As the popularity of peppers expands well beyond piquillos, shishitos, padrons, and poblanos, on-trend cooks want to know how to use the dozens of varieties they see at the market and on restaurant menus. Peppers of the Americas is the definitive guide for all pepper lovers, beginning with the fascinating history of how they have spread throughout the world since pre-Columbian times, influencing cultures and cuisines everywhere. Nearly 200 fresh and dried peppers are described, including tasting notes and recommended uses, with photographs showing each one's natural beauty. Information on how to buy, store, process, and cook with peppers, plus 40 pepper-forward recipes for dried ground pepper blends, piquant vinegars and bright sauces, lively salads and sides, and robust main dishes highlight the big flavors and taste-enhancing aspects of peppers. Cooks and gardeners will be inspired by the vibrant colors, diverse forms, and complex flavors detailed in this artfully designed reference, replete with botanical illustrations and 250 color photographs.
As dozens of new varieties show up in markets and the appreciation for peppers' complexity and health benefits spread,.
Winner of the 2018 International Association of Culinary Professionals (IACP) Cookbook Award for "Reference & Technical"
A beautiful culinary and ethnobotanical survey of the punch-packing ingredient central to today's multi-cultural palate, with more than 40 pan-Latin recipes from a three-time James Beard Award-winning author and chef-restaurateur.
From piquillos and shishitos to padrons and poblanos, the popularity of culinary peppers (and pepper-based condiments, such as Sriracha and the Korean condiment gochujang) continue to grow as more consumers try new varieties and discover the known health benefits of Capsicum, the genus to which all peppers belong. This stunning visual reference to peppers now seen on menus, in markets, and beyond, showcases nearly 200 varieties (with physical description, tasting notes, uses for cooks, and beautiful botanical portraits for each). Following the cook's gallery of varieties, more than 40 on-trend Latin recipes for spice blends, salsas, sauces, salads, vegetables, soups, and main dishes highlight the big flavors and taste-enhancing capabilities of peppers.
Author Biography:
MARICEL PRESILLA is the chef-owner of two pan-Latin restaurants (Cucharama and Zafra) and a cooking atelier (Ultramarinos), president/founder of Gran Cacao Company (a cacao importer), a frequent contributor to Saveur, and a former medieval Spanish history professor (Rutgers). She has been profiled in the New York Times and Washington Post, and led the White House's Latin cultureshowcase in 2010. She was named the James Beard Best Chef Mid-Atlantic in 2012; her opus, Gran Cocina Latina- The Food of Latin America, won the James Beard Book of the Year in 2013; and she was inducted into the Beard Foundation's Hall of Fame in 2015.
