Customer Reviews

The Everything Chinese Cookbook: From Wonton Soup to Sweet and Sour Chicken-300 Succulent Recipes from the Far East (Everything Series)

5 star:		(11)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I love Chinese food: Not the torturous, pages-long recipes found in "gourmet" chinese cookbooks, but the delicious concoctions I can get at the local Oriental restaurant. This terrific book seems to have been cribbed from a Chinese takeout menu; all your favorite are here, from Moo Goo Gai Pan to Hot-and-Sour Soup. the recipes are well written and easy-to-follow, and none of the dishes is difficult to prepare. There are hints and tips for the novice, as well. A great value!

The thing about this book that distinguishes it from other Chinese cookbooks, is that is had ALL the recipes I was looking for (e.g., black bean sauce for noodles, Dan Dan, Singapore noodles, sweet and sour shrimp, etc). The only downside is that the author decided to make some of the dishes lighter (e.g., not having the shrimps dipped in batter and fried for the sweet & sour shrimp) - which I think should go into a different kind of book than a general Chinese recipe book as this. However, to me that is something that can easily be corrected without exercising too much imagination.

I've flipped through many Chinese cookbooks, and this is the only one that I've bought.

This book is pretty good for beginners like me ..it's so informative on the cultures and what to do but ..there's no illustration of the food itself how it would look like when it's done...so basically having to guess what it looks like ,however it definately teaches me how to make the food from dim sum but and it's pretty simple and easy but the ingredients are sort of hard to get ...in all like i said it's a good book .

In The Everything Chinese Cookbook, Chinese cuisine expert Rhonda Lauret Parkinson has developed a truly "user friendly" specialty cookbook which is ideal for the novice kitchen cook wanting to prepare and serve traditional Chinese dishes as part of a family dining experience. With an informed and informative introductory chapter on getting started with respect to Chinese cooking, individual chapters are devoted to dipping sauces, appetizers, soups and salads, rice and noodles, beef dishes, pork entrees, chicken and other poultry, tofu and eggs, fish and other seafood, Chinese vegetables; desserts and snacks. An ideal introduction into the kitchen mechanics of preparing popular Chinese dishes, The Everything Chinese Cookbook is further enhanced with two appendices: "Putting It All Together" and "Glossary of Asian Ingredient". The Everything Chinese Cookbook will take even the most amateur kitchen cook and show how to deliver expertly prepared and palate pleasing Chinese fare for ordinary daily dining or those special celebratory dinners with a true Chinese flair and expertise.

I highly recommend this Chinese cookbook. I don't know if I just lucked out when selecting it, but I will tell you it was put together very well by Rhonda Lauret Parkinson. It is packed full of recipes we have all heard of and feasted on at the tastiest restaurants. For example, I became really excited to learn how to make Honey Walnut Prawns, a dish that my husband and I really enjoyed at our favorite chinese restaurant in an area we long since relocated from. We hadn't been able to find a restaurant that served them since then--not until very recently. And I have to say, hands down, the recipe in the book is far better than the dish we had in Seattle. Also, I love all the tips she gives because I find them extremely helpful.

I picked this up from the library thinking to use it as a starter cookbook before moving on to a better one. It turns out that I really like it. I was a bit intimidated by Chinese cooking but the organization and layout of this book made everything so very easy. I looked at a few other books but finally decided to buy this one.

Take it from me, this is the book you want to get first if you're intent on cooking Chinese food in your home. Parkinson provides a lot of helpful information and background in the beginning of the book you'll be hard-pressed to find anywhere else. Almost every recipe is something an American would love. It details which spices, vinegar, wines, sauces, etc. to buy at your ordinary grocery store. All you'll need is a wok after that (get the Lodge cast iron, it's the best and will last you a lifetime). Every menu can be adjusted to your tastes, meaning you can make them more authentic or you can further 'Americanize' them, as incorrect as that sounds. But if you're wanting food the entire family will enjoy, this is the book with which to start. THEN try others! Finally, visit [..] and watch some of the chinese cooking videos there. They will illustrate in real time many of these same menus, and there you'll see shortcuts and other tips that many recipe books take for granted, but don't bother to mention.
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TWO CAVEATS: (1) Within many menus, you'll see a measure of an ingredient (such as p.48) followed by the word "divided." For example, it will read: "2 tsp salt, divided." But you have to read the full process instructions below the recipe to know that you only add 1/2 tsp of salt first, and then sprinkle the rest on at the end during stir fry. (2) Nowhere is a batter recipe defined. You're told to deep fry chicken, etc., in batter first, but no batter ingredients are listed throughout. (I presume it's left up to personal choice.)

I purchased this along with my first Wok at Christmas, and I must say that this book gets a ton of use. The recipes are easy to follow, and reasonable replacements are listed for hard to find ingredients. The recipes are also adjustable when you get the hang of things, and I haven't had a bad recipe yet. I gave the book only four stars because of a lack of images and that it is just a tad on the basic side, but this in conjunction with other Chinese recipe books can help a beginner like myself and my wife make our first steps into cooking Chinese cuisine. As a stand alone guide, this book may lack in a few areas, but as part of a collection, you will find yourself referencing this one time and time again.

Love this book. I checked it out for free on my kindle with my prime membership and I'm seriously considering buying it after the month is over. Normally, I read through a recipe book once, copy out what I want and never look at it again. This book has so many recipes and helpful tips I can see referring back to it over and over again. The sauces section could have been a book by-itself. I was worried the book would be full of items I could not find but I have found everything I want to make (and I live in the center of Oregon, not a very culturally diverse area) by just going to a restaurant supply store. I say 'everything I want to make' because I'm not big on quail eggs and squid but also have not bothered looking for them... if I really wanted to try it I think I could talk my grocer into getting me the squid, if I wanted.

The most helpful thing about this book is the step by step cooking directions. Most books skip over the fact that most Chinese food is fried 2 times, or how to incorporate the sauces into a batter. Also gives you helpful rule and hints about making things yourself. For-instance, if you want that batter that will get nice and crispy but will still hold the sauce and not get soggy (like panda express orange chicken), don't use eggs whites, use vegetable oil.

Formatting: I can give it about a 3.7 here. Its kind of broken up and it can be hard to tell when a key note is about the previous recipe or the following one. The main reason to knock one star is there is no table of contents. The remedy is simple in this case. Simply go and bookmark the main headings for each area. On the next page after you will find hyper-linked entries for the entire section. It takes less than 3 minutes (also a one-time effort) and it works fine for me and thus isn't a total SNAFU.

Content: I wouldn't call this a hardcore Chinese food cookbook. As other reviewers have stated, this is the kind of fare you might find at a local Americanized Chinese food joint. That's what I wanted so the content gets 5 stars.

Overall Value: I give it a 4.4 stars for the current price and a solid 5 for anyone who just wants a primer on ingredients and combinations that are typical plus cooking methods with a wok.