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Rating: 
Summary: Disappointing
Review: The subtitle is very misleading.Having lived in New England, I love it as much as anyone, but to say the recipes come from across the country is a misrepresentation. Ninety-five percent of the recipes are from NH,CT,and NY. There are a couple from CA and one from another state, but that is it. The recipes are fine, but certainly not what I expected.
Rating: 
Summary: A More Sophisticated Church Fund Raising Cookbook
Review: There are two dangers in evaluating this book. One can overestimate it's value by focusing on the very reasonable price for an advertised 375 recipes, and buy it's patter that these recipes include valuable secrets which will produce better results than what, a New York celebrity chef, probably. Alternately, one can look down one's nose at the source of the recipes and claim that there is little value in these homespun recipes.There are elements of truth in to both positions, but both positions are guilty of not appreciating the audience for which the book was written. The book is a grown-up and slightly citified version of recipes assembled by church groups into a book to be sold to make money for the parish or womens group or some other worthy civic cause. Almost all recipes will produce tasty results without resorting to any hard to find or hard to make ingredient. Few, if any, will ask you to skin a sweet pepper or bake a fillet in paper. Even better, the book contains homespun versions of classic cuisine such as Cassoulet and Coq au Vin and is not shy about asking you to use a few cups of wine in some dishes. This is a perfect cookbook for rural New Hampshire. It does not even bother me that most of the recipes came from the same part of the country. The book may have been better with a better representation of southern, New Orleans, or southwest cuisine, but I don't think the book's audience will really miss it. What I am afraid the book's audience will miss is an original culinary experience. I just don't see the point of making Coq au Vin with boneless chicken breasts as this book's recipe suggests. You can get a reasonable dish with a winey taste in mushrooms and white meat, but that isn't Coq au Vin. To get real Coq au Vin, you must go to Julia Child or David Boulud. You would even find something more authentic and worthy of the name in a Martha Stewart volume. Another problem with this book is that there is a lot of inconsistency in the style of recipe writing, even with the single experienced editor. I think this book would have been a lot better if it had left out all of it's baking recipes. The recipe for pastry dough will probably work, but it totally ignores the wisdom of every good pastry chef I've seen of the Food Network regarding using cold ingredients, handling the dough sparingly, and having a delicate touch with the butter. Good cooking often requires finesse. Good baking always requires finesse. I especially dislike the statement at the beginning of the book which recommends substituting butter for margerine. This substitution can be disasterous in some cases such as cookie baking, and somewhat grim in many other cases, especially if you happen to hit upon a margerine with the warning against cooking in small print. The book has a patina of erudition in it's naming classic dishes such as Paella Valenciana, but a native of Valencia would probably get heartburn over the statement that Paella Valenciana is made in all sorts of different ways. It is true than hundreds of culinary writers have said this about 'paella', but not about 'Paella Valenciana'. A sample of false erudition there. This is a good book for what it does. I would recommend it as a second cookbook, as long as the first cookbook was 'The Joy of Cooking' or 'James Beard's American Cookery' or some other well regarded basic cookbook which gives proper attention to the subtlties. For a more sophisticated first cookbook, the old standard 'Mastering the Art of French Cooking' is as good as it was 40 years ago.
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