The Food of India

If I'm honest, I bought this book as much for the pictures as for the recipes. It's an interesting read on its own without the cooking aspect of it and if I'm honest I wasn't expecting this to be a book full of authetic-tasting dishes since it combines recipes from various cooks chefs. However, having tried a few of the recipes, I have been pleasantly surprised.The book is packed full of a good variety of dishes for starters, mains, and desserts. There is a good section on street food too which is rare to find in indian cookbooks. Totally recommend this book!

The book arrived in time and expected. The condition of the book is good. Value for my money .Will buy from the seller again. Thanks.

I owned this 2005 edition for a few years, and I cooked from it so often for a while that it fell apart, due to the substandard binding; the book is just too heavy to be glued together the way it is for everyday use. But this is not my problem with this publisher.I decided to buy a new copy, which I did and promptly got rid of my disintegrating one. B-I-G mistake: Out there in bookstores you now get the 2010 edition, and I discovered that the publisher had decided that ingredient lists must be changed -- perhaps to reflect the waning availability of some ingredients somewhere in the world? For example, about 1/2 dozen recipes in here hailing from the northwest of India used black cardamom. This was then replaced in 2010 by an insane amount of black peppercorns (1 tablespoon for a dish serving 4!), which changes the flavor of a dish substantially, and simply not in a good way as too much black pepper overpowers other flavors let alone it tastes nothing like the earthy and aniseedy black cardamom.For some of us part of the fun is to track down ingredients to cook dishes that taste like nothing you've ever tasted before. Some of us still can easily obtain black cardamom (I do not live in or near London or Birmingham either, btw). A better way may have been to suggest substitutes in the recipe notes for those who can't. Sorry for this turning into a rant, but authenticity is something that matters to me, and I am sure many others out there, too. Obviously it's not quite so meaningful to Murdoch Books though...

Love it. Lots of photos and information and easy to follow recipes.

Great cook book I am an executive chef and find the gives good information well worth buying I know I will get a lot of use from this book I understand herbs and spices just gives you that little bit better depth of some of the spices

This book is fantastic! We absolutely love the authentic recipes in this book, this purchase was a second copy for my dad as he kept asking to borrow it off me!!

Every single recipe out of this book has tasted brilliant and authentic. Some recipes look like a lot of effort but it's necessary for great tasting food. Would definitely recommend this book

Great book with some amazing recipies in, which are quite amazing. Really good write up of ingredients and where the dishes come from.

One of my favorite cookbooks

My husband loves all Asian foods and Indian is no exception. My life long best friend is Indian so I often had homemade authentic meals at her house. I had other friends who were also Indian so it was normal for me to eat different cuisines when I wasn't eating at home. My mom on the other hand is the typical southern 7 rotating menu items for the week (including fried chicken and meatloaf of course) so my experience with Asian foods was limited.A few years ago my husband and I wen to visit a few our friends in Hong Kong. When we came they had their house-help prepare an American dish for us after our long flight. We were very appreciative of course but being that they were both Indian we told them that we really only wanted to eat their food for the rest of our meals at their house. They were excited about this as they love sharing their culture and it made life a little easier for their house-help.Meal after meal was prepared by their house-help, who is Pilipino, and was amazingly delicious and savory. After a week or so I asked how their help knew how to make all these meals and my friend went into the kitchen and brought out this book. She told me that she taught her help to make the Indian dishes she grew up on and knew were authentic and true using this single cook book. I of course took a picture of it so I could order it when we returned home. Anything that is proved to be good enough for a native Indian (who had only recently moved from her home country) was definitely something I wanted to use too.When I did finally get around to ordering it and then finally took the time to go through it and prepare a grocery list I was taken by the gorgeous photos, not only of the food but also of India. It is just as you'd imagine; full of color and life and you can almost smell the spices coming off the page.The book is very easy to use and read. There is an index in the back and each page is clearly marked and the recipes, though maybe a bit intimidating, are actually easy to read and follow. I now have friends requesting an invitation to dinner on "Indian Food Nights".

If you're not afraid of buying the many different exotic spices needed to cook the various dishes presented in this book, you'll definitely be able to impress friends next time you prepare an Indian meal.Great book!!

Authentic and simple everyday recipes. Easy to follow. Very colorful pictures and it makes interesting reading because of the vast variety of dishes. It surely enhances the interest of the reader to try out a recipe. .

We have as well the Spanish, Chinese, Italian and Thai book. This are master pieces of cooking books. As well you find background information about the culture and history in cooking of the particular country. There is very little in what did not taster very good. I would give that books 10 stars :-)