From the Earth to the Table: John ASH's Wine Country Cuisine

In the companion volume to a forthcoming PBS series, one of California's foremost chefs shows how to use California's wines and produce in hundreds of delicious dishes. 35,000 first printing. National ad/promo. First serial, Cooking Light and Food and Wine. TV tie-in.

Ash, a noted Northern California restaurateur (his Santa Rosa restaurant bears his name) and author (he collaborated with Goldstein on American Game Cooking) is immersed in the wine-country gestalt, according to which dinner?and what we drink with it?is a way of life. A passionate advocate of cooks knowing where, when and how their food is grown and raised, he urges readers to eat "seasonally and locally." Instead of using tasteless tomatoes in a salad in December, he suggests the likes of Warm Red Cabbage Salad with Pancetta and California Goat Cheese. Along with imaginative salads (Fresh Corn, Orzo, and Smoked Chicken Salad with Pine Nuts), Ash offers a bountiful array of soups (Roasted Eggplant Soup with Sweet Peppers), pastas (Fusilli with Collards, Bacon, and Garlic) and desserts (Peach-Mint Granita). Fish (Seared Ahi Tuna with a Lavender-Pepper Crust), poultry, meat (Pork and Pepper Stew with Oranges) and vegetable dishes are innovative and tempting. For each salad and main dish, he suggests a wine ("Gewurztraminer is a showstopper" with Crab Wontons with Orange-Chipotle Sauce), and his cooking tips (e.g., "never throw away shrimp shells," which can be frozen and counted on to save a fish stock or soup) are jewels. This is a cookbook for those who truly want to live with their food. Photos not seen by PW.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Here are lots of beautifully fresh recipes from the authors of American Game Cooking (LJ 10/15/91). Ash is the culinary director of Fetzer Vineyards' Wine Center, which happens to have a huge organic culinary garden. With that as well as the produce and other ingredients available in abundance in California's wine country, he creates dishes like Orecchiette with Red Wine-Braised Chicken, Fresh Cherry Flan, and other delicious combinations. There are lots of sidebars on ingredients, and Ash suggests substitutions for seasonal or hard-to-find ingredients. Most recipes are accompanied by informative wine notes that explain the particular food-wine match. Highly recommended.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

It is unrealistic to imagine that the relatively unaccomplished cook will take to many of these more than 120 recipes. The long shopping lists and the demands on time prohibit such. But more experienced cooks will find the book difficult to ignore. Each recipe is accompanied by a wine recommendation. Barbara Jacobs