Complete Cake Mix Magic or Isabels Cantina

Complete Cake Mix Magic: 300 Easy Desserts Good as Homemade

Author: Jill Snider

The 300 best cake mix recipes, in a new concealed wiro format!

Cake Mix Magic and Cake Mix Magic 2 have sold a total of 300,000 copies and still continue to sell. The books' winning recipes transform a basic cake mix into a great cake that tastes homemade, simply by adding a few readily available ingredients.

Complete Cake Mix Magic combines these two original cookbooks with 30 new recipes, and is now full color throughout.

Here is a selection of the great cakes:

• Single-Layer Cakes: Apple Crisp Cake, Triple Lemon Cake, Chocolate Strawberry Cream Cake


• Multi-Layer Cakes: Black Forest Cake, Apricot Hazelnut Cake, Mocha Toffee Cake


• Tube and Bundt Cakes: Chocolate Macaroon Ring Cake, Butterscotch Swirl, Hummingbird Cake


• Special Occasion Cakes: Choo Choo Train Birthday Cake, Chocolate Yule Log, Pumpkin Pie Squares


• Cookies: Spicy Oatmeal Raisin Cookies, Crispy Chocolate Chunk Cookies, Hazelnut Biscotti


• Bars and Squares: Raspberry Dream Bars, Toffee Chocolate Bars, Cherry Cheesecake Bars


• Frosting, Fillings and Glazes: Very Peanut Buttery Frosting, Chocolate Ganache, Lemon Butter Cream

These 300 recipes provide results that taste homemade in less than half the time it would take to bake from scratch. Practical tips and techniques throughout the book ensure perfect results every time.

New interesting book: Guide to Canning Freezing Curing and Smoking Meat Fish and Game or How to Cook without a Book

Isabel's Cantina: Bold Latin Flavors from the New California Kitchen

Author: Isabel Cruz

When Isabel Cruz opened her first smallrestaurant in San Diego, she cooked what she loved to eat:
simple Latin comfort food spiced with the Pacific Rim flavors she knew from her old Los Angeles neighborhood. Her trademark blend of Puerto Rican, Cuban, Mexican, Japanese, and Thai cooking allowed her to cut some of the calories and fat so often found in Latin food without ever sacrificing taste. Soon, the nutritious, flavorful, easy-to-prepare meals Isabel had cooked every night for her family took California by storm.

In Isabel’s Cantina, she shares the deceptively simple recipes that make her five West Coast restaurants so popular, as well as many of her own personal favorites. By relying on the boldly flavored ingredients common to both Latin and Asian cuisines—like mangoes, limes, chiles, mint, ginger, coconut, and cilantro—Isabel’s healthful dishes are never bland. She gets things going with starters such as Grilled Vegetable Salad with Sofrito Vinaigrette and Shrimp Bites Wrapped in Greens. There’s Grilled Mahi-Mahi with Jalapeño-Ponzu Sauce, Green Chile Posole with Pork, and New York Strip Steak with Baked Plantain Fries. Gone are heavy refried beans and white rice, replaced by Chipotle White Beans and whole-grain Power Rice. In an invaluable chapter, Isabel reveals how to dress up any meal with healthy sauces and salsas, such as Papaya-Mango-Mint Salsa and Avocado Salsa Cruda. Desserts, drinks, and even brunch dishes round out her collection of recipes for every part of the day.

Blending fresh flavors with an eye for health, Isabel’s signature Latin food with Asian accents is not only good for you but—mostimportant—it’s delicious.

Publishers Weekly

Cruz, owner of five restaurants on the West Coast, is known for her version of Latin comfort food-simple, healthy dishes influenced by the various cultures and cuisines she was surrounded by growing up in L.A. like Cuban, Mexican, Japanese and Thai. Cruz highlights such ingredients as "mangoes, limes, coconut, chile peppers, mint, ginger, and cilantro.... These are my flavor building blocks." The "Starters" section includes Seared Tuna Wontons with Avocado Salsa Cruda, which are "a little nod to Japan but 100 percent California." Empanadas are made with turkey for a lighter meal as are Cruz's "Albondigas," Latin meatballs. The "Main Courses" chapter includes fresh, healthful dishes like Steamed Red Snapper with Hearts of Palm and Ginger, and Green Chili Posole, a Mexican stew. The "Rice, Beans and Other Sides" section includes recipes for Quick Black Beans, Brown Rice with Barley, and Sweet Plantains. The "Salsas, Sauces and Marinades" are used in specific recipes throughout the book, but can be added onto almost any dish. Included are Chipotle Corn Salsa, Guava Sauce, and Red Bell Pepper Sofrito. The options are endless in this bright debut, and Cruz convinces that "Latin food can be healthy and light and still be delicious, and that today's Latin food is a blend of the cultures that surround it." (Aug.)

Copyright 2007 Reed Business Information

Judith Sutton - Library Journal

In 1991, Cruz, a single mother of two with no formal training, opened a restaurant ("naively," she says) in San Diego, serving the food she had grown up with. "Improbably, it thrived," and today she has five restaurants up and down the West Coast, from La Jolla, CA, to Portland, OR. Her Puerto Rican family lived in a melting-pot neighborhood, with neighbors from Cuba, Mexico, Peru, Japan, and Thailand, and her cooking reflects influences from all of these cuisines, with an emphasis on healthy eating. Cruz has an engaging style, and her recipes are simple but fresh. For most collections.

Table of Contents:

Introduction     9
Starters     14
Salads     36
Soups     52
Main Courses     72
Rice, Beans, and Other Sides     116
Salsas, Sauces, and Marinades     138
Desserts     162
Drinks     182
Breakfasts     200
Sources     216
Acknowledgments     219
Index     220