Bean Books

I am into Y2K big time but can't get my friends to listen to me. I felt frustrated until I got them to read this book. It's not threatening at all. The humor helps get the message across as well as offer some good ideas.

If you're tuned in to the Y2K problem, this little book is a waste of your time (all five minutes). However, if you're looking for a way to tune others in, and those others may have a short attention span or a tendency to freak when confronted by recommendations from folks like FEMA or the Red Cross, this is the book to give them.

I used "Got Beans?" as stocking stuffers and sent a few others to friends. The feedback I got was quite positive! It is humorous to read, light and entertaining, but thought provoking at the same time. It made me realize the specific preparations I may need to make for Y2K. My son and his college roommate say that Y2K is a hot topic with them and they used this book to educate their friends on the subject.

This book is full of useful, common-sense ideas presented with hope for the future, confidence in our ability to overcome whatever comes our way and a refreshing sense of humor.

Boy am I ever glad I had this book. When society collapsed at midnight 12/31/99, I was the only one in my neighborhood who was prepared. When the power went out, phone service stopped, water shut off, and planes started falling out of the sky, I was unafraid, as I knew what to do!

By the way, does anyone wanna buy 5,000 cans of beans?

Nice variety of unusual recipes. I found this book when I was looking for Anasazi bean recipes. The Anasazi bean chili I found is the very best veggie chili I have ever tried. It was so good I got a copy of the book, and am I glad I did.

The recipes use either canned beans or dried beans. I think using dried beans and good quality spices gives the best results. I wonder if the reviews saying the recipes were bland used canned beans. That said the cowboy chipolte beans are hands down the best baked bean recipe I have ever had, that includes meat recipes.

As for high fat, yes some recipes can be. But if you are a full time vegetarian fat is usually not a problem for you. The kidney bean pasta salad using pesto as a dressing was very rich, but with the wheat pasta is was also very filling, so it was hard to over eat. This is a good book for vegetarians looking for more then the usual bean recipes.

I've used this book for around 10 years. I own a number of bean cook books but this is the one I go back to over and over.

Very few of these recipes are lean. Many recipes have up to 30 grams of fat. When I fix bean dishes, I want to improve my health not give myself a heart attack. This recipe book has adequate recipes for beans, but the title is very misleading, most every recipe is very fattening and not too good for your heart.

I've had this book for nearly 2 years and I use a recipe from it at least once a week. I love the wide range of cuisines presented - from Jambalaya to Sambar to Groundnut Stew to Pasta e Fagioli. I haven't tried a recipe, yet, that I didn't like.

Despite his generous use of herbs and spices, the four recipes I tried all tasted generic and dull.

If you don't use dehydrated cheese, eggs, and other liquids, this book will be a waste of money for you. This book claims to "cut the cost of convenient mixes by at least 50 percent". The only way you can really do that is like I said, already purchase the dehydrated ingred. Just in case you are wondering where you can even purchase these dehydrated items, conveniently she sells them on her website. Spending $25. on a can of dehydrated cheese will not assist me in cutting down on my convenient mixes. Hmmmm There are plenty of other ways to save by cooking your own mixes and baking from scratch.

I would have to recommend the "More With Less Cookbook" by Doris Janzen Longacre. She gives you enough ideas like homemade oatmeal and basic all-purpose mix to encourage and insipe you to go the extra mile and make your own homemade instant oatmeal. There are so many other ways to REALLY save money by making your own mixes.

Sorry, I can't recommend this book.

This was a book that a friend recommended. In starting back to work and all my other responsibilities I need a break from all the prepackaged prepared mixes at the store that have too many preservatives. This book did the trick. The mixes are on the shelf and easy to use everyday.

I was hoping this cookbook would help fill the niche of Make Your Own Groceries but it does not.

It does offer lots of recipes using dehydrated ingredients, which if you normally purchase, would make this method affordable. I am debating on whether to purchase the cheese powder, butter powder, dehydrated shortening, etc. to make the book's recipes.

I can either use the aforementioned Make Your Own Groceries or go back to the faithful copy of Make-A-Mix for do-ahead mix cooking.

Overall, the concept is good, especially if you normally stock dried ingredients for emergencies. I do not.

Easy, quick recipes. Bread recipe easier than mine, and just as good. Highly recommend this to people who want to save a few $$$.

What ever happened to the meals of yesteryear? They are here in this book. Talking about bring back years you thought were long gone. This book will reintroduce you to the comfort foods of your youth.

My daughter picked this book up from a garage sale for fifty cents and left it in the "reading room" in our modest house in a modest city in the modest midwest. Growing up on a farm and being raised in a climate where work was expected and birth/life/death were daily events and where weather determined how many presents would be under the Christmas tree, and as well, how much canning would be done in the fall from the family garden, I hold little respect from someone who makes light of being an organic farmer and makes "potpourri" from rose petals.

I realize it's been 10 years or so since Ms. Murphey wrote her book, but I would likely enjoy reading or listening to what she has to say today. Yes, neighbors were family and we lived and breathed next to them. The vet was next to God and God was next to the dinner table every single night when my Dad said Grace. A life on the farm is not romantic when there is no other livelihood. Too bad most people don't recognize this.

I spent just today working on tearing down an old chicken coop at my folks place. The mouse dirt, the years of chicken filth and the constant wind out on the prairie are NOT romantic and not to be trifled with.
This book goes to the next grange sale fund raiser.

Well, geez, the previous reviewer was a little harsh. I don't think Ms. Murphey glamorized or made light of the serious work she had to do on the farm. Rather, I thought she did a great job of showing how difficult it really is. I enjoyed the book and thought it was very touching.

Isn't quitting your boring 9 to 5 office job, moving to the country and living a quieter, humbler existence, everyone's secret dream? Well it has always been one of mine, and reading this book was absolutely a treat for me. In addition to thouroughly enjoying every page of this story, I actually learned many things from this book and was delighted to find that Sallyann included her recipes and tips from the story in the back of the book (although it did mean that the book ended too soon). I was especially dying to know the recipe for her Gorganzola and Leek Soup, and now I can't wait to try it out. I will fondly remember the Murphey's story as I try out her many wonderful recipes. I look forward to her next book, and hopefully a sequel to this story is in her plans.

I grew up in the country, so I knew Sallyann was in trouble when she named her turkeys! LOL I really did enjoy this book. I now live in the "big city" (Atlanta), and often dream of doing what the Murphey's did. I hope that if I ever get the chance, I will have neighbors as great as theirs. This is a wonderful book to read.

Hi, this is Charley Murphey - the daughter :) I may be nearly twenty now and heading toward my sophomore year in college, but I remember those years which Bean Blossom Dreams so aptly describes better than I remember the past five and I can tell you completely honestly that we were never once arrogant about our ability as farmers. I can only remember my mom's infamous enthusiasm at work, her total and complete optimism and hope that we could really have a farm. We have since eased off of that - especially when my mom became deathly allergic to bee stings and we had to completely change our expectations of the garden - but my father is starting a new business producing organic plant food and I've been learning all I can about gardening to help out my mother. I'm sorry that there are those who feel that farm work is not something to be celebrated the way we do, but one thing I can tell you for sure is that we were not glamourizing our life here, or trying to pass ourselves off as great farmers. I know what real farmwork is, I've seen it at home and at the farms of our friends - and I know I'm not cut out for it. But having humor and joy for something that is underappreciated as a profession and way of life is not making a mockery of it - it is simply making it real and something people can smile about and relate to on the smaller level we were working at, so that they would understand and appreciate what we were trying to accomplish. This farm means more to me than anywhere else in the world. The things my mother and father gave to me by coming here, by trying so hard, by having the grace to giggle at themselves when they made mistakes - is priceless. I will never forget what they did for me/us and I will be a part of this farm - as well as try to make it a part of my children someday - forever.

There were so many characters involved with this book I forgot who was who, and who to think was commiting the crime. Took the fun out of it. The only reason I read it in the first place was because it's based in my home state of Wisconsin, and a little over an hours away.

I like this series. If you haven't read this series, start at the first one as characters develope from the beginning. I like the way Ms. Logue weaves the past story into the present, makes it very interesting.

This book is one of three mysteries I picked up for vacation reading. It follows classic mystery conventions to a fault, becoming fairly predictable. Both of the other books I chose, Excursion to Tindari and, especially, Summer of the Big Bachi, are far superior. But, if you want a fairly good quick read that won't upset your lazy afternoons at the beach, this one will work.

The writing seems forced and is especially weak when it wanders off into the protagonist's boring personal life (yes, of course her kid is cute and precocious). Without even reading the dust jacket, the writing style, stock characters, and narrative emphasis clue you in that the author is an upstanding country lady right out of Lake Woebegone. I'm sure she grows organic vegetables when not writing poetry. Maybe the writing would be more interesting if she spent some time in a grittier locale.

Claire Watkins, Deputy Sheriff in Fort Antoine, Wisconsin is back. This time she is investigating a fifty-year-old murder of an entire family that came to her attention while investigating the theft of pesticide. Shortly thereafter plants and people start being poisoned and it all points back to the long ago death of the Schuler's, a farm family consisting of two parents and five young children.

Mary Logue has written a very compelling story interweaving past and present. Both past and present characters were intriguing. It took a little effort to keep everyone straight, but it was well worth it. The story was suspenseful and though I found the ending to be a bit weak it did not detract from the overall enjoyment of the story.

Bone Harvest is the fourth entry in the Claire Watkins series, and is the first one that I have read-but I am looking for the first three books now! The setting for Bone Harvest is a small Wisconsin farm town that does not have, or usually need, many law enforcement resources. However, fifty years ago, a brutal mass murder in an isolated farmhouse eliminated an entire family and the police never found the killer.

Using the quiet farm community with its violent history as a background, Mary Logue develops an absorbing story focusing on strange events that begin taking place shortly before the fiftieth anniversary of the crime. Pesticides stolen from the local farming co-operative reappear, first poisoning a garden, then a flock of chickens, and finally people at an outing. Claire Watkins begins to draw connections to the long ago killings when an anonymous letter writer provides hints to the local newspaper.

Carefully tying together situations from today with characters from the past, Bone Harvest leads the reader to a conclusion that is simultaneously chilling and sad. Well written, suspenseful, and demonstrating sensitivity and empathy, I would recommend Bone Harvest to anyone.

Great relaxation---death essentially occured "off stage" I have already passed it on to two friends who are enjoying it.

Although not as good as "A Stiff Risotto." This is much better than the other's in the series.

Heaven Lee, 45ish, once widowed, 4 times divorced, disbarred lawyer, ex-stripper and current restaurant owner, has gone to New Orleans to visit her friend Mary Whitten and to cook up some dishes for the Sisters Of The Holy Trinity annual benefit dinner.

Things aren't going well for the sisters. Someone has stolen their prized crucifix, which the original sisters had brought with them from France hundreds of years before, put thousands of termites on their antique wooden staircase and are generally trying to mess up their celebration.

Things can't get worse when at the celebration dinner, Mary's husband Truely is murdered, stabbed with one of Heaven's knives.

Is this just one more thing to ruin the sister's celebration or is there something else? Do the nasty letters, Heaven had received at her restaurant have anything to do with it? Whatever it is, Heaven is determined to find out who killed her friends husband.

What I liked about this book is that there are not the dozens of characters that she has in many of her books. That sometimes made it difficult to follow the storyline. This one only had a few additional characters and made for a very easy read.

The mystery was good, although I did figure out the killer, but it was close to the end of the book so it didn't matter.

Heaven is very funny in this book. The image of her walking into the police station with a dead bird to have them do a match on the bullet that killed it really had me laughing.

The only downside to this story is that she doesn't use her reoccuring characters enough. Except for Murray - who takes over running her restaurant when she's gone, and Hank, her twenty years younger boyfriend, the other characters are hardly heard from at all.

And you don't get a clear description of any of the characters. I'm still not really clear on what Heaven looks like.

The amount of profanity in the book has decreased. I still wouldn't consider this a cozy mystery.

There are three or four places in this book where it is plainly hard to follow the author's intended action sequence. Other than that this is a very good light read and well worth the price of admission. Even if you check it out of the local library as opposed to buying a copy (either in hardback or paperback) the book will keep you entertained.

Mondays were open mike nights at Cafe Heaven. The writing is good and the recipes are too. Heaven Lee is a former lawyer. She runs a cafe in Kansas City. Heaven visits New Orleans for the purpose of planning a benefit banquet in honor of the oldest convent in America. She learns that someone has sent anonymous notes that the waiters in her cafe are diseased. She collects the notes from the Kansas City Star and city hall on the advice of a hate crimes expert. Later Heaven feels better when she learns all of the chefs involved in the banquet received such notes. A friend's husband, Truely, is found stabbed at the benefit event with a stolen cross placed on his body. Heaven assigns herself the task of sorting it all out to find Truely's murderer. The scenes are lively and the plotting is clever.

Heaven Lee is invited to New Orleans to be a guest chef at a swank fund raising dinner for the Sisters of the Holy Trinity. Before she can even get packed, Heaven receives a vicious crank letter that could ruin the reputation of her Kansas City restaurant if it gets into the wrong hands. But going to New Orleans could be great publicity for her restaurant, so it's off the Big Easy. Almost as soon as she hits town, problems crop up. The planning meeting is disrupted by a loud mouthed local celebrity with a grudge. Mysterious and menacing people are lurking around her friends, Mary (an old law school chum of Heaven's) and Truely Whitten (successful owner of the largest coffee importing company in Louisiana). And to top it off, the Sister's lovely Convent building is vandalized and a priceless crucifix is stolen!

Heaven smells disaster for the future success of the fundraiser and reluctantly steps in to try and make sense of these seemingly unrelated incidents before it's too late.

She meets and befriends a former Madame, Nancy Blair, who knows a lot about the hidden skeletons of the society elite in town. She is squired to all the best night spots by handsome, smooth talking, Southern gentleman T. Wilson Tibbetts, who is Truely's best friend.

But murder, conspiracy and plain old greed complicate Heaven's life even further. On the way to solving the mysteries, the reader is treated to some of the most mouthwatering descriptions of delicious sounding Southern food. Many of the actual recipes are included, a trademark of author Lou Jane Temple's scrumptious series featuring Heaven Lee. By all means, read this book. It's a fun, fast paced book and a great addition to the series.

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We in this house adore this story. this must be a different rendition then the one we used to get from our local library though. Some of the words were different, and we liked it the other way. When we read it we just substitute what we know from before. If there is an older version that we could get I would rather like to know.

This is a great book for kids: boys and girls alike.
Very creatively illustrated and a nice story to read, Lauren Child does an amazing job with this children's book.
In this volume, you'll get to know who is Clarice Bean and her family (which is presented in a most imaginative way). I still have to read the other Clarice Bean books, but this one I don't regret I bought it.

...if you knew who wrote this book, you'll never want to read it. Lauren Child is the creator of Charlie & Lola. Although Lauren Child's artwork is really good, she made a bad choice to waste it on Charlie & Lola. Other than that, the book looks like a good book about a girl kids can relate to. But the fact that this person's the same person who created Charlie & Lola takes away 3 stars. If you'd like to read a good book, try out the W.I.T.C.H series or Tokyo Mew Mew.

A delightful new voice in children's books comes from Lauren Child, with her book, "Clarice Bean - That's Me" . The book's narrator, Clarice Bean, is a precocious little girl struggling through the circus of family life. Her mother says Clarice's older brother is "in the dark tunnel of adolescence." It's Clarice's observation, however, that "usually, he's in his room." When she fights with her brother and throws his blanket out the window and it lands on the neighbor's dog, Clarice is in trouble ("Right now," her father tells her, "you are not the flavor of the month, young lady."); she relates: "I am in such BIG TROUBLE that I get sent to my room for 3 whole hours. Alone. I LOVE IT (Finally, some peace and quiet.)." The writing is fresh and true -- the perfect voice for an intelligent young girl -- and the illustrations, also by Child, are a charming mix of ink line drawings, cut-paper collage and photographic background. Typography also plays a role in mimicking the inflections and emphasis of Clarice's pre-adolescent, observant narration.

This is a great book, fun for children and adults, Clarice Bean introduces us to her family - her brother Minal Cricket (where do these names come from) her older sister Marcie and older brother Kurt - (who is going through the dark tunnel of adolescence.....)

Mother loves lying in the bath and learning languages, Father swivels in his chair saying important things into the phone and eating tutti frutti ice cream. It is all from the point of view of Clarice Bean, so it is off-centre, fun and witty.

Bright illustrations mean that my 18month old as well as my three year old enjoy it. It is a picture book with both collage and painting, bright, large illustrations which appeal to both adult and child as well. There is a story running through it - Clarice Bean is looking for peace and quiet and can't get it at all. Highly recommended along with Lauren Child's other books

I really like the characters in this series, but felt that this book was not as good as some of the others in the series. Some parts went along great, and some lagged. Claire seemed very restless in this one, and started to verge on "hysterical female" at one point. I really hate that in a strong female character, and I have always felt that Claire was a great example of the strong female without the flights into "hysterical female" that plague other good, strong female characters.

I thought this one dragged a bit, but I still like Mary Logue's writing and the characters.

I know this area very well and was very excited to see a novel set here. The book doesn't disappoint. Logue is a polished writer. The story was suspenseful. What intrigued me most was the Prologue--a glimpse at true evil. A great read!

Good solid mystery. I loved the rural setting along the Mississippi River.

POISON HEART features Deputy Sheriff Claire Watkins set in a Wisconsin farm community. Rich in local color and flavor, POISON HEART, is novel that emphasizes the character and setting over the suspense of a traditional mystery. There is no doubt who does what, and what their motives are. Instead this novel is about character interaction. If you are looking for fast-paced action or intricate plotting, this book is not for you. If you like reading about the simplicity of small-town life and undercurrents, then this novel will not disappointment because Mary Logue is a wonderful storyteller.

Some gaffes in this book, I don't think the author has any real understanding. He even messes up the definition of expectation, and it doesn't get more elementary than that. There are many better probability books out there, don't choose this one.

I appreciate that many people will be buying this because it has been endorsed by the Society of Actuaries. My review is for those who aren't being compelled to use the book in exam prep. I find "The Science of Uncertainty" to be the most consistently useful of the statistics texts in my office. The examples are clear, it has the right equations, and it's well organized.

Some people here are complaining of inaccuracies but they provide no examples and, frankly, I've never noticed a problem.

I like that authors provided an appendix explaining how to manipulate the distributions they discuss in the book using Mathematica. This was not new to me, but I can imagine it would save others some headaches.

I used this textbook as my main study material for the SOA/CAS P/1 exam. I found it to be well-written and understandable. I have some background in calculus and probability (long-forgotten college courses). I'm hanging on to it for future reference. It's actually possible to learn the material from the book all on your own. All in all, one of the better textbooks out there.

As a statistics graduate, I found it hard to understand this book. There are not many friendly examples to help the readers to understand the concepts, even with the help of solution manual. There are some mistakes too.

I used this book to study for SOA exam P and loved it! If you already have some background in statistics and probability, this is the book to go. It will fill in the blanks left by your average school textbook and give you the nesessary coverage of the exam material.

We borrowed this book from the library at first. We tried many of the recipes and loved almost all of them and so ended up buying it. We have tried about 8 recipes so far and the only one we haven't enjoyed thoroughly was the long beans with dried shrimp (the dried shrimp was not to our taste-buds liking!).

This book just serves as an intro to the veggies used in asian cooking, giving a brief description for each one. It offers only one or two recipes per veggie. And don't be deceived, this is not a vegetarian book! Most of the recipes have meat! (The braised short ribs with hearts of bok choy was great!)

Very delicious!

This book would've ordinarily been a very good book, however, with a few of the same kinds of books available at the same time, I believe that you should shop around before purchasing this one. I have looked at several with the same theme and have found that "Asian Greens" is more concise and lists 3x more vegetables than this book and offers 30 more recipes than this book. Yes the pictures are very beautiful but so are the ones in "Asian Greens". For an informative guide, I would have to go with "Asian Greens" -- unfortunately, I picked up this one first and have since bought "Asian Greens" to help me pick Asian vegetables at the markets.

Next time I go to my local farmer's market I will take this book with me to share with the other shoppers who stand puzzled in front of the Asian vegetable vendor's table. In addition to a complete guide to Asian vegetables with great pictures, this book is full of recipes that are clearly explained and good to eat. The author's style, something one doesn't always notice in a cookbook, is personal and fun to read.

`Asian Vegetables' by first time author, Sara Deseran is a lightweight entry into the world of books about Asian cooking. While there may not be as many heavyweight classics as there are in English for Italian, French, or Mediterranean cuisines, there are important classics against which one's efforts must be measured. The heavyweight in the area of guides to Asian ingredients is `Bruce Cost's Asian Ingredients', updated in 2000.

For starters, for roughly the same list price in paperback, Cost's classic has twice as many pages, covers all ingredients, not just vegetables, and presents vegetables and all other products in a greater depth than Ms. Deseran's book. For starters, Deseran does not include the Latin scientific names for her vegetables, which is doubly annoying as she herself says, most of the vegetables have different names, even in different parts of China, let alone different names in Japan and Thailand. So, the only way to be sure we are talking about the same thing is to give the one name that is guaranteed to be the same across all books.

Ms. Deseran has one opportunity to gain a march on Cost's book by providing color photographs of almost all of the plants she discusses, but this feature is, to my mind, done poorly. In an attempt to compare and contrast the appearance of related vegetables, the photographs are all `family pictures'. Thus, for example, one picture of four oriental members of the cabbage family is so small that I am very hard pressed to see the differences between the four vegetables in the photograph, and I am hard pressed to see the difference between choy sum (Chinese flowering cabbage) and the Mediterranean veggie, broccoli Rabe (rapini). This brings up another weakness with the book.

One of the main features of the book is the recipes presented for each featured ingredient. One problem with these recipes is that relatively few of these ingredients are available outside of an Oriental market in a large city such as New York or San Francisco. My local very well stocked megamart probably carries less than a third of the ingredients in this book. One of the virtues of Bruce Cost's book is that since it covers all types of Asian products, including meat, fish, noodles, sauces, and grains, the average coverage is probably better than half, as grains, noodles, and fish are much more common than many vegetables. So, even though Ms. Deseran says that most oriental leafy greens are almost entirely interchangeable with one another, this doesn't help if you can't find any. It would have made the recipes much more useful if the author had provided substitutions, especially for the leafy green vegetables and the squashes.

Even on the subjects on which both Deseran and Cost have articles, Cost's information is deeper and generally more useful. While Deseran has articles on `Ginger' and `Galangal and Turmeric', Cost has several pages on the `Ginger family', including individual articles on `Ginger', `Galangal', `Turmeric', `Mioga Ginger', and `Lesser Galangal'. For the ginger family, both books provide two soup recipes featuring ginger and Galangal. Deseran gives the usual short paragraph to ginger, while Cost gives two pages to ginger, including a discussion of `baby ginger' and ginger shoots. Cost also covers dried and powdered preparations made from ginger and turmeric, which are beyond the scope of Deseran's book. Deseran does cover a fairly sizable number of non-vegetable topics in her `pantry glossary', but most entries offer little substantial information. For example, there is a paragraph on chicken broth, which gives no recipe for same, and makes no mention, like Cost, that the Asian chicken broth is an entirely different preparation than it's French or Italian cousins. She simply suggests you use a commercial western style organic chicken broth. This point alone makes me question the depth to which Ms. Deseran has seriously researched her subject.

Oddly, Ms. Deseran's bibliography is very respectable and includes `Bruce Cost's Asian Ingredients'. It almost seems she knows of this important work, but has never read it. Ms. Deseran's patron and inspiration for this book is noted Chinese cookbook author, Barbara Tropp, whose `The Modern Art of Chinese Cooking' has all the cachet and quality of a Chinese `Mastering the Art of French Cooking' by Julia Child. And, Ms. Tropp agrees with Mr. Cost in clearly distinguishing Chinese from French broth by leaving out the vegetables and adding ginger. So much for packaged supermarket stocks!

One attraction found in Ms. Deseran's book is the anecdotes by noted chefs on Oriental ingredients. I found these contributed virtually nothing to the value of the book.

Virtually the only situation in which it seems Ms. Deseran's book may have an edge over Bruce Cost's work is if you happen to live near a first class Asian market which stocks a good variety of fresh ingredients and the color pictures can serve as an aid in identifying the products. But then, Cost's book becomes more valuable, as it offers an excellent guide to how to make the best of Asian markets, something Ms. Deseran does not cover, except to note how to care for the vegetables once you have them.

This is really an average book, so my three stars simply reflects that this book offers virtually nothing when compared to the standard works on the subject.

This is a good guide to the produce you'll find in an Asian market, and it gives you a decent idea of what you can do with that bitter melon or mustard cabbage after you've brought it home. It's a good book -- but I can't work up my enthusiasm for it.

For one thing: even though the photography is attractive, it's not terribly useful. Presumably to both save money and to give a sense of size-and-scale, most of the vegetable photos have several items in the same picture (Chinese broccoli next to choy sum next to mustard cabbage), with little circles (TOO-little circles) indicating the item highlighted in the text. The veggie photos are also smaller than the recipe photos; personally, I'd rather a good hard look at a healthy bunch of greens than a full-page picture of Asian gumbo with mustard cabbage and chinese sausage (however appealing that recipe might be).

The information given is also... well, not quite minimal, but far from exhaustive. While the entry for Lotus root in Vegetables from Amaranth to Zucchini is two or three pages (plus recipes), there's really only 3 paragraphs devoted to it here. It's good information, mind you, just not that much of it.

But note that I do give the book 4 stars. If you're completely new to Asian cooking, then this inexpensive book may be helpful (and a fatter book would be overwhelming).