owling's Full Review: Jeanne Jones - Canyon Ranch Cooking: Bringing the ...
It's yet another entry in my series of "spa cookbooks make for great tasting healthy food" reviews. The first was the "Golden Door" - fish, chicken, and vegetarian food. The second was "Rancho la Puerta" - all-vegetarian, heavy on the fresh vegetables, simple soups, and salads. This time we're covering "Canyon Ranch," which actually includes red meat on the menu.
The Extras
This book includes a few helpful bits, like a short chapter on nutrition, and another on cooking tips and techniques.
The former discusses balance in eating, protein, carbohydrates, fat, fiber, salt, water, spices, moderation (as opposed to deprivation), "mindfulness," tips for mixing and matching recipes, details on artificial sweeteners (they point out that just because something is sugar-free doesn't necessarily make it good for you), and a few facts about going vegetarian.
The tips & techniques chapter discusses ways to enhance flavor without using fat. They cover the use of herbs and spices, marinating, browning, toasting, roasting, use of acidic ingredients, using reductions, slow-roasting, rapid roasting, defatting, using tofu, smoking foods, and grilling. None of these are covered in great detail - the purpose of this chapter is not to teach you everything about cooking - but a few tips are provided to help you actually enjoy healthy food.
The essentials of a well-stocked pantry are provided, as well as a few details on how long various items will last in the pantry, fridge, or freezer.
There's a discussion of relative fat content of various ingredients, such as different cuts of meat. You'll even find an explanation of the label terminology of store-bought foods. For instance, you'll find out that "good source of" means "contains 10 percent to 19 percent Daily Value per serving."
You'll also find a few sample menus. Finally, at the end, you'll find tips for planning your own at-home weekend "getaway." The index is thorough and easy to use.
The Recipes
This is a very large cookbook - almost 420 pages not including index. A number of the recipes come with gorgeous full-page pictures, but certainly not all of them. It's enough so you won't feel deprived, but not so many that you'll feel like you're paying too much for the number of recipes.
Obviously I can hardly tell you about all of the gorgeous recipes in here, so I'll detail a small sampling (with occasional parenthetical editorial commentary):
Appetizers/Soups:
Blue Corn Blinis
Tofu Guacamole
Cucumber Raita (best cucumber raita we've ever tried!)
Butternut Squash and Cider Soup
Corn Chowder with Chipotle Pepper (fantastic!)
Hot and Sour Soup (quite good, if not amazing)
Salads and Salad Dressings:
(includes a detailed glossary of various salad greens)
Curried Shrimp Salad in Pineapple Boats
Melon Bowls with Curried Crab
Winter Pear and Stilton Salad with Port Dressing and Toasted Walnuts
Raspberry Walnut Dressing and Marinade
Vegetarian Dishes/Fish and Shellfish:
Canyon Ranch Stuft Spuds (these are a little plain; we found they needed some added spicing)
Grilled Portobello Sandwich with Roasted Pepper and Wasabi Mayonnaise (wonderful!)
Mushroom Beignets
Lemon Rosemary Marinated Halibut
Mahimahi with Citrus Balsamic Vinaigrette
Poultry/Meat:
Barbecued Chicken (not the best barbecue sauce we've ever had)
Barley Risotto with Shredded Chicken and Parmesan Cheese
Indonesian Chicken with Grilled Bananas
Marinated Duck with Blueberry-Madeira Sauce
Teriyaki Steak (a very good teriyaki!)
Veal Tenderloin with Tarragon Cream
Peachy Spiced Lamb Chops
Side Dishes/Sauces and Spreads:
Gingered Spiced Carrots (wonderful, and we're not normally all that fond of cooked carrots)
Lentil Dhal
Mango or Papaya Salsa
Spicy Peanut Sauce
Roasted Garlic Spread
Quick Breads and Breakfast Treats:
Lime Coffee Cake
Gingerbread Pancakes
Fresh Apple Butter
Apple and Fig Chutney
Desserts/Beverages:
Peppermint Patty Cheesecake
Honey Plum Pie
Lemon Panna Cotta (one of the best desserts we've ever had!)
Pumpkin Creme Brulee
Caramelized Custard (fantastic creme caramel recipe!)
Banana Peanut Butter Punch
Blueberry Shake
It's Worth It
This isn't the best cookbook we've come across. My feeling is that they try to stretch themselves a little thin. In providing such a wide array of dishes, they don't seem to have taken the time to really perfect them. On the other hand, there are so many recipes that you'd be hard-pressed not to find plenty in here to love, and they all seem well-kitchen tested.
In addition, the simple fact that they can take already-fabulous desserts like creme caramel and lemon panna cotta, turn down the fat content, and yet still have them come out absolutely delectable, alone makes this book worth buying. You'll also find plenty of useful advice for making your healthy food taste delicious.
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