Dan May, author of the Red Hot Chile Cookbook and his publisher, Sandra Ng, graciously sent us a copy of this cookbook and we really liked what we read, so Katie wrote up a book review.
Dan May’s Red Hot Chile Cookbook is a collection of recipes sure to please any chile-lover. The recipes hail from international cuisines so there is quite an interesting mix of choices. You’ll find Caribbean, Thai, Asian, Spanish, Moroccan, American and European (even a few Scandinavian) recipes in this cookbook.
The difficulty level of the recipes ranges from intermediate to incredibly simple & easy, and his writing style is straightforward and easy to follow for anyone from a culinary novice to an expert. As a native Englishman, May uses traditional British spelling and offers both metric and imperial measurements in his recipes.
The recipes in this cookbook run the full culinary gamut – you’ll find everything you need to throw a spice-filled dinner party. There are recipes for soups & salads, mains, sides, sauces, marinades, drinks and desserts. A few recipes in particular that piqued our interest were: Jerk Chicken with Caramelized Pineapple; Whole Roast Salmon Stuffed with Salsa Verde Piccante; Habanero Marmalade, and Deliciously Boozy Truffles with Ginger & Chili Praline.
May’s cookbook is primarily focused on fresh chiles, so if you are using dried chiles, you may have to adapt the recipes a bit. A few of May’s recipes call for very hot chiles like Scotch Bonnet, Habanero and Aji Limo, but there are also many medium and mild chile recipes, and of course you can always substitute a more mild chile in any recipe.
Each recipe has a heat rating shown in a pictogram ranging from one to four chilies. This is an easy tool you can use to decide whether or not to ramp up or tone down the heat in a recipe, depending on your taste. May also supplies a few alternate chile suggestions for each recipe if you’re having a hard time finding the specific chile variety mentioned in a recipe.
Another nice feature of this cookbook is the photography. The photos are full page images of finished dishes and the presentation is simple, yet enticing. The food is front and center in each photo and the background tends to be neutral, letting the food be the star. Each recipe has an accompanying photo and the recipes are all one page or less – no hassling with flipping back and forth between pages. The recipe layout for the instructions can be a bit text heavy and there isn’t any bulleting to break up large paragraphs; however, the instructions themselves are very well explained.
We think anyone with a love for chiles and the willingness to try something new will enjoy this cookbook. Finally, we’d like to thank Dan May for listing us as a resource for chiles, and thank his publisher for sending us a copy of the Red Hot Chile Cookbook.