This cookbook was reviewed by David and Karen of Twenty-Fingered Cooking.

I have to admit, I was a little skeptical when I opened up the package from the Daring Kitchen crew to find the stars-and-stripes-and-beer-studded cover of Entertain Like a Texas Gentleman by David Harap staring back at me. Full disclosure: I am not from Texas. I do not want to be from Texas. And, while I do try to generally be nice and respectful of people, being called a “gentleman” just makes me feel old. So, in short, I’m definitely not this book’s target audience.

That being said, however, I can’t argue with good food, and to use a bit of Texas slang I just found on the internet, the food in this cookbook is larrupin’! Harap’s recipes look and taste out of this world. He has a knack for taking ingredients that you can’t possibly picture being on the same plate together, and making the most scrumptiously delicious meal out of them that you can imagine.

First, a bit on the overall organization and design of the cookbook. Each chapter is designed as a full-course meal or spread of food for all occasions, from the “Scotch Tasting Affair” with the guys, to a long, detailed “Romantic Dinner” with the woman of your dreams. Each chapter includes a bit of advice for the meal at the beginning, and gives you lots of space at the end of the chapter to scribble down your own notes on the meal. The back of the book gives complete shopping lists for every chapter, so you can just cut them out and run to the store.

This review was prepared by Nikki Gardner of Art and Lemons.
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Love Soup: 160 All-New Vegetarian Recipes from the Author of The Vegetarian Epicure by Anna Thomas serves up 160 vegetarian recipes, the book is a comprehensive soup catalogue designed for every season. Complete with hand drawn illustrations and personal stories, this book celebrates fresh ingredients and pots of soup made from scratch, like Whole-Wheat Walnut Bread scooped into a bowl of Red Lentil and Squash Soup, Green Soup, or Neeps and Tatties Soup, suitable for any occasion.

Anna Thomas wrote the best selling The New Vegetarian Epicure: Menus--with 325 all-new recipes--for family and friends in 1973 as a graduate student in film production at UCLA. The book remains a classic with over a million copies sold and is broadly known for bringing vegetarian cuisine into gourmet eating. She went on to write a companion volume to the original classic, The Vegetarian Epicure, Book Two (1978), as well as, the menu-based The New Vegetarian Epicure: Menus--with 325 all-new recipes--for family and friends (1996). Anna Thomas is also a well-known screenwriter and film producer, her recent credits include the screenplay for Frida (2002) and producer for Infinite Space: The Architecture of John Lautner (2008).