One of my favorite cookbooks to collect is international cookbooks. I love trying different recipes from different countries so was excited to check this one out.

This was a wonderful cookbook that I have to admit I went through in one sitting. It’s a bilingual cookbook written in English and Spanish. What I liked about it is that each recipe is included twice in the cookbook, once in Spanish and then again once in English both clearly printed on separate pages.

There are 30 recipes ranging from American Chili with Turkey to Uzbek Plov with Chicken. Each recipe is clear and concise without overcomplicated ingredients or directions. Most people if they have a well-stocked pantry would be able to make the majority of these recipes with ingredients on hand. The author has taken some liberties with the authenticity of a few of the recipes and has replaced red meat or pork with turkey, chicken or vegetables. I personally didn’t have an issue with that and actually liked the twist on the traditional.

Each recipe page has information on the origins of the recipe, a clear colorful picture of the finished dish, amount of servings and nutritional values. As I mentioned before, each recipe has clear directions and simple basic ingredients which I liked. Because I do collect and make International dishes the ones that I am familiar with in this book were similar to what I know and looked true and close to classic recipes. The recipes I was not familiar with were not overly complicated and the finished products looked delicious and tempting!

The book also has Cooking Tips and Tricks, Healthy Hints for the Home Cook, an Index that is alphabetized with Recipe Names and Main Ingredients along with which recipe you may find the ingredient in, and a handy Notes section near the end.

In conclusion, I have the majority of the recipes in this cookbook marked to try! It’s definitely a cookbook I look forward to using. I would recommend it if you’re looking for something new and different and like to explore different cuisines.

I had high hopes for this recipe book. I love collecting traditional recipes from around the world – in particular from countries with successful football teams. During World Cup and European Cup football (soccer) tournaments, I try to cook recipes for whichever teams are playing that evening. I then cheer for England (if playing) or the country with the best recipe on the night. Out of the 30 recipes included, all bar four come from countries that have reached the World Cup finals. I am still waiting for China, Thailand and India (countries with amazing cuisine) to get their football up to scratch.
I also like that the book is a Spanish-English bilingual version. I don’t speak Spanish, but love picking up words for ingredients in foreign languages. Having the Spanish and English pages facing each other makes that easy – and fun. There is always a picture of a main ingredient on the Spanish page, and photo of the completed meal on the English page
I agree with the general philosophy of the book: “food – and by extension the cooking of food – is not only essential sustenance for the human body, it is also emotional nourishment for the soul.” To my mind, to really learn about a country and its people, you need to learn about its cuisine, and this book is a good starting point: “the dishes in this book … are a collection of national and well-known culinary creations that have become intrinsically identified with a particular country because of their history. As such, they are a symbol of national pride and culinary identity with the country of origin, pride that is carried on from generation to generation”. The authors see the wide variety of cuisines and ethnic dishes brought to America by immigrants, as “a bond that draws us together – citizen and non-citizen alike” and that “these recipes have become synonymous with the essence of American cuisine”
However, I was not happy with the way that some of the recipes were changed from the traditional ingredients to other ingredients deemed healthier or less spicy. In particular, red meat or pork is often substituted for turkey or chicken. In fairness, some of the original ingredients are mentioned in the fact sidebars that accompany each recipe. But, I would personally prefer the traditional recipe (with the traditional taste!) - then hints as to possible substitutions (for reasons of health, budget, accessibility, diet etc). I was especially annoyed with the “British Shepherds Pie” cooked with turkey mince. Shepherds Pie is LAMB. If it has a different meat, or no meat at all – it is NOT Shepherd’s Pie. At least the “German Sauerbraten” has been allowed to keep its beef.
I cooked seven of the recipes, and would make the “Colombian Sancocho” (next World Cup) and the Indonesian Satay with Peanut Sauce” again. The other five recipes were OK, but did not particularly grab me.
A lot of the cooking times given were inadequate – which made planning a meal involving other dishes difficult. In a number of the recipes, several ingredients were added together, which should have been separated. For example, in the “Spanish Tortilla”: “sauté together potatoes, onions, bell pepper, shallots, garlic, carrots, peas and cayenne pepper”. And some of the quantities given seemed excessive. I am a chilli-head, but even I blanch at adding a tablespoon of cayenne pepper to any recipe – let alone a tortilla. Then there was the “6 Tbsp curry powder or more to taste (!!!!)” in the “Indian Fish Curry” and the tablespoon of salt in the “Uzbek Plov”. It is possible that spices and spice mixes have different strengths in the USA to those in Britain, but these seemed to me to be extreme.
So, you needed to be both an adventurous and highly competent cook to attempt these recipes, so that the errors (?) in the text did not ruin the meals. However, I do not think that was the key audience for this book.
The book also suffered from my pet hate of only having imperial measures and no metric conversion chart. Fine, if you are only marketing the book to USA, Myanmar and Liberia – but the rest of the world has moved on to metric.
In conclusion, the variety of dishes is very interesting, but the recipes are not without problems. The book is coming from the right place and positive thinking, but the execution leaves something to be desired.

This is a great cookbook for someone who likes to cook but doesn't want a bunch of different cookbooks. It contains recipes for just about any dish you thought about cooking at one time.

Famous Dishes from Around the World/Platos famosos de todo el mundo
by Stephanie Maze


Alphabetically set out from America to Uzbekistan 30 national dishes with recipe, history of the dish and nutritional information presented. Healthier options are provided as well. The book provides the recipes in both English and Spanish with illustrations that made my mouth water. I learned a few new-to-me tips: soak bamboo skewers in water overnight to help keep them from burning on the grill AND to wash cast iron not with soap but with water, oil and salt instead. The recipes chosen were those that the editors believed most representative of those brought to America and most well known. To provide all of the recipes would require many volumes, I believe. I enjoyed learning a bit more about some of the recipes I have eaten in the past and really enjoyed learning that the origins of some recipes were not actually in the country that has claimed them their own.

Thank you to NetGalley and Moonstone Press for the ARC – This is my honest review.

4 Stars

This cookbook showcases delicious recipes from around the world.

I love cooking and trying new recipes, and this book shows some of the most beloved dishes from different countries. It has beautiful, clear pictures, and is written in a bilingual (Spanish/English) format.

On one page you will have the recipe in Spanish, and the other one in English with nutrition values at the bottom. The recipes that I'd love to try from this cookbook are the Greek moussaka, Kung Pao chicken, and Jambalaya.

If you love trying new dishes, then you will enjoy this book.

Received ARC from publisher via Netgalley

Essentially a cookbook of about 30 recipes covering a wide range of word cuisines. The recipes are basic but interesting and should give readers an idea of the tastes of those countries such as to encourage them to buy more specific books/try more recipes and expand their skills. I understand why a lot of them have turkey - the author is trying to encourage better eating habits - but this spoils it for me. I'd prefer the recipes to retain the traditional meat ingredient but say that turkey, and other things, is a substitute. Not the other way round. So many lose so much by using turkey! To be picky, Swedish meatballs would never have dill sauce with them (they don't traditionally have a sauce at all, just serve with potatoes and lingon jam). Lots of parsley in them though. British shepherd's pie traditionally only has mushrooms, carrots and onions as veg. Not chopped rosemary either - if you must and are using lamb then cook the meat first with sprigs of rosemary but take that out before compiling the dish. I appreciate that one does not follow precisely traditional recipes but if the cook book is supposed to be about ethnic food then make it so in the first place. Adding more vegetables, substituting ingredients is all part of becoming a good and competent cook as well as making more healthy (according to modern ideas) food but don't pretend that they are what they clearly are not. The introduction notes that 'some liberties have been taken with the authenticity', fair enough, 'and the spices for which they are known remain authentic' - think about this, Certain spices were used with certain meats. That does not mean that they necessarily work with others. Overall it is a good introduction to a wide range of dishes and I like the English/Spanish versions but trying to make dishes healthier does not always retain their ethnic origins. Thanks to NetGalley and Moonstone Press LLC for an advance copy in exchange for my honest review.

This cookbook is written in both Spanish and English and has recipes from around the world. It is an interesting book and carries some good recipes and easy to follow instructions. There are photos of all the meals and comes with tips and tricks, and is little different from your run of the mill cookbook.

What a delightful book! The recipes presented celebrate some of the best from around the world. These recipes are presented in an easy-to-follow format so cooks at any skill level may follow them with ease. Each recipe and its accompanying nutrition and historical information have also been provided in Spanish as well as English. In addition, healthy hints are also provided at the rear of the book for those needing to modify the recipes.

I must add that when I saw the number of ingredients needed for each recipe, I was concerned. Often that amount of ingredients might put some people off from even making the recipe. However, determined cooks who want to achieve the results will probably not be affected by this. In any event, for wonderful culinary adventures, these recipes are worth a try.

I voluntarily reviewed an Advanced Reader’s Copy of this book that was provided by the publisher through Net Galley. However, the thoughts and opinions presented here are my own.

VERY NICE! I really, really, really enjoyed this book. I learned a lot. Great for the adventurous eater!

A wonderful cookbook along with several stories of how the recipes were developed. I've become more adventurous as my cooking skills progress and have not reached the point where I can comfortably tackle several of these dishes. So far I've received 5 star reviews on the results. A good cookbook for adventurous cooks.

This book has a great collection of international recipes and clear instructions. Also there was a nice selection of vegetarian recipes, all which look delicious!

An interesting book including many familiar recipes from around the world. I like the little side notes which give a brief history of the recipes. It is also very helpful to have the nutritional values for each dish listed, many books do not include this.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for an advance copy of this title in exchange for an unbiased review.

This is a cookbook giving people a nice introduction to various dishes from around the world and it has a great variety in terms of recipes, though I wish it had more African dishes. A redeeming aspect is that this cookbook is bi-lingual (English/Spanish), which makes it more accessible.

To be honest, this is the kind of book I'd expect to see on the shelves of the dollar store next year. While I appreciate the intent (highlight favorite dishes from immigrants around the world) and some features (nutritional information and a color photo for each recipe, each recipe is supposed to cost less than $18 which I find very high but others may deem budget-friendly, and all recipes are provided in both Spanish and English), it fell flat for me in several ways.

There are only 30 recipes, so this is a brief book. Most are meat-centric even when they don't have to be. There are 7 vegetarian recipes like borscht and ratatouille but meat features heavily in the rest of the dishes, even a few that were originally vegetarian like pad thai and quiche.

Most of the recipes are not made traditionally, which is my biggest qualm with the book. Most traditional meats have been replaced with poultry such as turkey sausage. Each recipe has a little blurb at the top about its history (which is a nice touch) and it tells what it was originally made with. The recipe that follows generally is not very close to what's described. Even the American recipe (chili) is not traditional -- it's made with turkey sausage, cinnamon and cranberries (yes, I know some folks make chili with these ingredients but they're not exactly the most representative). Fajitas are made with wheat tortillas and the lasagna includes 3 cups (!) of cilantro, for instance.

The recipes are created to be made quickly, which many home cooks will appreciate. That said, I prefer to cook with fresh ingredients instead of things like jarred salsa and sauces to save money, taste better and be more authentic. This is a matter of personal taste but I mention it to provide more information for folks who have preferences either way.

Photos are provided for each dish but they are often Shutterstock photos so they do not necessarily represent what that recipe will look like. The stock image of Swedish meatballs showed meatballs covered with parsley while the recipe didn't call for any and used a creamy mustard-dill dressing, for instance. Also, many of the photos used unappetizing colors like bright blue for the backgrounds that just sort of clashed with the red and green ingredients and reminded me of food photography in the 80's or 90's. Again, that's just personal preferences.

Also, some of the nutritional advice is outdated or untrue. While I avoid GMOs for a wide variety of health and environmental reasons myself, for instance, it is not really true that they are "full of chemicals" (they do tend to be grown with more toxic herbicides like Round-up, though). The authors say that frozen foods are as healthy as fresh and studies have now shown that that's not actually true (see "Eating on the Wild Side" for detailed information on how quickly various nutrients in foods break down when picked, cut and/or frozen). That said, a lot of the advice is great for making meals healthier (cook with lots of spices, grow fresh herbs to use in cooking, limit sugar and artificial sweeteners, etc.).

I'm not sure who the target audience is, but this book would be well suited for English or Spanish-speaking busy home cooks who are looking to cook more international meals but are not concerned with replicating traditional tastes all the way, especially those on diets who favor cooking with things like turkey sausage.

Those eating gluten free and dairy free diets should find a fair number of recipes that will work for them, though there are no designations of gluten-free, dairy free, vegetarian or vegan. The authors recommend switching out meat for vegetarian ingredients like beans in their tips section, but do not provide vegetarian suggestions in the recipes.

I read a temporary digital ARC of this book for the purpose of review.

It might be evident from the sheer fact that I review a plethora of cookbooks on this blog that I absolutely love food and cooking. Something that I also really enjoy is trying foods from all over the world. The recipes included here are some of the more popular recipes from many different places including Greece, France, Spain, India, and many other places. Some of my favorite recipes that are included in the book are Fajitas, Vegetable Korma, Moussaka, Irish Stew, and Huevos Rancheros. Famous Dishes from Around the World is a great addition to any kitchen. I would recommend this book to anyone who likes trying new things or who is interested in food from different places.

Wonderful book filled with Spanish / English recipes!
If you bilingual that will help you a lot, if not - you can learn additional language through cooking!
I have tried couple recipes from this book and they are wonderful!
Highly recommended!

A book in English and America's second language, Spanish, celebrating American culinary influences from around the world.

Of the 30 recipes, only France is represented by three dishes ( Quiche with Salmon, Ratatouille, Salad Nicoise). The UK has Shepherd's Pie; Ireland, Irish Stew.

For better or worse, depending on taste, the recipes have a marked American twist. Turkey features strongly - including in the Shepherd's Pie and in Lasagne and Moussaka. Irish Stew is made with beef.

Recipes are well presented, with nutritional data. Photography is excellent, with pictures of each finished dish.

Famous Dishes from Around the World is a wonderful book for a middle or high school library. It represents so much more than just a cookbook with recipes from around the globe. The book can be used in cooking and health classes, in foreign language classes, in geography classes and in all kind of multi-subject projects that have to do with cross-cultural studies. I especially like that the recipes are written in English and in Spanish and are all accompanied with background information, nutrition facts, and appetizing photographs. The ingredients used in the different recipes are easy to find and inexpensive, which is important if you work with a tight budget. Food unites people, and trying out foreign recipes is a good way to get to know foreign countries and to become interested in learning more. From my own experience with my kids I know that they simply loved cooking French and Spanish dishes with their French and Spanish teachers. They had not been to France or Spain, but the cooking experience in middle school sparked their interest and they kept pursuing their foreign languages throughout high school. I only wish there were two Chinese recipes in the book. The Kung Pao recipe from China contains peanuts, which might not be feasible to cook in a school for allergy reasons. Other than that I wholeheartedly recommend to add this book to your library.

Cute little cookbook featuring some iconic dishes from all over the world. The photos are clear and appetizing but not real special. I think the book could use a little more flare and embellishment. Love the concept.

Good variety of recipes with a sample recipe from many international flavors. Easy to source ingredients with alternatives provided. Also appreciate the nutritional information provided