Cuisines of India: The Art and Tradition of Regional Indian Cooking

Rating:
Summary: must own book
Review: Being new to Indian cooking, I immediately appreciated this book for completely describing everything. The author writes with a very personal touch in the written passages before the recipes. What I really like is that she offers suggestions for substitutions, and where to get ingredients that I was not normally familiar with. Many of this dishes have ingredients that have been found in my kitchen for years. The book is broken down into various regions and the recipes have wonderful introductions to give a brief history on the recipe.
I would highly recommend this well written book to anyone interested in Indian cooking.

Rating:
Summary: must own book
Review: first off, although i think this is a must-own book, i would not recommend it as a first-buy indian cookbook. for someone completely new to indian cooking, one of the classics by sahni or jaffrey would be better as an introduction and basic resource. for instance, if you don't know what paneer is, the authors' unexplained use of the term "cottage cheese" when paneer is called for will be more than confusing. but, as a book to expand your repetoire of indian recipes, this is fabulous! anyone who has more than one or two indian cookbooks has probably noticed the surprising duplication, even between authors, of the same recipes, which is amazing, given the vastness of india and the incredible number of cultures in it. however, this book has more unduplicated recipes than any of my other indian cookbooks (and i have far too many), and i look forward to cooking all of them. but for me, the second, equally important reason to buy this book is the wonderful introductory paragraphs before each recipe. it seems that it is mandatory for indian cookbooks to inlude history as well as cooking instruction,which is no bad thing, given the ignorance of other cultures in this country. i have enjoyed and learned much from the texts of other indian cookbooks. however, the authors of this book write exceptionally well and amusingly, and the subjects not only include indian history, culinary and social, but even anecdotes about apicius, the roman credited with writing the first known european cookbook; a dishonest medieval english baker; elihu yale, for whom the college is named; and many other fascinating known and unknown people. there are quotes from the diaries and writings of european visitors to india from the 17th to the 19th centuries which are fascinating. (sample fascinating fact: poundicherry was a french colony for three centuries, and the cuisine reflects this.) there are stories of indian rajahs and the english raj. if fact, it might be difficult to keep your attention on the recipes while cooking, there is so much else that is interesting in this book. the line drawings are another plus. all in all, this is a superb book--tempting, wide-ranging recipes, entertaining reading and beatiful illustrations.

Rating:
Summary: Not a 'Must-Have', but still worthwhile
Review: I collect cooking books and have a massive collection, with a fair emphasis on east Indian cuisine. This book rose above the herd because it has a decent discussion of history and tradition etc, and is well organized. The recipes are fairly pedestrian (ie: not that very different than you can find in other Indian cookbooks), but I wa not sorry I bought it.

Rating:
Summary: Greatly disappointed
Review: INdian is perhaps my favorite cuisine & I've been to allot of Indian restaurants and own several books. This one though was mediocre at best. Allot flash in the pan, nothing spectacular though it was nice to see the book divided into 6 chapters for the 6 regions of the subcon.
I think that the sisters tried to make the recipes harder & more complicated than they are in the name of authenicity. Most of these recipes were very elaborate with lots of steps.
I would recommend Lord Krishna's book, Julie Sahni's or one Madhur Jaffrey's early books instead.

Rating:
Summary: Greatly disappointed
Review: INdian is perhaps my favorite cuisine & I've been to allot of Indian restaurants and own several books. This one though was mediocre at best. Allot flash in the pan, nothing spectacular though it was nice to see the book divided into 6 chapters for the 6 regions of the subcon.
I think that the sisters tried to make the recipes harder & more complicated than they are in the name of authenicity. Most of these recipes were very elaborate with lots of steps.
I would recommend Lord Krishna's book, Julie Sahni's or one Madhur Jaffrey's early books instead.