Creamy Cucumber Salad from Kitchen Sense: Cookbook Spotlight

In a pretty unique bit of cookbook marketing, publishers of a brand-new cookbook recently contacted food bloggers with an idea. They would give 25 food bloggers a free cookbook if the bloggers would agree to write a post about what they made from the book. I was asked if I'd be interested in trying out the book. Free cookbooks? And I don't even have to promise to say I liked the book? I'm there!

(Let me make it clear that after I had looked at the book if I didn't like it or think it was a good cookbook, I would have sent it back and not written about it. I wouldn't ever give a product a good review or space on my blog just because it was free. To me, that would be completely unfair to the readers of the blog. So, since you're reading this here you can be assured that I think this is a pretty great cookbook.)

The book is called Kitchen Sense, More Than 600 Recipes to Make You a Great Home Cook, by Mitchell Davis. Mr. Davis is obviously a talented cook, and I liked nearly everything about this book. It's a fairly thick volume with a wide variety of recipes. Some are things I already know how to make, but there were enough recipes that were new to me to make this book worth having. For an inexperienced cook, the book would be a great resource.

Kitchen Sense was extremely well-written, and the recipes sounded good. There were a number of recipes for well-known dishes where Mitchell Davis had added an interesting twist, like adding radishes to Middle Eastern Tomato Salad, for one. In a bit of constructive criticism, let me say the only thing I don't like about the book is the way some recipes start on one page and end on the next page. Cookbook publishers, listen up! Don't do that! That's the only thing about the book that didn't appeal to me.

I chose the Creamy Cucumber Salad as my dish to spotlight. Kitchen Sense has asked us not to post the recipes from the book, which I'm respecting, since after all they gave me the free book! But you can find this recipe on page 63 for a salad which has cucumbers in a dressing of mayo, white vinegar, and lots of fresh herbs. It was really delicious, in fact I made two servings with a couple of my very first garden cucumbers to test the recipe and ate it all immediately after I took that photo..

Look for the round-up of reviews of Kitchen Sense as a part of Cookbook Spotlight to be posted on July 17. Thanks to Sara from I Like to Cook and Cath from A Blithe Palate for asking me to be a part of this.

We're halfway to the weekend, so just a reminder about Weekend Herb Blogging. I'll be in San Francisco having lots of fun this weekend, and the WHB host will be Gabriella from My Life as a Reluctant Housewife. Send her your link (MSGABRIELLATRUE AT aol.com) by midafternoon on Sunday, and be sure to include a link to My Life as a Reluctant Housewife with the words Weekend Herb Blogging somewhere in the post.

Food Recipes Cooking
Weekend Herb Blogging