Review - The Turkey Cookbook - 138 New Ways to Cook America's Favorite Bird

By Jane Wangersky
This book promises "138 new ways to cook America's favorite bird" - but if you just want to make a simple Thanksgiving dinner, it'll help you with that, too। Chef Rick Rodgers starts at the beginning, describing different kinds of turkeys in his introduction। ("Farm-raised wild" turkey, anyone?) The chapters cover whole turkey, leftovers, white meat and dark, turkey cutlets ("the new scallopini"), ground turkey, special occasion recipes, turkey on the barbeque grill, and side dishes. All the old Thanksgiving favorites are here, along with new twists on them. If you're just looking for a good way to roast your Thanksgiving turkey, look no further than the first recipe in Chapter 1. Rodgers gives his seven-step method for what he calls "the crispiest, juiciest, tastiest turkey you have ever dreamed of". He also tells you how to make giblet gravy at the same time. From there on, the turkey recipes get more exotic: Texan, Cajun, Spanish, Moroccan, Chinese and more. Rodgers even tells you how to roast a turkey entirely in the microwave, though he prefers not to. New cooks with a little ambition will be able to handle the recipes in this book. The reading level is only moderately difficult. Although the lists of ingredients are usually long, there's no need to be overwhelmed by them. As Rodgers says in his directions for homemade turkey stock: "Don't let my long list of tips throw you off - turkey stock is easy to make. But even simple chores have their little secrets to make things go more smoothly." He starts each recipe with an enthusiastic description, and throws in lots of random facts and true stories. (My favorite is the one in Chapter 2, about the family who serves their turkey along with bread and mustard so they can go straight to the turkey sandwich stage.) His enthusiasm is catching. Read this book and you'll look forward to cooking Thanksgiving dinner. The Turkey Cookbook: 138 New Ways to Cook America's Favorite Bird, by Rick Rodgers (Harper Perennial, 1990), is available on Amazon.Jane Wangersky is an ESL teacher and the author of Thanksgiving for Beginners. To learn how to cook a great Thanksgiving dinner, even if you don't know where to start, visit her site, Thanksgiving for Beginners.



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