Book Review - Quick and Easy Mexican Cooking

Quick and Easy Mexican Cooking- More Than 80 Everyday Recipes by Cecilia Hae-Jin Lee is based around the idea of quick to prepare, easy meals that are based off of traditional Mexican cooking.
The first part of the book explains a bit of the history of cooking and the author's history with Mexican cooking, followed by lists of the seasonings and essential ingredients, a glossary of ingredients and an introduction to Mexican cheeses and easier to find substitution suggestions.

Most of the recipes, with only a few exceptions, are cooked on a stove top, not baked or roasted in an oven.
The recipes are all listed with a descriptive name in English, followed by the Español  name. There are gorgeous, mouthwatering full color photos of much of the food.

It's separated by recipe type. Sauces, salads, soups, entrees by main ingredient type (poultry and eggs, pork and beef, fish and shellfish), desserts and snacks and drinks. Since the author was a vegetarian at one point, she offers tips on some of the recipes like the refried beans for adapting the recipe for vegetarians, and some of the recipes like the soup would be easy to adapt as well. It's not a vegetarian cookbook, but if you're planning a dinner with guest who don't eat meat, you can find flavorful recipes in this book to serve them.

The recipes are wonderful, easy to prepare using short cuts like canned beans and grocery store rotisserie chickens. Most of the prep time is in cutting up ingredients. All the recipes are things that can be made in about an hour, a few of them go a little over that in cooking time, but the prep time is a lot shorter.

What I like best about this cookbook, other than the easy to make recipes, is also how easy they are to follow. If you're an experienced cook, for some of the recipes all you'd need is the ingredient list. If you're more like my son who needs a recipe, this is one you could follow easily.

I've already used a few recipes in this book, and it's one I could see making almost every single recipe in it at least once. The chile spiced peanuts will be a favorite with my son and husband. My daughter and I will have lots of fun making and eating churros, and if you've never had fresh, homemade churros, I can't recommend them enough. Yum!

I'm a big fan of quick to cook recipes and my whole family loves Mexican food, this cookbook fits the bill.

You can get this book directly from the publisher- Chronicle Books You can get more information about my review policy here.