Book Review: Everyday Food

Getting food on the table fast does not have to be a compromise. Everyday Food: Great Food Fast ($24.95, Clarkson Potter) delivers 250 recipes pulled from Martha Stewart's Everyday Food magazines and TV show.

Most recipes in the book can be prepared in 30 minutes or less using ingredients that can easily be rounded up in a local store.

Stuck for a seasonal weeknight supper idea? This book offers the solution. The book is broken down by season, the better to highlight favorite produce and flavors from each time of year. We loved both the Cod with Leeks and Tomatoes and the Asparagus Gruyere Tart from the spring section.

Guests said that the dinner cooked from this book tasted like "restaurant food" and we'll take the compliment. There is a fullness of flavor in these recipes that is not found in other quick fix recipes. Each recipe has a punchy full color photo, which helps cooks create picture perfect meals. Nutritional information is also provided for each recipe in the back of the book.

The book uses some short cut ingredients, like puff pastry, jarred salsa, and ketchup, but many of the recipes are completely from scratch. The book feels just a bit chicken-centric; nearly a third of the spring main dishes use chicken.

Beginner cooks and those of us looking for a speedy refresher (how many minutes does it take to hard boil an egg?) will depend on the Basics chapter and the notes through the book ("do not soak shiitakes in water, because they will become spongy").

We keep wishing this book was ring-bound. We'd love to pop out the spring section and take it to the grocery store or keep the whole book at work and pull out just the recipe we're ready to make tonight. We suppose producing books as binders costs more, but it would make the book even more a part of cooks' everyday lives.

The book is currently #7 in the New York Times Paperback Advice and How-To bestsellers list.

From our archive
Inside the Test Kitchens at Martha Stewart Living

Comments (9)

I received the magazine subscription as a gift. Some of the recipes come in handy when you're looking to whip something up with what you've got in the pantry. The recipes are definitely a better alternative to Rachael Ray {blech}.

posted by minipanda on April 10th 2007 at 4:17am
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I have this book. I really like it. I have made a couple things from it. The shrimp coconut soup was great, as were the turkey meat balls. The time estimates seem very accurate. The only thing is.....all the recipes in it can also be found on Martha Stewart's website.

posted by laura dot on April 10th 2007 at 5:19am
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There are a gazillion 30-minute meal/quick dinner/speedy recipe type cookbooks, so it's nice to hear that people have had success with one.

Does anyone else find Martha Stewart's website really unwieldy when it comes to searching for recipes?

posted by vera in dc on April 10th 2007 at 6:11am
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I just got this book recently and I'm wanting to try the recipes right now. Even though the recipes are on the Martha Stewart site, I generally find grabbing a cookbook to be easier than grabbing my laptop. On top of that, the links on the Stewart site aren't always working properly.

posted by shipwrecks on April 10th 2007 at 7:29am
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There are a gazillion 30-minute meal/quick dinner/speedy recipe type cookbooks, so it's nice to hear that people have had success with one.

Yeah, that. Thanks for the tip.

But hold up! Don't soak shitakes in water? How am I supposed to reconstitute them?

posted by mjoe on April 10th 2007 at 8:24am
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Mjoe, I think the tip applies to fresh mushrooms. I'll double-check the tip for context and post here tonight.

posted by gochrisgo on April 10th 2007 at 8:55am
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Oh. Thanks, gochrisgo. I thought of that, but then I thought "that makes no sense, why would anyone want to soak fresh shitakes in water?" So that's mystery #2.

posted by mjoe on April 10th 2007 at 8:56am
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Mjoe, I scanned through the book again and can't yet find the page where I took that quote from. I'll keep looking as I use the cookbook. And now you've got us thinking: look for a whole post about cleaning mushrooms sometime over the next couple of weeks.

posted by gochrisgo on April 11th 2007 at 2:57am
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Ha! I can't wait. And since the kid groomed the dog with my mushroom brush, I am in the market for a new one.

posted by mjoe on April 11th 2007 at 9:22am
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