My Companion this Summer: America's Test Kitchen's Complete Summer Cookbook
I am a huge fan of America's Test Kitchen and their books. For starters, they put the "TEST" in test kitchen. A lot of those recipes that look so good in magazines, that you try to make, and they turn out bland, horribly, cakes don't set, glazes run down the sides of cakes, etc, and you feel like a failure as a home chef. But a lot of those recipes aren't TESTED or lack critical steps. Thus anyone following step by step without modification (like adding the necessary 30-40 minutes needed to caramelize onions rather than the 5-10 minutes most recipes lie that it takes) would have the same disappointing result. Not so with ATK. Their youtube video series are also good. One issue with their cookbooks is that there is quite a bit of overlap. As someone with a lot of their cookbooks, I see that. A book in the "make ahead" compendium with show up as an identical item in the Autumn/Winter cookbook, and so forth. But enough stays on theme and has ...