Effortless Elegance With Colin Cowie: Menus, Tips, Strategies, and More Than 200 Recipes (Hardcover)

~ (Author), Maureen Clancy (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description

Colin Cowie, one of the West Coast's preeminent specialists in catering and event planning, has been the mastermind of some of Los Angeles' most spectacular parties. Now, in Effortless Elegance With Colin Cowie, he dedicates himself to helping you create the same effortless elegance when you entertain at home.

With enthusiasm, taste and style, Cowie teaches you how to entertain with ease and comfort and how to enjoy your own parties. One impressive yet easy menu, "Dinner When Time Is Short," takes just one hour, including shopping and preparation, leaving you plenty of time to relax and clean up before your guests arrive. Cowie's philosophy is based on enhancing the materials at hand. He tells you how to create a lasting impact with just one element -- a type of flower or a single color -- and use it to the greatest effect.

Beginning with "A Lazy Sunday Brunch" and ending with "Dinner in Front of the Fire Effortless Elegance With Colin Cowie provides complete menus for all seasons and any occasion, from "An Elegant Cocktail Party" to "A Perfect Picnic." A sampling of the delicious menus and recipes includes: "A Casual Breakfast" with fresh grapefruit juice, fried apples and stewed prunes, almond pancakes, scrambled eggs with yogurt and chives, and chicken and fennel sausage; "A Rustic Luncheon" with a terrine of eggplant and roasted peppers with arugala sauce, seafood paella, and lemon sorbet with marinated grapefruit; and "A Cape Malay Barbecue" featuring curried lamb kabobs with mango chutney, basmati rice with toasted cashews, raisins and sultanas, a bulgur mint salad, and baked bananas with rum-spiked creme fraiche.

The recipes are designed to be prepared with a minimum of fuss and a maximum of aesthetic impact, freeing the party-giver from the kitchen and allowing him or her to enjoy the essence of the perfect party -- a close and companionable evening with good friends.

Effortless Elegance With Colin Cowie is a gorgeously illustrated treasury with more than 250 color photographs, 200 recipes organized into 28 menus, and an abundance of effective strategies for making all of your parties, both large and small, sensational events to remember.

Nothing is impossible for Colin... He delivers fantasies and dreams that most people can only think of."--Emeril Lagasse

About the Author

Colin Cowie, writes a monthly feature for In Style magazine and is the founder of Colin Cowie Lifestyle, an event planning, catering, design, and production company in Los Angeles. His legendary coolness under pressure and attention to detail have placed him in the ranks of the nation's top wedding coordinators. He is currently working on a book about designing and planning wedding. Born in Kitwe, Zambia, and educated in South Africa, Cowie has lived in Los Angeles, California, since 1984.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 260 pages
• Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers; 1 edition (September 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0062701525
• ISBN-13: 978-0062701527
• Product Dimensions: 12.3 x 9.4 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3.7 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #202,591 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

41 of 42 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Scrumptous recipes!, March 9, 1999

By A Customer

I've poured through this book over and over again. Although I love seeing the photos of Colin's presentations and decor, I find the recipes incredibly different and easy to prepare. I use Effortless Elegance as a cookbook, perusing the index for dishes I'm considering. I'm especially wild about his recipe for Grilled Shrimp on Lemongrass Skewers. I now keep a permanent stash of frozen lemongrass in my freezer to use for any BBQ skewers.

31 of 32 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A cookbook and a breath of fresh air on entertaining, June 15, 1997

By A Customer

This handsome book is refreshingly up to date. The recipes are excellent and the point of view is much less work than Martha. Some of the ideas are so great they will wow the new brides. The rest of us are lucky to find a really new idea every once in a while and this book has them. Next time I hope we get more entertaining and perhaps less cooking. The guy has STYLE

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars In a class of its own., February 28, 2002

By A Customer

This book is beautiful to look at. The recipes are excellent as well. There are a broad range of dishes for a variety of occassions. I turn to this book for ideas every time I entertain. Even if I don't use a recipe from this book, I often find ideas that make special occassions that much more special. I highly recommend this book to anyone who likes to entertain. One word of caution, all the recipes are for a large number of guests. The recipes are not for an intimate dinner party for four. I have successfully scaled some back though.