Women Hearts All Heart Family Cookbook or Raos Recipes from the Neighborhood

Women Heart's All Heart Family Cookbook

Author: Kathy Kastan

Heart disease is the leading cause of death among women, killing six times as many as breast cancer. What's worse, too few women realize the dire risk they face.

WomenHeart, the National Coalition for Women with Heart Disease, is an organization dedicated to helping women heart patients and those at risk for heart disease, whether they know it or not. Through an extensive support group network, they also help women who have heart disease live normal lives. And because dietary changes are often an important part of the recovery process, when their members gather, the conversation naturally turns to food.

To help spread the news of their work, WomenHeart has created this one-of-a-kind collection that focuses on 40 key foods known to promote heart health that features a number of family-friendly recipes from their members.

Packed with plenty of great-to-wake-up-to dishes like French Toast with Orange Cream and Lemon Blueberry Muffins, it also includes dozens of crowd-pleasing dinner favorites like Revamped Chicken Pot-pie, Beef and Vegetable Stroganoff, and Sesame Salmon with Spicy Cucumber Salad. In fact, in this collection there's a recipe for every occasion, as well as 40 enticing photographs.

Even better, this cookbook includes plenty of desserts, like Flourless Chocolate Cake, Summer Fruit Compote, and Raspberry Buckle, making it easy to see that fighting heart disease can mean indulging in the pleasures good food offers.

Publishers Weekly

The introduction explains that "scientists have identified 40 foods that can help reduce, prevent, and even reverse heart disease." Those 40 foods-among them chocolate, red wine, tropical fruits, almonds and avocados-are the focus of this health-conscious cookbook. All 175 recipes include one or more of them, and the first section details, food by food, in easily understandable (even occasionally funny) language, why they're good for you. The recipes are accessible and appealing, if not especially original. The superstar ingredients are marked with a heart symbol; key nutritional information accompanies each entry. The full spectrum of basic food genres is covered, from breakfast foods like Broccoli and Cheese Strata (featuring egg whites), Asparagus Frittata (using egg substitute) and Green Tea-Oatmeal Pancakes to desserts such as Orange Pistachio Cake and an antioxidant-rich but still decadent Flourless Chocolate Cake. In between are plenty of soups, salads (including an elegant Grape and Fennel Salad), vegetable side dishes, grains, beans, pasta and main courses such as Sesame Salmon with Spicy Cucumber Salad, Oven-Fried Fish and Chips, Revamped Chicken Potpie and Make-Over Veal Marsala. The variety and simplicity make this a reliable-and lighthearted-resource for anyone trying to fight or prevent heart trouble. (Feb.)

Copyright 2007 Reed Business Information

Library Journal

WomenHeart was founded in 2000 by three women who had heart attacks in their forties and felt heart disease was an invisible issue in women's health; it is the leading cause of death in American women. The organization published this cookbook in an effort to educate women about protecting their hearts with a healthier lifestyle. After a section on general healthy heart tips, Kastan (From the Heart: A Woman's Guide to Living Well with Heart Disease ) and dietitian Suzanne Banfield with medical writer Wendy Leonard focus on 40 foods that benefit the heart. Citations to medical studies and health organizations are scattered throughout these two sections. The final section contains recipes using the 40 foods, which are geared toward the average cook, with no complicated techniques or hard-to-find ingredients. Because many of the women who use the cookbook will be feeding families, the recipes are meant to appeal to everyone and include Spicy Oven-Fried Chicken, Better-for-You Black Bean Chili, and Paella. Overall, the book will be useful for those who are interested in a healthier diet, and it is recommended for most public library collections.-Ginny Wolter, Toledo-Lucas Cty. P.L.

Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.

Interesting book: Global Business Etiquette or The ECO Guide to Careers that Make a Difference

Rao's Recipes from the Neighborhood: Frank Pelligrino Cooks Italian with Family and Friends

Author: Frank Pellegrino

Rao's Recipes from the Neighborhood is a tribute to generations of cooks and the delicious Italian home-style meals that are America's favorite foods to make in their own kitchens-they're also the kind of dishes served at Frank Pellegrino's inimitable New York restaurant, Rao's, and have helped make Rao's famous.

Richly illustrated with full color photography as well as vintage photographs and studded with essays on the great Italian heritage of home cooking, this book is an inexhaustible source of ideas for any enthusiastic home chef. With a full range of dishes from antipasti to desserts, this book includes the kind of recipes you beg relatives to write down, such as: Rose Caiazzo's lasagna, stove-top chicken cacciatore, Frankie's meatballs, Susan di Sesa's oven-roasted peppers, Rao's lemon chicken adapted for the grill, and Maria Pugia's biscotti.

You will turn to this cookbook again and again-to get ideas for a quick midweek pasta dinner with the family, for chicken dishes to feed a crowd, for holiday baking recipes that are simple to make and satisfying to share. Over a hundred years of traditional Italian-American cooking is behind Rao's Recipes from the Neighborhood and will make it a beloved favorite in your kitchen.

Frank Pellegrino is the owner and impresario of the restaurant Rao's. He also distributes a hugely successful national brand of pasta sauces and other products under the Rao's name (sold at upscale groceries and big retailers like Bed, Bath and Beyond). And he's a sometime actor who has a recurring role on "The Sopranos" (look for him more frequently in the new 2004 season).

Library Journal

Rao's Cookbook featured the home-style Italian American food served at Pellegrino's tiny but nationally known family restaurant in Manhattan's East Harlem. In this second book, he offers more of the same from family, friends, and his own kitchen: e.g., Peppers and Eggs, Christmas Eve Seafood Pasta, and Stove-Top Chicken Cacciatore. Pellegrino is very engaging-his personality is one of the major reasons for Rao's continued popularity (even though it's almost impossible to get a reservation)-and the text reflects his warmth and sincerity. The first book included vignettes and reminiscences from celebrity customers, while this one sticks closer to home. However, Rao's line of pasta sauces is distributed nationwide, and the first cookbook was a best seller. For area libraries and larger collections. Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.