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• Dojny, Brooke

Timeless favorites from America's Premier Regional Cuisine.

New England's vibrant fare represents the first tastes and dishes to become part of the American palate, and these culinary delights are still very much a part of every American's repertoire. Every autumn Americans across the country celebrate Thanksgiving Day, recreating the famous feasts of Plymouth, Massachusetts. In The New England Cookbook, Brooke Dojny picks up the strands of the culinary influences that began there, and provides, in 350 recipes and plenteous anecdotes, a portrait of the way New Englanders cook today.

In Wellfleet Oysters on the Half Shell and Roasted Pumpkin Cider Soup she celebrates the goodness of fresh crops and the abundance of the land and sea. Recipes like Cheddar and Ale Potage de Vermont and Shaker Roast Pork Loin with Cider-Sage Gravy provide hearty antidotes to winter's chill, and Simple Grilled Dilled Striped Bass and Blackberry Patch Cobbler revel in the region's fleeting yet glorious summer.

The cookbook features a number of recipes for dishes that have been brought by immigrants into New England's mainstream fare, as well as skillful combinations of flavors New Englander's love. the region's people, culture, and lore spring to life in sidebars that round out the pages of this remarkable paean to America's culinary home.

For all its modernity, The New England Cookbook will surely inspire readers to keep one tradition alive, that of setting aside life's work for a time and gathering with family and friends around a table to enjoy all the delectable, heart-warming food these recipes have to offer.

BROOKE DJONY co-authors the monthly column Thirty-Minute Main Courses for Bon Appetit. She is co-author of the James Beard Award winning AMA Family Health Cookbook, as well as nearly a dozen other cookbooks. Dojny and her husband live in Westport, Connecticut and spend their summers on the coast of Maine.