Madhur Jaffrey Cookbook

This cookbook combines two of Jaffrey's earlier cookbooks into a single volume:

Eastern Vegetarian Cooking includes recipes from all over Asia, including the Middle East, Korea, China, Japan, the Phillippines, Indonesia, Malaysia, as well as her native India.

An Introduction to Indian Cooking provides a wide variety of excellent Indian recipes, some simple, some more elaborate.

Although it features an integrated index (thank heavens!), the books are presented entirely separately, with their own suggested menus, table of contents, and information about ingredients. Although separate, I am grateful that they are present, especially the ingredient descriptions.

The book is intended for a British audience and the quantities and sources are British. This is not too much of a problem for me, but for a North American audience it would be a hassle (pints instead of cups).

I have tended to use it mostly for the Indian recipes and these are excellent. Occasionally an ingredient is missed in the list of ingredients, so reading the directions first is always necessary. The recipes also call for more oil than I like, but I think this reflects both the time in which the books were written, and the culture.

This book is my go-to book for Indian recipes (I don't have many others) and as I try to eat more vegetarian meals I hope toexplore more of the other recipes too.