Mychols Monster alla Truck-ish Kitchen

Time for some new Cookbook reviews that include taste tests of monster drinks, sheet supper tacos and homemade taco truck pickles starting with….

…a cookbook exploration of, “Shut Up and Cook!” by Erica Reid.

This book starts with great healthy inspired food information and a nice look inside the author’s actual story, and why she calls this book, “Shut up and cook!”

As for the recipes, I admit that at the beginning, it seemed like the author was going in a direction of only vegan-ish recipes-but turns out, her recipes DO twist and turn quite nicely! I’m pretty dang sure anyone can find a nice handful of favorite looking recipes to bookmark-like I have!

All in all, this cookbook felt really personal to me. Her personality really shines brightly, bubbly and authentic. I felt like I was reading a book that a really good friend would have written!  I thought Erica Reid did a really nice job here with her BEAUTIFUL and HEALTHY intention!

Available at Amazon/Shutupandcook!

Erica Reid’s website Ericareidcooks.com

Next up…

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A cocktail book that pairs up drink recipes with horror movies!
by Jon Chaiet (Author), Marc Chaiet (Author) 

I found this cocktail recipe book to be scary…lol-I mean, funny-scary…and sometimes a tad disturbing. Seriously, ready to be deliciously haunted by killer cocktails? This book offers a nice punch of everything entertaining so, of course, I had to try at least one out…just to make sure these authors were actually serious!

I chose THE SKIN SUIT from the Shots section of the book. (You’ll have to guess what movie THAT came from!)

This drink was SO EASY to make (hint-homemade Jalapeno Simple Syrup), yet so elegant at the same time! I chose to NOT put the pork rind garnish in…yea, I just couldn’t go there-but imagine how impressed your guests would be if you DID serve THAT at your next scary cocktail party!

I can’t say enough about this book except, “CHEERS…Bwahahahaha!!!”

Just in time for Halloween, right?

Available at Amazon/LetsGetMonsterSmashed

 

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Sheet Pan Suppers Vegetarian
Raquel Pelzel

 

 

Okay so I personally didn’t know that “sheet pan cooking” was even a thing, and so I was very excited to dive in to what this cookbook had to offer!

There are LOTS of great recipe ideas for food with family, food with friends, or even food for one, which obviously includes leftovers-YAY!

I’m not a vegetarian anymore, but I found PLENTY of great “event oriented” recipes to choose from for the brunch I made today! I went for ROASTED POTATO AND POBLANO TACOS with TACO TRUCK PICKLES.

Of course, what sometimes (or usually) happens to me, is that I wont find an ingredient or two…like on this one! But it was fine! I used Anaheim pepper’s instead Poblano peppers and it turned out GRRRREAT!

I threw these on a sheet pan along with the rest of the ingredients suggested, then went ahead to make the TACO PICKLES…

EASY!

As soon as the Taco Pickles and Potatoes (with the substituted Anaheim peppers) were all ready, I took a tortilla and just filled it up. As I was about to take that first bite, I realized…wait. There was no particular spices in this dish.

I continued on to that first bite anyway and…

YUUUUUUUUUUUUUUM! This was so absolutely perfect, in it’s own whole and simple way!

What a PERFECT choice for a simple brunch right next to my Monster Smash jalapeno-tequila cocktail!

So YAY to ALL the authors here! Thank you for making books that are FUN to review and blog about! I wish each cookbook GREAT success!

(Pictured: Low carb tortilla, potato/pepper filling, taco truck pickles and fresh cilantro!)

Sheet Pan Suppers Vegetarian from Amazon/SheetPanSuppersVegetarian

Raquel Pelzel’s Website http://www.raquelpelzel.com/

All photos by Mychols/Richards

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How To SET A TABLE

I FEEL INSPIRED TO ENTERTAIN AGAIN!!!

I knew right away when I received this book that it would be exactly what I was hoping for! A book where I could never mess up my next table setting, haha!

Seriously, my Mom brought me up with how to set a table properly and yet this book is my forever refresher course and a book that I can hand down to my kids! To me, this is a really FUN book-AND elegant enough to sit beside the fancy dishes I display from my dining room! 😀

The greatest inspiration I took from this book, though, were the fun ideas it gave! I’m talking about the author’s eventful THEMES and IDEAS! OMG-I feel so excited to entertain again and I am so grateful to have found this sweet and perfect little set a table book!

Although I LOVE this book, I WISH it would have given more ideas on napkin folding. Still to me, it’s a GREAT TREASURE…

…and a perfect gift to give yourself and to pass down to family!

Available NOW on Amazon.com/HowToSetaTable

Thank you for stopping by Mychols Fabulous Kitchen Blog. Please feel free to share your thoughts, comments and questions here with me! 

XO-
L Mychols 

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a modern way to cook (Anna Jones) – Review

My taste testing video: Youtube 

*a modern way to cook, 150+ vegetarian recipes for quick, flavor-packed meals.*

Quick, being that if you have the mindset of the author’s prepping and cooking “practice” in place along with the proper equipment, yes-you CAN make quick flavor-packed meals!

I come from a traditional upbringing of cooking-meaning brought up in the seventies but raised from the influence of the sixties. The new “modern” ways of cooking is something I’m still catching up with.

I love the idea of cooking using fresh and healthy ingredients, I just don’t like having to go to the store all the time for them.

So, coming from a person like me, here goes my review.

The book itself is lovely in a farm-fresh/french countryside way.

I loved sitting down with this book The author writes and explains how this book will work for the reader. How the ingredients of her recipes will affect us and our lives.

A couple things I really loved about this book:

The author includes a nice paragraph before each recipe – like the history of where each recipe came from and how she has changed it in to something new, healthy and modern.

My other favorite highlights throughout this book are her pairings-like her 10 pairings of omelet fillings. She puts each pairing in six categories: Main Vegetable, Backup Vegetable, Accent Flavor, Backup Flavor, and Richness.

I also appreciate that even though the author uses a lot of healthy and fresh ingredients, you WILL still find some “fun” ingredients like sourdough bread and actual ….cheese! (NOTE: There are a few ingredients the author will suggest substitutions for, like for dairy, grains, etc.).

For me, I personally probably will not be using this book to cook from much. I like it more for reading and educating myself with. (Again, I’m still coming from traditional habits that I actually like.)

I did attempt a recipe from this book, for blogging purposes.

SMOKY PEPPER AND WHITE BEAN QUESADILLAS

I chose this recipe because I personally love ALL quesadillas, and this one would only take 10 minutes! Well, prep alone (for me) took about 20 minutes and then cooking it and dishing it took a few more-but then I probably move slower than most.

As far as the ingredients went, the green onions, smoked paprika, roasted red peppers, lemon, parsley, and cherry tomatoes were no problem to obtain from my local store. What I DID end up having to substitute were the cooked white beans (SUBSTITUTED for red kidney beans), whole wheat or seeded tortillas (SUBSTITUTED Ezekial sprouted grain tortillas), and Manchego cheese (SUBSTITUTED sharp white cheddar cheese with hints of Parmesan).

The parsley that I bought at the store were truly a huge bunch but the packaging DID say that it was “technically” a bunch at 3oz. and so I used half of that bunch. It still seemed like an awful lot, but I trusted and proceeded anyway.

NOTE: the only parsley I could find for this recipe was the rougher “curly leaf” kind and not the Italian “flat leaf” kind. The recipe only called for …parsley.

So my taste tester and I found the recipe to be pretty good-he rated it at a 6, and I agreed. I LOVED the cheese I used and the beans seemed to make it a “meatier” kind of experience. The parsley was a bit rough, though.

This recipe was probably more trouble for me for the end result I got. Even if I had used a different or “softer” tortilla and less -or a different kind- of parsley, I’d still probably simplify this recipe, while in the back of my mind always remembering the initial recipe that inspired me! 😉

So to sum up my review of A Modern Way to Cook: the book is a beautiful read. It’s beautiful to look through and a GREAT cookbook to learn from-this coming from someone who is still used to cooking and eating the “old” way!

Thank you so much for reading my review of A Modern Way To Cook.

Available at Amazon.com

Authors Website: http://annajones.co.uk/

***I received this book from Blogging for Books for this review.***