of Mallorca, which has contributed so much to her personal approach. Included are supplementary sections on breads, sauces, salads, desserts, drinks, and much more.

The Biodynamic Food & Cookbook will find a permanent place in every healthy kitchen.

Baking Bread with Children

Warren Lee Cohen

Softbound

$30.00

Bread. Is there anything that evokes Life and Love more? Or smells more tantalizing when baking? Or tastes better right out of the oven?

I don't know about you, but I have been awaiting this book with an eagerness akin to that of my childhood Christmas Eves - almost unbearable, the waiting has been.

But now it is here and the book is as much of a feast as the breads it will teach you to make. Almost any kind of bread, baked almost anyway: It's all here. And, as joyful as that in itself is, what makes Bread Baking with Children truly magical is, well, the children. There is so much here to engage children - stories, folklore, songs, poems, and best of all, bread!

Bread. Christ's body broken in Love. Bread. Mother Earth's gift of Life. Bread. Millennia of human tradition, in your kitchen, with your children. Alive again!

Feeding the Whole Family
Recipes for Babies, Young Children, and Their Parents

Cooking with Whole Foods

Cynthia Lair

Foreword by Peggy O'Mara

Softbound

$21.95

One of the most difficult things for me when I was a young mother was learning how to go about creating a meal that would taste good to everyone, be nourishing and wholesome for everyone, and not take more time than I really had available to prepare it. What I really wanted, of course, was a magic wand to wave that would make a delicious home-cooked meal appear. Given that I didn't find one, I went about collecting cookbooks that gave me the guidance and help I needed - a bit here, a bit there, but over time I did learn to manage a kitchen and feed my family well without feeling burdened by the task.

Had Feeding the Whole Family been in print when my children and I were young, it would have spared me an entire shelf of books and done a better job at conveying the essentials of cooking for and raising a family. Cynthia Lair is a gifted writer and a lover of good health and good food. That she has taken the time to create the book that every mother longs for is like leaven in the bread of life - a gift for the generations.

Her recipies, meal suggestions, discussions on teaching children to eat in a healthy way and more are all delicious. She selects whole foods, including fish, fowl and meat, and teaches how to combine them into meals to remember with love. Happily, her food choices are also among the most economic ways to eat, as well as the most healthful. I know well how important this is for most young families.

Altogether, you'll find joy and a helping hand where you most need it. Sit, eat, and enjoy!

The Waldorf School Book of Soups

Collected by Marsha Post

Arranged and Introduced by Andrea Huff

Illustrated by Jo Valens

Spiral Bound

Regular Price: $14.95

Introductory Price: $13.50

I've been watching and waiting for this book for a long time - now that it's here, I can report that it's even better than I had hoped. Soup Day was always a favorite of mine when I worked in a Waldorf Kindergarten, so I expected to find a collection of wonderful, tasty recipes. My expectations are deliciously rewarded -- there's soup for all seasons, occasions and tastes. You'll love them!

What I didn't even dare expect was the attention to nutrition and food sources. After reading through The Waldorf School Book of Soups, I've decided that next time, I'll set my hopes to a higher level. This book offers, in the clearest and most concise ways, a thorough introduction to the value of organic and biodynamic food as well as an outstanding overview of some of the most important nutritional principles articulated more fully in Nourishing Traditions by Sally Fallon.

In other words, The Waldorf School Book of Soups is just plain excellent and destined to serve families, classes and, most especially, children for years to come.

The Waldorf Kindergarten Snack Book

Collected and Annotated by Lisa Hildreth

Illustrated by Jo Valens

Spiral Bound

$12.95

This is another one of those books that many of us have been waiting for years to see someone publish - hooray! that the day has arrived.

Lisa Hildreth has gathered up recipes and suggestions from many different Waldorf kindergarten teachers and topped them off with high-quality research and explanations about the whys, wherefores, and other considerations. This is book that any parent or teacher of young children will come to treasure and use daily for many years.

With contents that range from rich and rewarding considerations to mouth-watering recipes, The Waldorf Kindergarten Snack Book is such a celebration of food and children that you'll find yourself singing each time you prepare meals. This is one indespensible book!

Contents:

• Planning Your Snacks - How Are Snacks a Part of Our Day? What Foods Nourish Young Children? How Does Food Affect the Process of Incarnation? What Foods Might You Wish to Avoid? What about Sugar? What Types of Snacks Will You Decide to Offer? How Can Snacks Help Children Make Connection? Will the Snacks Meet the Needs of Your Special Group of Children?
• Snack Menus - 3-Day Nursery Menus; 5-Day Kindergarten Menus; 4-Day Kindergarten Menus
• Our Daily Bread
• Warming Soups
• Luscious Fruits
• A Grain a Day - Here's where you'll find the list of grains (and colors!) by days of the week!
• Happy Birthday Cakes and Muffins
• Festival Foods

Yummm!

Nourishing Traditions
The Cookbook that Challenges Politically Correct Nutrition and the Diet Dictocrats

Revised and greatly expanded 2nd edition

Sally Fallon
with Mary G. Enig, Ph.D

Softbound

$25.00

I LOVE this cookbook! There are over 700 recipes and eveyone I've tried produces delicious, satisfying, healthy food. Reading it inspires both appetite and joyous cooking -- and, the only cookbook I can think of that offers almost as much variety as this one, is The Joy of Cooking. I was serious when I said "almost" as much variety -- out of a foundation of world traditions, there is more creativity, wide-ranging ingredients and surprising combinations here than in any other cookbook I've read (we're talking hundreds - I love cookbooks).

As much as I love the recipes, I think I love Fallon's research and clear thinking about food the best. I knew I'd met a friend when I discovered that the bedrock of her research begins with Dr. Weston A Price, a dentist who got to wondering what the nutritional roots of good dental formation and health were and set out on several journeys around the world, photographing and documenting which groups of people had well-formed teeth, which did not, and what each group generally ate.

In 1939 he published Nutrition and Physical Degeneration which is the classic study of isolated populations on native diets and the disasterous effects of processed foods and commercial farming methods on human health. The book includes Price's unforgettable photographs showing the superb dentition and facial development of peoples living on nutrient-dense foods. I first saw these photos in the late 1970s in one of the original Whole Earth Catalogs. I've never forgotten them, and the little bit I learned from them has guided my diet and what I chose to feed my family ever since. In later years, I was startled to find that Rudolf Steiner offered similar conclusions about human nutrition from an entirely different perspective, which shouldn't have been surprising, but somehow was anyway.

What Nourishing Traditions offers is a diet that brushes aside Politically Correct notions of nutrition in favor of traditional food choices that are known to produce robust health. What you'll find is a diet rich in meat, vegetables, whole grains, naturally sweet treats and brimming with easily absorbed vital nutrients. And flavor. Lots and lots of flavor -- as though the love of cooks throughout the ages infused each bite.

A great book!

*See also The Fourfold Path to Healing, co-authored by Sally Fallon.

As a convinced vegetarian of some 25 years, I opened Sally Fallon's book to her many meat recipes and immediately closed it again. But then I figured that there must be more to it than that. There is . . . I was surprised at the wealth of information to help me (even as a vegetarian) make better food choices and prepare the ones I have chosen to get the most nourishment from them.

-Peter Hinderberger, MD, Past President
Physicians Association for Anthroposophical Medicine

Foodwise
Understanding What We Eat and How It Affects Us
The Story of Human Nutrition

Wendy E. Cook

Softbound

$34.00

Foodwise is the best-ever-written account of nutrition from the perspective of Anthroposophy (and includes some great recipes!). The account is wonderfully enhanced because, rather than the somewhat clinical accounts previously available, Wendy Cook's not only brings us the facts but laces them with her own enthusiasm for food and for cooking (she was personal cook to many British celebrities many years before she wrote Foodwise).

When her daughter became ill, Wendy Cook began to study the deep aspects of nutrition, particularly the effects of different foods on human health and consciousness. In Foodwise she presents a cornucopia of ideas, advice and commentary, informed by the work of Rudolf Steiner.

Cook relates human evolution to changes in consciousness and the consumption of different foods, considering among other topics the importance of agricultural methods, the nature of the human being, the significance of grasses and grains, the mystery of human digestion and the question of vegetarianism. She also analyzes the nutritional (or otherwise) qualities of carbohydrates, minerals, fats and oils, milk and dairy products, herbs and spices, salt and sweeteners, stimulants, legumes, the nightshade family, bread, water and dietary supplements. She ends this comprehensive survey of nutrition with practical tips on cooking, planning menus, children’s food and sharing meals—and some mouth-watering recipes!

Louise's Leaves
A Cook's Journal Around the Calendar with Local Garden Vegetable Produce

Louise Frazier

Softbound

$9.95

This is a book whose contents are so delicious to read that you can almost smell the fresh herbs! Louise Frazier has poured 12 years experience in maintaining a fulfilling diet with local produce in every season (and yes, she lives where there is a real winter) onto the pages of this elegantly illustrated book. The recipes are great - really, really tasty; but, her suggestions for how to use each vegetable are even greater because they energize and inspire your own wonderful creations. They also bring to life and understanding what is special and wonderful about each and every one of them. This is a beautiful, delicious and nutritious way to learn about the bountiful world of plants as it graces your table.

The Tassajara Bread Book
25th Anniversary Edition

Edward Espe Brown

Softbound

$19.95

In my opinion, this is the book that restored breadmaking to American kitchens, not just as warm, satisfying activity (with warm, satisfying results!), but as an art of love. I learned to bake bread from the first edition of this book "way back" in the 1970s - this is where I first encountered the then-surprising (to me) idea that it is the love we pour into the food we make, as much as the ingredients, that really nurtures those who partake of it. I think I have carried a part of The Tassajara Bread Book with me into just about every meal I've made since then.

This 25th Anniversary Edition - the only edition I've seen since the 1st Edition which I still own and use - has some interesting added commentary by Brown and a few new and tasty recipes. But mostly, it has one great improvement over the original book: the basic bread recipe has been scaled back to 2 loaves instead of the original 4. Back in the "olden days" of my youth, in addition to offering us all the joy of loving as we cook, TBB also presented a significant challenge - where, oh where, can you find a bowl big enough to accommodate a 4-loaf sponge??? I can remember friends calling excitedly to say that their sister (brother, lover, mother) had just given them a bowl of mamouth proportions. "Now I can make Tassajara bread with only one bowl for the sponge!!" We used to experience finding or receiving such a bowl as an act of grace - "the heavens want us to bake!!"

Now, this grace is in the book - along with the joy and the love. And you can bring it all to your heart, your kitchen, your hands, your bread, your table - and your life.

The Italian Baker
The classic tastes of the Italian countryside - its breads, pizza, focacce, cakes, pastries & cookies

Carol Field

Hardbound, dust jacketed, large format

$35.00

This is my all-time favorite bread book - it is absolutely packed with practically all the great breads of Europe (the only type missing is the slow-rise rye breads of Southern Germany - I'm still looking for a good recipe for those). Here you will find Como bread (the original "French Bread"), Ciabatta ("slipper bread"), Pane Tuscano (Bread from Tuscany) and, my personal favorite, Pane Rustica - a crusty loaf that relies on a generous amount of whole wheat pastry flour for flavor and texture. When you grace your dinner table with any of these breads, you transform a simple meal into something everyone remembers with pleasure and hopes to see again soon.

You will also find some of the best pizza recipes ever, foccacia in several delectible flavors and cakes, pastries and more for festivals and everyday. In short, The Italian Baker is a virutally inexhaustible source of joy, delight and warmth for your table.

Beyond all the wonderful recipes, there is something much more important that I discovered here - and am hoping to share with you. These "old world" breads are not made the way we usually bake bread in the United States. Here, to my way of thinking, our breads rely on a combination of quality ingredients (the US produces the most robust wheats in the world), prolonged kneading of a firm dough, an economically short rise and a moderate baking temperature. What arrives at our table nurtures us through the strength of both the baker and the ingredients.

A baker approaches Italian/European breads much differently. The dough is not worked so predominantly by hand - nature, in the form of the interaction of the yeast with the dough - is given an equal role. By American standards, the amount of yeast added is almost homeopathic. Part of the dough has undergone a very long rise (this is the starter) and the rest raises for most of a day. This results in a complexity of flavor that is unequaled. Instead of heavy kneading, the first kneading is relatively restrained, the yeast having done most of the work, and the second kneading isn't what we think of as a kneading at all - its more of a carress, a shaping. The dough is not firm, but soft, moist, pliant. Finally, once all is ready, the bread is baked in a very hot oven - which gives it a good crust and a satisfyingly substantial interior. Where the American breads nurture through strength, these breads, in my opinion, nurture through the feeling of the baker for the bread, for nature, and for the people who will eat the finished loaf.

I've used The Italian Baker for about 15 years - every time I make something from it, it's a joy.

The Whole Soy Story
the dark side of America's favorite health food

Kaayla T Daniel, PhD, CCN

Hardbound, dust jacketed

$29.95

The Whole Soy Story is a groundbreaking expose that tells the truth about soy that scientists know but that the soy industry has tried to suppress.

• Soy is not a health food, does not prevent disease and has not even been proven safe.
• Epidemiological, clinical and laboratory studies link soy to malnutrition, digestive problems, thyroid dysfunction, cognitive decline, reproductive disorders, even heart disease and cancer.
• There is no culture that has ever existed where widespread consumption of unfermented soy beans or soy products has ever occurred. The small number of people who did eat such products did so because the effects on the endocrine system were noted -- the soy eaters were monks seeking help in sustaining their vows of chastity.
• Dairy cattle that are fed on grass and grains can live to nearly 30 years old; those fed on soy and corn die at between 7 and 9 years of age.

The list actually goes on (and on). This is a critical gathering of facts that we believe everyone should know. Change your diet, change your life.

Anyone in America who is interested in safe, healthy nutrition must come to terms with Dr. Kaayla T Daniel's The Whole Soy Story. This book is a gauntlet thrown at the feet of the soy industry, whose reputation often seems based as much on self-promotion as science. Well-written, authoritative and accissible to the lay person, this is science writing at its best.

- Larry Dossey, MD
Author of Healing Beyond the Body, Reinventing Medicine and Healing Words