Customer Reviews

Simply Thai Cooking

5 star:		(15)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I used to go to one of Wandee Young's restaurants in Toronto all the time with my friends, so when I discovered that she had published a cookbook (including recipes from her restaurant), I was thrilled. Ever since I have bought this book I have prepared delicious meal after meal. My favorite dish is the Thai Spicy Noodles (with Pork). The preparation of this food is just as pleasurable as the consumption. As you cook, the wonderful smells of all the ingredients blending together will send shivers of delight down your spine. After eating Thai cuisine, my big complaint is the blandness of North American food. Thai cuisine is much healthier, just as easy to prepare, and bursting with flavor. Do yourself a favor and order this book now.

This is one of the first Thai cookbooks I purchased. Since then I have purchased several others, but I keep coming back to this one as my starting point for creating an Asian menu. As most other reviewers have stated, the directions are clear and the ingredient list is manageable. Young offers some helpful tips along the way to make it easier.

Some of the humor sprinkled throughout the book is an unexpected surprise. I love the spicy chile sauce recipe where the last step is "call the fire department". There could be more photos in my opinion, but that is not a major issue.

All in all a good investment is you want to learn how to cook Thai food. And if you are like me, living in an area that is devoid of closeby Thai restaurants, it is a necessity for those of us who need our Thai "fix" on a regular basis.

Thai food lovers will dance around the kitchen while preparing these recipes,and those who dine at the table will widen their eyes in amazement that you, yes you, could have prepared such an incredibly authentic meal in such a remarkably short time. I have turned my 10 year old onto Thai, and prepared a dinner for 8 in less than an hour. This cookbook makes me a hero everytime. Low fat, high flavor, my friends are all asking me to gift them with this book for Christmas. I will do so willingly...Nothing would make me happier than to have them all cooking Simply Thai for me.

From the first recipe I tried which was the basil chicken and sweet and sour tofu, I knew I hit upon a great Thai cookbook. Together with Real Thai by Nanci McDermott, these two books firmly established my reputation as a great cook. Every single thing I made came out delicious. The recipes are not time consuming, the ingredients are easily available, the direction is clear and guides you step-by-step and the taste is incredibly delicious. I finally can make these dishes that I used to buy all the time. Very flexible and workable recipes.

I have been using this book for about a year now and have used many of the recipes. The results beat any Thai restaurant. Do not be frightened by the long lists of ingredients, as they are not hard and the recipes are very clear.

Like many others, I've wanted to learn to cook Thai for some time now but have always been intimidated by what I thought was going to be complex, high energy cooking...Boy was I wrong. This book has enabled me to indulge my passion for cooking while still allowing me to make healthy food choices. Thanks Wanda! [When can we expect another book? I've made almost everything in this cookbook (some more than once).]

After falling in love with Thai food five years ago, I was determined to learn how to cook it myself.

This is the first and only Thai cookbook I own. Wandee offers a great glossary of Thai cooking ingredients complete with substitute suggestions. More helpful than anything, though, are the wonderful descriptions of each dish in the margins of it's accompanying recipe. This is a terrific starter Thai cookbook that accomplishes exactly what it claims to do. All of the recipies are simple, easy and excellent. I've never been disappointed with anything I've made with this book. It's a must-have for any beginning Thai cook.

The authors have taken classic Thai dishes and converted them to home kitchen use. Some require quite a few steps if you want to cook entirely from scratch (such as Pad Thai) but most take only about 10 minutes once the chopping is done. Doing several items as part of a meal should take less than an hour, including chopping.

The instructions are detailed, telling you to cook something for 30 seconds, 2 minutes, or whatever. Some recipes may require 4-6 such steps because different ingredients cook at different rates. But the instructions are all here, and they're clear. This detail is s key for Thai cooking since the idea is to cook quickly at very high heat. My young-teenager son is an enthusiastic sous chef and can do most of these recipes.

The meals are also tasty, and I haven't been disappointed yet.

You will need access to an Asian grocery store for most of the recipes, though you could probably get by with getting a couple of the spices from a mail-order spice store.

I'm learning to cook Thai, so I don't always have to buy it. This book is a great way to learn about the special ingredients as well as some super recipes. The only negative is that the steps are probably more complicated than they need to be for someone who already knows how to cook. I would streamline the instructions and it would seem less daunting.

These recipes produce great results. The basil chicken is incredibly fragrant and so is the chicken coconut noodle dish. I love that the ingredients are not overly obscure and the methods/preparation is very doable. A lot of thai books use really strange ingredients for authenticity. This book strikes a balance between using what you are comfortable with while producing delicious Thai dishes. It is aimed at those cooking in a western kitchen but the food is still extremely flavorful and "authentic". Highly recommended.