Customer Reviews

The Foster's Market Cookbook: Favorite Recipes for Morning, Noon, and Night

5 star:		(28)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Sara Foster's "Foster's Market Cookbook" is a hands-down winner. She combines a comfortable manner with comfort food galore--usually comfort food with just enough of a twist to make it new and interesting. Granny Foster's Refrigerator Rolls (which keep for an amazing two weeks in the fridge if you want to put off baking them) are highly recommended!

In addition to featuring terrific, simple, delicious recipes, the layout of the book makes it a breeze to read. It's amazing to me how many cookbooks are actually sort of hard to follow when it comes to the directions, but this one isn't. The design is attractive and the font easy to read. Each recipe direction is numbered--a wonderful thing if you happen to look away and lose your place. For the most part, each recipe is complete on a single page and when this is not the case, the recipe is usually complete on the facing page. This makes following the recipes a breeze. This one is a keeper.

As both a professional Chef & a faithful patron of Foster's Market, my expectations have been exceeded by The Foster's Market Cookbook.

Not only does the book seem to give away all of Sara's favorites- from her Tarragon Chicken Salad with Granny Smith Apples & Grapes (this might possibly be the BEST chicken salad i've had anywhere in the world), to the Roast Pork Tenderloin with Dried Cherries & Rosemary, to the ultimate cookie- The Chocolate Whopper- but she does so with refreshing ease. Where most "Celebrity Chef" cookbooks are filled with multi-task & complicated recipes, the ones in this cookbook are very simple- yet produce real food with real flavors that fit with today's real work schedules & culinary skill levels.

The Cookbook is the same as her Market- warm, informative & friendly. This is a book that i will cherish using for the rest of my life.

I recently received my copy of Foster's Market Cookbook and have already moved with lightening speed through a number of the recipes, and they are excellent! The recipes are not too complex, or fussy and at the same time each one is a great combination of fresh ingredients. The comfort food section of the book is alone worth the price. The Chicken Salad with a honey mustard mayonaise was a big hit, paired with a great orzo salad. My family is in love with the Risotto cakes. This is a great cook book for casual great-tasting food. It will be tough to find one cookbook with as many great recipes. Gotta go Cook!

The criteria I set forth for an ideal cookbook is that the recipes must be relatively easy to make (but the food has to be outstanding), it has to be beautifully organized, and the ingredients must be easy to obtain. The magic touch of this cookbook is that it not only meets all of these criteria, but you can use it for weekly family cooking *and* for entertaining. The recipes are simple and affordable enough to work for nightly home cooking but tasty enough to feed guests for special occasions. What a star you are, Sara Foster, for sharing these lovely recipes with all of us! The Foster's Market Cookbook will be my number one gift for fellow home cooks and food lovers from now on and I'll continue to use it each week in my own home.

`The Foster's Market Cookbook' by Sara Foster, with Sarah Belk King, I bought in my `buy everything I saw on the Food Network' phase, especially after I saw Sarah Foster demonstrate her killer sticky bun recipe on the Food Network's `In Martha's Kitchen' show. This was also in my sticky bun-baking period, before I gave it up as too much work and went back to straight breads.

One of the main reasons the book sat unopened on my shelves for so long was the fact that the `killer sticky bun' recipe was simply not that killer. Do not believe anyone when they say they have an easy sticky bun recipe, because it probably means the end result will fall below expectations. Around the same time, I did a sticky bun recipe from funny baker Wayne Harley Brachman, and that one didn't come up to snuff anyway. Leave it to Julia Child to come through for me. I did the sticky bun recipe in `Baking with Julia' and it was a LOT of work, but it in fact surpassed anything you can get from the mall.

But getting back to Sarah Foster's book, I have come back to it because I harbored s suspicion that there was some really good stuff in the book, and I was not disappointed.

Part of my attraction is that I am a sucker for any cookbook that covers sandwiches. While I think Foster's sandwich recipes are not as interesting or as complete as those in Nancy Silverton's whole book devoted to the subject, they are a great resource if you happen to have no other source of ideas for sandwiches.

Otherwise, the book covers everything you would expect, and it is especially strong on topics where you would expect expertise such as muffins, biscuits, scones, soups, salads, and egg dishes. On one of my favorite criteria for evaluating cookbooks, the recipe for a classic French omelet, Foster comes through like a champ. The only omelet tip she does not follow is to let the eggs come to room temperature before cracking and beating them, but then, this is probably quite impractical for a restaurant kitchen.

She is also quite good on another of my favorite criteria, the making of stocks. Her recipes are very good for non-foodies and people who care not for haute cuisine, as they do not take very long to produce a very acceptable chicken, vegetable, or beef stock. My only reservations may be that some of her suggestions may lead to waste perfectly good poached chicken on the one hand and include less than edible vegetable cuttings into stocks. There is a reason some people are hyperfussy about stock making. These are but two of the reasons.

I fully endorse Ms. Foster's recipes for muffins, biscuits, and scones. They are as good or better than recipes I have seen in books by professional bakers and books specializing in these subjects.

The hardest aspect of whether it is worth buying this book is how if will complement your current cookbook collection. If you are a cookbook collector, the question is moot. Nothing will stop you from getting this notable title. On the other hand, if all you have is `The Joy of Cooking', this would be a welcome supplement, as like fellow Martha Stewart alumnae, Ina Garten's early cookbooks, all the recipes come from a commercial kitchen which depends on their products for good business and the products are relatively easy to make.

This also means that the selection of recipes is very good fare for church bazaars and bake sales. While Foster is downsizing her recipes to household serving numbers, I am sure that her soups would work well at two to four to eight times her recipe size. Just be a little careful on multiplying some of the spicier ingredients.

I find all the recipes extremely well written. They are full of important details for amateur chefs and unlike some books, everything is printed in good old fashioned black and white with a little highlight shading here and there for sidebars. And, several dishes are presented in living color photographs, and little real estate is taken up by cutsie pics of Foster's Market staff and customers. My only argument with the layout of the book is the chapter title pages where the names of the recipes are written in a kind of multicolored hodgepodge, similar to the maddening typography in Jamie Oliver's otherwise excellent cookbooks.

Fostering this kind of material is what made Martha Stewart so respectable in what she did on her shows. Of this genre of cookbook, this is a very good sample. I would recommend it to anyone who is looking for recipes from this `feel good market' venue. I think, for example, that it is more value for the money than Ina Garten's first cookbook.

I've enjoyed shopping and eating at Foster's every time I visit Durham for the past 10 years. Sara's distinctive style and fresh approach to food has never disappointed. The scones are fabulous and I am so excited about the sandwich condiments and combinations. I've tried many times to duplicate the Foster's flavor at home and I'm thrilled to finally have the recipes so I can enjoy my favorites all the time! Bravo!

I just received Sara Foster's cookbook for my birthday and I have already made several of the recipes and each one turned out fantastic! One thing I loved immediately about this cookbook is the number of recipes! You certainly get your bang for your buck with this book. There are such an array of recipes from appetizers to soups (lots of really good soup recipes), to vinigarettes, to dressings, to entrees and desserts, any cook cannot be disappointed with this book.

I read the review before me and I have to say that I just made the Roasted Pork Tenderloin with dried cherry sauce myself and I thought it tasted wonderful. I often have difficulty keeping pork moist when I cook it but I definitely didn't have that problem with this recipe!

I cannot wait to make some of the desserts as well. Everything looks so good and relatively easy to make!! A great cookbook for anyone!

I completely LOVED "The Foster's Market Cookbook" by Sara Foster et al. I found her recipes beautiful, easy to perform and glorious to eat. She's a woman I can really get behind. I found her approach very familiar and comforting. I think we have the same basic food philosophy and you can really see her catering background. This is a great book for parties, gatherings or those special occasions when you really want something special with fresh ingredients.

I am a sucker for a gorgeous cookbook and this one did not disappoint. I love it and think it might be holiday gift for more than one of my friends. A real treasure!

I just bought the book this week and have made the Lemon Bars with Blueberries and the Coconut Macaroons. The recipes were easy to follow and the beautiful photographs show you what the end result should look like. Both were delicious! I have a few hundred cookbooks and this may be one of my favorites. It is beautifully photographed and the layout is great. I look forward to making many more recipes from this book. I think anyone should buy this book with confidence and enjoy every page and delicious bite.

As a student at Duke University, my friends and I went to Fosters for brunch EVERY Sunday. The breakfast specials - pancakes, omlets, and the "special" - were always, without fail, incredible. If we made it there later in the day, the soups, breads, and salads were always a hit.
My best friend bought me this cookbook for graduation, and it was by far the best gift I received. Being able to actually make all the food we always ate at Fosters brought back all the memories of my college days. The strawberry-rhubarb crisp, hummus, blondies, and scones are among my favorie recipies to make. The pictures speak more than a thousand words and entice even the novice cooks to try out her recipies. Among my collection of cookbooks, this one is certainly the favorite.
If you are ever in Durham or Chapel Hill area, I encourage you to check out Fosters Market - truly worth the trip.