Book Review: The Slow Cook Book

There are a lot of slow cooker cookbooks available today but how many give you recipes for both the slow cooker version and the traditional version? The Slow Cook Book by Heather Whinney does just that and much more. Whinney is both food writer and home economist. She has written for several magazine in the UK including Prima, BBC Good Food, Family Circle and Woman and Home. She is also the author of the Illustrated Quick Cook and co-author of the Diabetes Cookbook.

The Slow Cook Book contains over 200 recipes from around the World. From Borscht to Lebanese Meatballs, this book spans the globe to feature many classic international recipes. Like the many travel guides by DK Publishing, this book is well organized, easy and fun to use. The recipes seem to be well tested and many have outstanding photographs of the end product. In addition to the recipes themselves, Heather Whinney provides some great chapters on cooking techniques including choosing ingredients, adapting recipes to a slow cooker, as well as instruction on marinating, browning, sautéing, deglazing, reducing, and many other techniques. She also includes a cool section that helps you pare different recipes to create a perfect meal.

We give The Slow Cook Book four stars out of five. We really liked the emphasis this book placed on featuring a wide variety of international recipes. Indeed, it was difficult to choose which recipes to try for our review. We ended up choosing two curries: the Sri Lankan Coconut Pumpkin Curry and the Malaysian Mango Curry. For the Sri Lankan dish, we were able to use a pumpkin that we grew in our garden. This along with the coconut was a phenomenal combination with a spicy finish from the chilies. The Malaysian curry had the sweetness from the mangoes balanced with the heat from the red chilies. The third recipe that we tried was the Asian Beef and Bok Choy. This dish featured the rich flavor of slow cooked beef with the fresh, light taste of lightly cooked bok choy. We also tried the feijoada recipe but this dish did not match up to the versions of this Brazilian classic that we were able to experience in São Paulo and Rio. But to be fare, some versions of this recipe can take up to 2 days to prepare so it would be challenging to adapt it to a slow cooker and achieve the same results.

If you had to choose one book this year for someone that is interested in learning how to cook or to just cook better, we would recommend The Slow Cook Book. It has some solid chapters on cooking techniques, many delicious, easy to prepare recipes, and great introductions to some of the World’s best dishes.