Vegetables on the Side: The Complete Guide to Buying and Cooking [Hardcover]

Sallie Y. Williams (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 1995

In Vegetables on the Side, Sallie Y. Williams solves the age-old problem of what to serve with the main course. To round out any meal, she offers basics like steamed broccoli, such regional specialties as New England baked beans, antioxidant-packed recipes for collards, and exotica ranging from stuffed chayote to roasted Jerusalem artichokes. All told, Williams brings together more than 400 recipes, classic and created, for the vegetable-minded. Williams knows that fresh produce is not always an option. So there's advice on preparing frozen, dried (as in the case of mushrooms, peas, and beans), or even sometimes canned vegetables, such as hominy, to present them in their best possible light. She doesn't ignore health concerns either. All the vegetable entries include nutritional highlights, and while this is a vegetable, not a vegetarian, book, it naturally favors meatless fare. Within each vegetable entry, the recipes kick off with directions for steaming, boiling, baking - whatever you need to start cooking. Then you can build on the basics to prepare anything from vegetable pancakes to souffles. For anyone who doesn't know what to serve with the side dish, Williams offers suggestions of entrees to pair with each recipe.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Sallie Williams has put together the definitive reference guide to the vegetable, alphabetically presenting 100 kinds of vegetables, greens, and beans (artichokes to zucchini), with more than 400 associated recipes. Let's say a friend hands you a basket of fennel from her garden. What do you do with it? The chapter on fennel discusses not just its history and flavor, but how to select a good bulb, how to store and prepare it (microwave, boil, and steam), plus it provides several fennel dishes (steamed with Parmesan, sautéed with red pepper, braised with red onion, roasted, stir-fried, or in salad) and includes suggestions for good companion dishes. Fond of tomatillos but unclear on the cooking concept? Rutabagas in the farmer's market but no recipes coming to mind? Vegetables on the Side employs a remarkably simple yet practical concept, offering inspiration to menu preparation and cutting down on the dreaded vegetable storage-bin rot. --Stephanie Gold --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

About the Author

Sallie Y. Williams is the former associate director of the LaVarenne Cooking School. She is the author of several cookbooks, including The Complete Book of Sauces (Macmillan, 1990), The Art of Presenting Food, American Feasts, and Down Home Feasts. She lives in Virginia. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 320 pages
• Publisher: John Wiley & Sons Inc (July 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0026291150
• ISBN-13: 978-0026291156
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,193,019 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars One of my favorites, April 4, 2006

By 

P. Larkin Hutton "PLH" (California) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Vegetables on the Side: The Complete Guide to Buying and Cooking (Hardcover)

I keep checking this book out of the library, so I guess I'm just going to have to break down and buy my own copy. It is one of the two vegetable cookbooks I turn to again and again, the other being Deborah Madison's "Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone". Several recipes are given for each vegetable, and most are easy to prepare. If you want to include a varied selection of vegetables in your diet, and you want eating them to be a pleasure, then this book will serve you well.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Vegetables - the one book to have, December 6, 2004

By 

Rover's Mom - See all my reviews

This review is from: Vegetables on the Side: The Complete Guide to Buying and Cooking (Hardcover)

This book is one of the top five in my kitchen - the only one soley for vegetables. After a trip to a farmers market - this is where you go to learn how to cook the Japanese eggplant or the Jerusalem artichoke or the rabe.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars fantasitic, August 7, 2001

By 

glouise (Upstate New York United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Vegetables on the Side: The Complete Guide to Buying and Cooking (Paperback)

I never thought I would need to purchase a cookbook about vegetables but I was proven wrong. This is a book that is well worth the money you pay for it. From a-z vegetables are arranged in chapters that begin with a discription of each with it's history, storage, how to choose and cooking methods. What then follows is a collection a recipes for each vegetable that ranges from the common place to the not so common. The standard is that all the recipes are very tasty, well explainded and easy to accomplish. Since purchasing this book, when I see a good looking vegetable I will buy it and then go home and look through the book to find how I will prepare it. I have never been disappointed. The author will often even give suggestions on what to prepare as an entree to accompany the vegetable dish.