The Asian Grocery Store Demystified - Softcover

Bladholm, Linda

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1580630456 ISBN 13: 9781580630450

Publisher: Renaissance Books, 1999

Synopsis

A food lover's guide to all the best ingredients.

Do you want to prepare an Asian meal as delectable as those in restaurants? Are you too intimidated by the exotic ingredients to try? And what's inside those mysterious bottles, bags, and boxes in your local Asian grocery store anyway?

This handy Take it With You guide provides the answers. Author Linda Bladholm, who has lived, worked, cooked, and dined in locales as diverse as Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, Japan, Hong Kong, China, Korea, Laos, and Vietnam, takes you on a tour of a typical Asian grocery store and expertly describes what you'll find.

Make Your Next Shopping Trip a Successful and Fascinating Journey.

Peppered with over 400 illustrations, plus stories about the ingredients used in every major Asian cuisine, this guidebook identifies and tells you how to use the vast array of meats, fruits, vegetables, noodles, tofu, rice, and delicacies. A bonus section of the author's favorite recipes will help you create savory, authentic dishes that will impress everyone-- and it will open a window onto the remarkable civilizations of the Orient.

About this title

About the Author

Linda Bladholm is a regular contributor to the Miami Herald. She is also a designer, illustrator, and photographer who has contributed to Singapore and Asia Pacific Magazine and Big O magazine. She has designed books for Noto Publishing, and designed and illustrated for FEP/McGraw-Hill, Gunze Company, and World Books International. She resides in Miami Beach, Florida.

Review

Though many Americans are eager to cook Asian dishes at home, the thought of navigating an Asian grocery store is a different story. For a non-Asian it can be bewildering territory full of pungent aromas, packages with labels in Chinese, Japanese, Thai, Korean or Vietnamese and odd-looking specimens you don't know whether to eat or to plant. At last there is a book that takes you by the hand and gives a clear and fascinating tour of these markets. It couldn't have a better title, The Asian Grocery Store Demystified. The author, Linda Bladholm, begins by describing the layout of an Asian grocery store in her neighborhood in Miami. As she explains, there is indeed an order to these markets. "Asian markets are generally stocked according to the principles of balance, " she writes. "Hot, spicy, chili sauces and curry pastes are all in one place; salty items are together in one row, and bitter, sour or sweet things are in other sections." That explanation changed my entire perspective, making these markets seem more manageable and interesting. Ms. Bladholm not only sorts out the cultural context of an Asian grocery store, but also does it in such a way that makes you hungry to return. -- Book Description

About this edition

• Publisher: Renaissance Books
• Publication date: 1999
• ISBN 10: 1580630456
• ISBN 13: 9781580630450
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 240