Williams-Sonoma Essentials of Roasting

Book excerpt: Williams-Sonoma Essentials of Roasting includes everything you need to know to roast successfully, from how to season food before cooking to how to test when food is perfectly done. More than 130 delicious recipes for starters and small plates, a variety of meats and poultry, fish and shellfish, and vegetables and fruit, all with clear directions, encourage you to put your newfound knowledge to work. Beautifully photographed, this comprehensive teaching volume and recipe collection will be an "essential" addition to your cookbook shelf. A chestnut-brown turkey with garlic and herbs hidden beneath its crisp skin. A whole sea bass perfectly cooked inside a coarse-salt crust. Thick, Caribbean-inspired pork chops basted with a tropical blend of lime, brown sugar, and dark rum. Slender fingerling potatoes shiny with olive oil and flecked with fresh herbs. Warm, tart apples spiced with cinnamon and served with a silky creme anglaise. The secrets behind roasting these tantalizing dishes and dozens more can be found in Williams-Sonoma Essentials of Roasting. This information-packed volume opens with a brief history of roasting and a discussion of the many ways that this technique transforms and enhances food. Comprehensive descriptions cover the types of roasting and explain every stage of the roasting process, from preparing the food to properly testing the food for optimum doneness, providing all the knowledge you need to roast even without a recipe. Detailed instructions and step-by-step photographs show how to make accompanying sauces and gravies. Roasting pans, thermometers, and other equipment and tools are clearly described and pictured. Five chapters, with more than 130 traditional and innovative recipes, offer a broad range of irresistible ideas for preparing starters and small plates and for roasting fish and shellfish, poultry, meats, and vegetables and fruits. The chapters begin with advice on buying and preparing their subjects, and the recipes, each handsomely photographed, balance everyday fare, such as winter squash soup, meat loaf, and spareribs, with special-occasion dishes, including Christmas goose and standing rib roast with Yorkshire pudding. Delicious recipes for seasonings, sauces, and both savory and sweet accompaniments to roasted foods; illustrations and descriptions of beef, pork, and lamb cuts; instructions on trussing and carving; and an informative glossary complete this indispensable volume, leaving you fully prepared to turn on the oven and start roasting. Book jacket.