Customer Reviews

Macaroni And Cheese

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

 

 

Here's a book to enjoy in the winter months. Actually I never was a fan of the packaged mac and cheese with the powdered day-glo orange cheese. So this book had to go some way to win me over. It did.

The author's love of this food comes through on every page. She is enthusiastic without being cloying (well, maybe a little cloying), and it's apparent that her recipes have actually been tested in a home kitchen. The book is well illustrated with color pictures of about every third recipe.

The recipes should satisfy the most discriminating home cooks, without being intimidating for novices. This is real food, not just something to donate to a pot-luck dinner. Recipes range from "Macaroni with Moroccan-spiced Butter and Shredded Goat Cheese" to "Trinadadian Macaroni Pie." Even the old familiar dishes are made special. The first recipe my wife and I tried was the old stand-by "Tuna Noodle Casserole," which the author made special with the addition of porcini mushrooms and a mushroom bechemel sauce. Absolutely delicious!

If you like pasta and cheese and enjoy coooking, this cookbook is for you.

This book is awesome for cheese and food lovers. I love it! There is a huge variety of recipes in here - I feel like I could cook dinner from it every day and not get bored. There are classic recipes ("Yankee Doodle Dandy") and some things I would never have thought to include in a Mac & Cheese book ("Minestrone al pesto con Formaggio"), but are equally tasty.

She also spends time discussing different types of cheeses and pastas, which I found very enlightening. I also liked the section where she talks about making macaroni & cheese without preplanning. It makes this book great for both types of cooks: 1) those who use cookbooks for inspiration and 2) those who use cookbooks as step-by-step instruction manuals. She allows for (and encourages) experimenting but does not require it.

Another thing I like is that the cookbook has a very narrative quality to it. I spent my first night with this book, just reading it from cover to cover. Her writing is entertaining and lighthearted and gives character to her recipes.

As much as I love this book, I will provide one caveat. This book is best suited to foodies and cheese connoisseurs, as opposed to the average American suburban mom. While these recipes are great for families, you need to have a place you go to get good cheeses. You can't just use the Kraft Cheddar that you bought at Albertson's, and certainly not Velveeta or anything like that. There are some simple recipes, but many are more complicated, and many involve ingredients that you're not going to get at your average neighborhood grocery (Creme Fraiche, exotic cheeses, truffle oil, fennel seeds, etc.) That said, depending on where you live, you probably have a store nearby where you can get these things, and it's worth a small drive to get good cheese.

Yum. Just finished another recipe - this time 'Macaroni and Cheese for People Who Love Onions'. The flavors of the Cheshire and Sharp Cheddar cheeses mixed together were tremendous. It's quick to cook for a weekday night, too.

Another great recipe from this book is 'Yankee Doodle Dandy Baked Macaroni and Cheese'. My guests loved it for July 4th.

This book also provides readers with information about the many types of cheeses found in different parts of the world. The author invents many recipes from her travels and the little stories at the top of each recipe are enlightening.

This is good cookbook for teenagers and/or beginning cooks.

I purchased this book purely out of curiosity. I wanted to know how many different ways one could possibly make macaroni and cheese--because I only knew of two, and one of those involved a blue box!

This book is great for mac 'n cheese lovers, because it illustrates ubiquitous variations on the typical mac. If you want a culinary adventure, this would be the book for you.

This is easily one of my favorite cookbooks (out of many)! I've tried 8 recipes so far, and not only want to repeat every single of one of them (actually for most of them I have, haha), but have loads that I still want to try (if only mac and cheese was less fattening I'd make a different variation weekly)! Some of my favorites are Macaronis au Gratin Va Va Va Voom (a bit rich, but a wonderful flavor combination, buttery garlicky mushrooms ooze their yummy juices over a bed of gruyere infused noodles) to Macaroni's Got the Blues (a great creamy combo of pesto and blue cheese with crunchy toasted pine nuts, yum!) It's version of Tuna Noodle Casserole is also quite yummy, with dried porcini mushrooms and peas! Leah's Homey Greek Macaroni and Cheese was great fresh and as a midnight snack later that night :) Only thing with that particular recipe is next time I will shred the cheese and mix it in instead of leaving it in cubes like it suggests. That made for overly cheesy bites throughout instead of a great melty gooeyness that makes mac and cheese so fantastic. Oooooh, I think I want some right now :)

It is a book of recipes involving both macaroni and cheese, so I guess there's that. But most of the recipes in the book are not things you would identify as "mac and cheese" if they were placed in front of you. I make a lot of mac and cheese, and didn't find a single recipe in this book I was interested in trying.

I gave this book to friends as a holiday gift. I received rave kudos from friends who like to cook especially people for enjoy macaroni and cheese.

Marlena Spieler, Macaroni and Cheese (Chronicle, 2006)

What can you possibly say about a cookbook that contains nothing but macaroni and cheese recipes? I can only think of one thing: delicious. Marlena Spieler has created another excellent cookbook, spiced up with gorgeous photography, that's full of recipes that are begging me to try them. How can that be anything but an unqualified success? ****

This cookbook presents fabulous versions of loosely-interpreted macaroni and cheese recipes. Didn't know there were enough to fill a whole cookbook? She has noodle/cheese recipes from different cultures (even some dessert recipes!) but also old standbys like macaroni salad and baked deep-dish mac & cheese. The captions preceding each recipe describes the genesis of each one. This woman is an expert on this supreme comfort food. Great value, and plenty for kids and adults to enjoy.

Ive never been a large fan of mac and cheese ..but then I always had the cheap stuff..I cant wait to try some of these recipes..they look delicious