The Gourmet Toaster Oven: Simple and Sophisticated Meals for the Busy Cook [Paperback]

Lynn Alley (Author), Joyce Oudkerk Pool (Photographer)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 1, 2005

Simple and Sophisticated Meals for the Busy Cook
 
In Lynn Alley’s kitchen, toaster ovens aren’t just for browning bagels or warming up frozen pizzas. The best-selling author of The Gourmet Slow Cooker has discovered yet another unconventional and imaginative way to prepare gourmet meals at home. In The Gourmet Toaster Oven, Alley reveals why the toaster oven is an ideal tool to create mouthwatering meals with minimum effort. Toaster ovens are quick and energy-efficient, and provide additional oven space for side dishes when preparing large meals.
 
In this beautifully photographed book, Alley offers fifty gourmet breakfast, lunch, appetizer, side dish, dinner, and goodie recipes. Dishes include Coffee Cake Muffins, Southwestern Jalapeño and Red Pepper Scones, Macaroni and Cheese with Tapenade, Yogurt Baked Chicken, Beef and Vegetable Samosas, and Chocolate Lava Cake. This handy book also offers numerous surprising entrées—who knew you could grill a steak in a toaster oven?—sized for one or two portions. To complete the gourmet experience, Alley offers wine and beer suggestions for many of the dishes.
 
Tips on buying and caring for a toaster oven take the guesswork out of acquiring this useful gadget. Using fresh, high-quality ingredients and influences from global cuisine, Alley crafts sophisticated recipes that, with the help of your toaster oven, are simple to prepare and divine to experience.

Editorial Reviews

From the Publisher

The follow-up book to the best-selling GOURMET SLOW COOKER, featuring full-color photography and 50 recipes for creating dishes in a toaster oven.

Delicious dishes include Coffee Cake Muffins, Southwestern Jalapeño and Red Pepper Scones, Macaroni and Cheese with Olive Tapenade, Beef and Vegetable Samosas, and Chocolate Lava Cake.

Includes tips on buying a toaster oven and taking care of it, and wine notes for each recipe.

About the Author

Lynn Alley is a freelance food and wine journalist and the author of The Gourmet Slow Cooker and Lost Arts. She has contributed articles to Fine Cooking, Cook’s Illustrated, the San Francisco Chronicle, San Diego Union Tribune, and Wine Spectator. Alley also teaches classes at cooking schools around the western United States. She lives in San Diego, California.

Product Details

• Paperback: 128 pages
• Publisher: Ten Speed Press (October 1, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1580086594
• ISBN-13: 978-1580086592
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 0.5 x 9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #54,389 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Lynn Alley began her career in cooking as a middle school teacher where she and her students gained notoriety selling their hand made gourmet items at Neiman Marcus. Alley long ago began writing and saving recipes so that down the road she could write the cookbooks for which she has become known. Since leaving the classroom, she has traveled to teach cooking in southern France and at cooking schools throughout the western United States. She has, over the years, contributed articles on both food and wine to the San Diego Union Tribune, the Los Angeles Times, the San Francisco Chronicle, Fine Cooking, Cook's Illustrated, The Herb Companion, Health, Natural Home, Organic Style, and Organic Gardening, and has authored six cookbooks, the latest of which, "50 Simple Soups for the Slow Cooker" is scheduled for release in September of 2011. For more than ten years, she has also been a regular contributer to the Wine Spectator online and magazine, and her "Conscious Cook" blog appears weekly on the Yoga Journal's website, yoga journal.com.
An avid animal lover, she has also contributed article on animal diet, travel and wellbeing to the Natural Dog, Dog Fancy, and the Herb Companion.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

61 of 63 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Gem!, April 11, 2007

By 

A. Lupia "amlbee" (Branford, CT United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Gourmet Toaster Oven: Simple and Sophisticated Meals for the Busy Cook (Paperback)

"Gourmet" and "Toaster Oven" in the same title? You bet! I usually don't review cookbooks unless I feel they are special enough to encourage others to purchase them, and this one I recommend highly.

My family has downsized but my cooking enthusiasm has not and I am entertaining more often but with smaller guest lists. Heating up a gas oven for a small quiche to feed four seems a waste of energy (the planet's and my own) and time (my large toaster oven takes four minutes to reach 400 degrees: my oven, almost 15.) Also, with most recipes in the book serving 2-4, there is not the problem of reducing larger recipes and the resulting dreaded calculations. Quality ingredients well combined and engagingly presented replace long grocery lists and too many leftovers for a small family, singles, empty-nesters and the diet conscious (I mean, who of us really wants that chocolate cheesecake that serves 8 sitting temptingly in the 'frige after a dinner for 2-4?!)

The book itself is a quality paperback, large enough for lovely photos, a brief description of the recipe and suggestions, as well as print that is easy to read.

Well organized, with a good index, the book is divided into five sections, (as well as an informative description of toaster ovens and their features) which makes finding a recipe quick and easy. And, sit down for this, there are even wine suggestions for many of recipes...from toaster-oven cooking! Too cool.

The recipe chapters are: Breakfast, Lunch, Appetizers and Sides, Dinner and Tea and Goodies. Short lists of commonly available ingredients make it easy to take a basic recipe and imagine many substitutions for variety and what is available in your larder.

The Herbed Oven-Fried Chicken, Quiche Lorraine, Artisan Whole Wheat-Walnut Loaf, Banana-Walnut Muffins, Savory Cheesecakes (yup, that's what I said), Turkey, Tarragon, and Apple Meatloaf, Chocolate Lava Cakes...if I have to pick "favorites" these are just super. Yes, you can probably find similar recipes in your cookbook collection, but again, you don't have to do the arithmetic. I guarantee that no one will associate that toaster oven sitting innocently on your kitchen counter as the source of these lovely dishes. And you don't have to tell them, you know.

Of course, you will have to re-think baking pans, casserole dishes, etc. for these smaller amounts, but I have found some lovely and very useful such items on sale in most all places that carry cookware. Besides, if you are a true "foodie" imagine how happy your friends and relatives will be to have something new to give you for birthdays and holidays! And, think of all the room you can free up in your kitchen (large baking pans and huge casseroles can be stored under the bed with those "extra cookbooks"...well, it works for me!)

44 of 46 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars long overdue, March 19, 2006

By 

Kelly Pocci (Downers Grove, IL) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Gourmet Toaster Oven: Simple and Sophisticated Meals for the Busy Cook (Paperback)

As an empty nester and avid cook, this book is perfect. Very tasty recipes without making huge quantities. The author has done her research and deserves credit for filling a rare niche
in this cookbook category. Shhh, don't tell my away-at-college children, but they will be receiving a copy of this book along with a nice toaster oven for Christmas. This is a cookbook everyone could use for fresh ideas, from Anzacs to Yogurt Baked Chicken with wine pairings suggested for many dishes. I wish I had thought of it first.

17 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Simple and sophisticated indeed!, December 27, 2006

By 

LoeTeke (U.S.A.) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Gourmet Toaster Oven: Simple and Sophisticated Meals for the Busy Cook (Paperback)

Excellent set of sophisticated recipes downsized for small servings & simple execution. If you take the next year to practice each recipe you'll be well on your way to gourmet-hood! For example: Authentic English "High tea" scones.