The California Pizza Kitchen Cookbook [Hardcover]

Larry Flax (Author), Rick Rosenfield (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 18, 1995

The California Pizza Kitchen Cookbook BBQ Chicken Pizza, Mixed Grill Vegetarian Pizza, Tandoori Chicken Pizza, Thai Chicken Pizza. These are just a few of the delicious pizzas, baked fresh in wood-burning ovens, that have helped to make California Pizza Kitchen into one of America's hottest and most successful restaurant chains. Founders Larry Flax and Rick Rosenfield "put the world on a pizza" and the results are fantastic. Now, for the first time, here are the recipes that have made CPK restaurants so popular, with step-by-step directions to make pizza cooking easy and fun, even for beginners. In addition to the pizzas and calzones, Rick and Larry include recipes for creative pastas, salads, soups and appetizers, not to mention the tempting dessert pizzas. Whether CPK is already your favorite place to dine with family and friends or you're a creative cook with a taste for bold, fun, international flavors, The California Pizza Kitchen Cookbook is the cookbook for you.

Editorial Reviews

From the Inside Flap

The California Pizza Kitchen Cookbook Ever since the first California Pizza Kitchen (CPK) was opened in Beverly Hills in 1985, founders Larry Flax and Rick Rosenfield have been inundated with requests for their creative pizza recipes. As Larry and Rick explain in the introduction, the recipe for their success is simple—take America's favorite food cravings, like barbecued chicken, shrimp scampi, Peking duck, Thai satay, Southwestern burrito and BLT, and put them on a pizza. Until now, the official recipes were a secret. You could only get their California-style pizza at one of more than 80 CPK restaurants across the country, baked fresh in a wood-burning oven. The California Pizza Kitchen Cookbook includes all of your favorite pizza recipes, right off the menu, including the original BBQ Chicken Pizza, Thai Chicken Pizza, Shrimp Pesto Pizza, Santa Fe Chicken Pizza, and Mixed Grill Vegetarian Pizza. There are more than 25 delicious pizza recipes in all, plus an extra chapter with the creative CPK pastas, salads, soups and appetizers. And don't forget the dough—you'll also find recipes for CPK's Basic Pizza Dough as well as honey-wheat pizza dough, with step-by-step instructions and photographs so even a beginner can master the techniques of tossing dough at home. The best thing about The California Pizza Kitchen Cookbook—maybe even better than their recipe for BBQ Chicken Pizza—is that founders Larry Flax and Rick Rosenfield are donating all of the royalties to charitable organizations across the country. It's their way of saying thanks to Americans for all of their support. So whether you're a pizza aficionado and can't wait to impress your friends with an "anything-goes" pizza party, or you know someone who loves to create food that is on the cutting edge, The California Pizza Kitchen Cookbook is sure to please.

From the Back Cover

The California Pizza Kitchen Cookbook BBQ Chicken Pizza, Mixed Grill Vegetarian Pizza, Tandoori Chicken Pizza, Thai Chicken Pizza. These are just a few of the delicious pizzas, baked fresh in wood-burning ovens, that have helped to make California Pizza Kitchen into one of America's hottest and most successful restaurant chains. Founders Larry Flax and Rick Rosenfield "put the world on a pizza" and the results are fantastic. Now, for the first time, here are the recipes that have made CPK restaurants so popular, with step-by-step directions to make pizza cooking easy and fun, even for beginners. In addition to the pizzas and calzones, Rick and Larry include recipes for creative pastas, salads, soups and appetizers, not to mention the tempting dessert pizzas. Whether CPK is already your favorite place to dine with family and friends or you're a creative cook with a taste for bold, fun, international flavors, The California Pizza Kitchen Cookbook is the cookbook for you.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 112 pages
• Publisher: Wiley; 1 edition (December 18, 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0028609883
• ISBN-13: 978-0028609881
• Product Dimensions: 8.7 x 8.1 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (32 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #82,051 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #17 in Books > Cookbooks, Food & Wine > Baking > Pizza

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

41 of 42 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great Tasting Pizza and Pasta, December 17, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: The California Pizza Kitchen Cookbook (Hardcover)

CPK brings a wide variety of international cuisines to the pizza crust. I was delighted when they came out with this cookbook, but was disappointed to find that my favorite item from the restaurant, the Oriental Chicken Salad, is not included in the cookbook. Well, they need to get me back into the restaurant once in a while. The recipes make extensive use of cilantro and garlic. Also note, that although the recipes are easy to make (as cited by the other reviewers), the first time you make the recipe it make take a long time. For example, the first time I made the Shrimp Scampi pizza (listed as Shrimp-Garlic in the book), it took me about 3 hours, not including the dough preparation time. This is because just making one ingredient, the roasted garlic, took about an hour. Since then I have learned which ingredients can be prepared in advance. The Shrimp Scampi Pizza with whole wheat crust is the best pizza that I have ever tasted, and that opinion has been shared by everyone who has tasted it. It is better than the restaurant's and worth the trouble. Another family favorite from this book is the broccolli with sun-dried tomatoes. Again, except for getting all that garlic peeled, this recipe has a minimum number of ingredients, is quick to make (30 minutes), is extremely tasty, and can feed a crowd. You feel really special when you get to have this for lunch the next day.

28 of 29 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Great recipes, but not everyday stuff, April 20, 2000

By 

Diarmaid "Diarmaid" (Bethesda, MD USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The California Pizza Kitchen Cookbook (Hardcover)

For those of you who don't know CPK, it is a chain of pizzarestaurants in the USA. (There may be some abroad, I don't know.) Theyproduce gourmet pizza including some very unusual recipes which taste remarkably good. If you're after something to impress a weekend casual dinner guest, or just fancy some adventurous cooking, this is the book for you. However, some of the ingredients can be fairly expensive or hard to find. This is not a book for your workday evening meal. No complaints about the recipes I've tried so far; They've all been very good. Picture-by-picture instructions on how to 'throw' a pizza provides a lot of fun. Make sure you have a very clean floor...or ceiling!

15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Love the Restaurant--Love the Cookbook!, April 3, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: The California Pizza Kitchen Cookbook (Hardcover)

I was so excited to find that this cookbook existed that I bought it right away. I love making homemade pizzas. I use my bread machine to make the dough and a pizza stone & their crust recipe is WAY better than the one I was using. The Thai chicken Pizza is my favorite and it's not really that hard to make if you have all the ingredients. You won't be disappointed.