Recipes + Cook Books

1080 Recipes is the definitive book on traditional and authentic Spanish home cooking, trusted throughout Spain for over thirty years. Written by Spain's best-loved food authorities, it showcases the fastest growing cuisine in popularity, with Spanish restaurants and tapas bars opening in cities all over the world. A bestseller since publication, 1080 Recipes has sold millions of copies in Spain. It contains 1080 recipes from all Spanish regions, covering everything from appetizers to stews, from vegetables to desserts. 1080 Recipes is designed by Javier Mariscal, the famous Spanish graphic designer and illustrator, and it includes over 200 illustrations he has created exclusively for this edition along with 100 specially commissioned photographs.

One out of 1080: A Sample Recipe from 1080 Recipes

Potatoes with chorizo and bacon
Patatas con chorizo y bacon

Serves 4

Ingredients
--3 tablespoons butter or 4 tablespoons lard
--5 tablespoons sunflower oil
--2 ounces chorizo sausage, peeled and thinly sliced
--3 ½ ounces thickly sliced bacon, cut into ½ inch wide strips
--3 ¼ pounds small potatoes, preferably new potatoes, unpeeled
--1 tablespoon chopped fresh parsley
--1 clove garlic, finely chopped
--salt

Melt the butter or lard with the oil in a pan or large skillet. (It needs to be big enough to hold the potatoes in a single layer.) Add the chorizo and bacon and cook over medium heat, stirring constantly, for a few minutes then add the potatoes. Season with salt and cook covered over low heat, shaking the pan occasionally, for 45-60 minutes, until the potatoes are evenly browned. Just before serving, sprinkle with parsley and garlic and stir for a few minutes more. Transfer to a warm serving dish and serve immediately.

Note: Some types of chorizo become hard with prolonged cooking. To prevent this, cook the slices with the bacon, then remove and set aside. About 10 minutes before serving, return the slices of chorizo to the pan.

New York City chef/author Anthony Bourdain is invited to film the research laboratory of Ferran Adria, the most controversial and imitated chef in the world—chef/owner of El Bulli, voted "World's Best" by Restaurant Magazine and the most visited by chefs on sabbatical. The lab, an ultra modern, Dr. No-like facility with sliding walls, backlit ingredients, latest equipment and a full staff of devotees is tucked away inside a vast, renaissance-era palace in the old section of Barcelona, Spain. Adria and his chefs close the El Bulli restaurant for six months out of ever year to work on new concepts. Bourdain tracks Ferran's process from lab to a once-in-a-lifetime meal at El Bulli restaurant, enjoying a high-concept, surrealist, haute cuisine meal of unparalleled creativity and striking visual appearance.

In chapters such as Tapas in Sauce; Marinades, Patés, Salads, and Other Cold Tapas; and Tapas with Bread or Pastry, Casas provides a definitive selection of the traditional Spanish bar food--dishes to pass out at a gathering, to serve on a buffet, or to make a party of. Readers wishing an introduction to this versatile food, and the culinary culture in which it thrives, will want this bestselling book.

The recipe array is vast. Sauce or ragout-like tapas include Shrimp and Mushrooms in Almond Sauce, Scallops with Cured Ham and Saffron, and Veal Meatballs in Spicy Chorizo Sauce. Endives Filled with Salmon and Shrimp Melon and Apple Salad are two examples of the many tantalizing cold tapas. Prawns Grilled with Garlic Mayonnaise, Lamb Brochettes, and the Three-Layer Omelet, a mixed-egg and vegetable tortilla, are hot-from-the-stove, show-stopping tapas. Including eight pages of color photos, a glossary of ingredients, menus, and a list of recommended Spanish tapas bars, the book is a complete tapas tour. Cooks at all skill levels will find dozens of these tasty little morsels to make and enjoy. --Arthur Boehm

The Cuisines of Spain is first and foremost a book to read. The author's first two chapters describe in great detail the history and geography of Spain's regions which she groups by shared climate and natural resources. She calls this "following bean stews rather than political boundaries." Woven into this tapestry are traces of the Phoenicians, ancient Greeks, Romans, Celts, Visigoths and Vandals (who left behind livestock farming practices), Moorish and Jewish culture, and, of course, the New World impacts of foods returning with Columbus--tomatoes, potatoes, corn, peppers. She gets granular--which pigs, grown where and eating what, contribute to the great hams of Spain.

She divides the book by the flow of a meal, and makes suggestions throughout which dishes would typically go together. This is if you were to choose to cook an entire Spanish meal, from tapas to dessert. You could also strive to include a single Spanish dish in your weekly meals, learning as you go, expanding a repertoire, because this is home cooking. This is about every day, not just special occasions.

The enterprising cook will find chapters devoted to "Tapas," "Cold Soups and Salads," "Vegetable Dishes and Other First Courses," "Breads," "Pies and Pastas," "Warm Soups and Legume Stews," "Rice Dishes," "Fish and Shellfish," "Poultry, Meats, and Game," "Desserts and Other Sweets," and "Beverages." There's a chapter of basic recipes as well as a list of sources for some of the more unusual ingredients.

This is a lush, beautifully illustrated and designed cookbook, as at home on a coffee table or nightstand as in the kitchen. Take the author's advice: Follow the bean stews into a new world of Old World home cooking. --Schuyler Ingle