Customer Reviews

Complete Book of Irish Country Cooking: Traditional and Wholesome Recipes from Ireland

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I have always been fascinated by the homey and satisfying food of traditional Irish cooking. This book is full of information on different traditional Irish dishes. There are no contemporary or imaginative dishes in here, and many don't sound very appetizing.(does oatmeal soup sound good to anyone?) That is not the point of this book though. The point is to preserve the dishes that the earliest settlers in Ireland lived off of, and to preserve the Irish heritage in doing so. Miss Allen puts a large emphasis on using seasonal, organic ingredients that are naturally available to you. If you're interested in traditional Irish cookery, this book is well worth the money.

The best of Irish country cooking all in one volume! Stews,Casseroles, nourishing natural country foods.Excellent!

A very nice cookbook,with plenty of color photos & clear concise instructions,covers all the food groups,beautifully done.

A very nice cookbook,with plenty of color photos & clear concise instructions,covers all the food groups,beautifully done.

Attention: "The Complete Book of Irish Country Cooking" and "Irish Traditional Cooking" are the same book, under different titles. DO NOT BUY BOTH. As for the book itself, it is more comprehensive than any of the books by Margaret M. Johnson (e.g., "The Irish Heritage Cookbook" and "The Irish Spirit") but less detailed. In other words, Ms. Allen includes more recipes but the instructions in each recipe are not as thorough. Given a choice, I would choose one of Ms. Johnson's books over Ms. Allen's. Ms. Johnson's recipes are more appealing as well, and more accessible. I might eat a bowl of nettle soup if it were presented to me but I would not seek it out or look for nettles to make it. Ms. Allen's book contains many recipes for things like Nettle Soup that most people will never make. Ms. Johnson's books include one mouth-watering recipe after another, each of which makes me want to run to the grocery store for the ingredients.