Product Description

After more than twenty years of running Barefoot Contessa, the acclaimed specialty food store, Ina Garten published her first collection of recipes. The Barefoot Contessa Cookbook was an overnight sensation, but it's the kind of success that can only be grounded in years of experience. In it, Ina shared her ideas for familiar food but with outstanding flavor and -- most important of all -- recipes that really work.

Now, with Barefoot Contessa Parties! Ina shares secrets she has gleaned from her years not only as a caterer but as a dedicated party giver. The keyword here is fun. Ina's parties are easy to prepare and fun for everyone, including the host. Forget those boring Saturday-night dinners that just won't end. With Ina's advice, you're certain to have all your friends saying, "Wasn't that fun!"

Ina has packed Barefoot Contessa Parties! with plans for pulling off parties like a pro, stories about her own parties, and tips on assembling food (rather than cooking everything) and organizing like a caterer. In the spring you can invite your friends to a party where they all make their own pizzas. Come summer, it's into the garden for a lunch with grilled lamb and pita sandwiches that guests assemble themselves. In the autumn, when it's not Thanksgiving, Ina roasts a fresh turkey, which her friends enjoy with popovers and a creamy spinach gratin. And on a snowy winter's day, everyone is invited for a lunch buffet with seafood chowder and butternut squash and apple soup.

Ever since Ina published her first book, people write, e-mail, and stop her on the street to say how much they love the food. She's reached new heights here with recipes like sour cream coffee cake--the ultimate breakfast treat. Salads? The red lettuce, balsamic onions, and blue cheese; Chinese chicken salad; and panzanella may be the best you've ever tasted. Filet of beef is easy to make for a fancy dinner with oh-so-good gorgonzola sauce, or sliced into sandwiches and served with lobster rolls for a Superbowl party. And fans of The Barefoot Contessa Cookbook will be delighted to find the recipe for the Lemon Cake they drooled over but only saw pictured, right here in this book.

With so many great ideas and recipes in these pages for you to use, your friends will start to wonder why your parties are always so much fun.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #4478 in Books
• Published on: 2001-03-27
• Released on: 2001-03-27
• Original language: English
• Binding: Hardcover
• 264 pages

From Amazon.com
"A good party is not about the food," says Ina Garten, "it's about the people." That may be true, but her Barefoot Contessa Parties! will ensure that your next party is a fabulous one, regardless of your guest list. Garten, author of The Barefoot Contessa Cookbook and a monthly column in Martha Stewart Living, has been catering since 1978. So who better to put together a collection of entertaining theme parties? She's included everything from drinks and hors d'oeuvres to dessert and coffee, as well as notes about what "surprises," atmospheres, venues, and table decorations lend themselves to each. Because she likes to attend her own parties (and who doesn't?), almost every recipe is make-ahead and remarkably uncomplicated.

From casual get-togethers, such as the Pizza Party--which includes recipes for Caesar Salad with Pancetta, California Pizzas that your guests can assemble themselves, and Ice-Cream Sodas--to the elegant Academy Awards dinner--where your guests will enjoy Raspberry Vodka, Rori's Potato Chips with Caviar Dip, Smoked Salmon with Mesclun, Filet of Beef with Gorgonzola Sauce, Roasted Cherry Tomatoes, Garlic Roasted Potatoes, and Chocolate Ganache Cake--Garten's parties are well thought out and well organized. Divided by season, you'll look forward to Summer's Outdoor Grill, which starts with Real Margaritas, followed by Endive and Avocado Salad, Grilled Herb Shrimp with Mango Salsa, Spaghettoni al Pesto, Tomato Fennel Salad, and Peach Raspberry Shortcakes for dessert. Autumn brings beautiful menus like the one where you cook with your guests and end up with a feast of Potato Pancakes with Caviar, Salad with Warm Goat Cheese, Rack of Lamb, Orzo with Roasted Vegetables, and Apple Crostata. Winter's menus bring soul-warming food, such as Seafood Chowder, Butternut Squash and Apple Soup, and a recipe for possibly the world's best Chocolate Chunk Cookies. Spring offers menus such as the Sunday Breakfast, with a main course of Roasted Asparagus with Scrambled Eggs, and the Jewish Holiday Party, with Chicken Soup with Matzo Balls.

Filled with funny party anecdotes, a bit of Ina Garten history, and clever hints and tips to help guarantee the success of these recipes, this collection, subtitled "Ideas and Recipes for Easy Parties That Are Really Fun," delivers on every count. --Leora Y. Bloom

From Publishers Weekly
Building on the success of The Barefoot Contessa Cookbook, Garten presents 16 simple menus, yielding readers four fun and distinctive parties per season. True to her theory that the easiest parties are usually the best, Garten offers sound advice (e.g., prepare dishes in advance when possible so you can be a guest at your own party, and use strategy when building a guest list) and fare within the reach of any cook. Moreover, by suggesting many dishes that can be served at room temperature, she helps hosts minimize any last-minute frenzies. Brisket with Carrots and Onions requires very little supervision, and Chocolate Ganache Cake can be baked a week ahead and glazed the day it's served. Garten pumps up the flavor with such recipes as Potato Pancakes with Caviar and an irresistible vinaigrette-tossed salad topped by sliced onions baked with balsamic vinegar and then by crumbled Maytag blue cheese. Potables are as innocent as Tropical Smoothies and as potent as Raspberry Vodka and Real Margaritas. (Apr.)Forecast: Having already catapulted herself from her eponymous gourmet shop in East Hampton, N.Y., to the national stage, Garten is sure to secure the success of her second book with the added exposure of her own cooking show on the Food Network, regular appearances on Martha Stewart Living and her high-profile Web site (www.barefootcontessa.com).

Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal
The Barefoot Contessa is Garten's upscale take-out shop in East Hampton, NY, but her Barefoot Contessa Cookbook proved to have a national audience (it sold more than 100,000 copies). Here she provides menus and recipes for 16 parties and other festive gatherings, from "Lunch in the Garden" to "Not Thanksgiving" to "Valentine's Day," along with tips for stress-free entertaining. With the same attractive design (featuring dozens of full-page color close-ups of food and settings) that helped make the first book so popular, and its simple, seasonal recipes, this, too, is sure to be in demand. (Not to mention that Garten is soon to become a regular contributor to Martha Stewart Living, as well as host of a new Food Network series.) Recommended for most collections.
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Customer Reviews

Gives you what you expect. Nothing More. Others are Better
This is Ina Garten's second of three cookbooks and the one most closely patterned after the flagship work of her mentor, Martha Stewart. It presents ideas and recipes organized for small scale entertaining at home. As such it is no match for Stewart's 'Entertaining' volume, to which I would direct you if you need to plan any serious parties with more than eight guests.

Garten's first book was simply recipes from her catering business. They were probably the best she had. This book adds value to a simple collection of recipes by organizing courses into party menus designed for sixteen different family and close friend occasions. The third book seems to be composed of leftovers.

The choice of events to celebrate is a bit quirky in that traditional occasions such as Christmas, Graduation, Thanksgiving, Fourth of July, Mardi Gras / Carnavale, and St. Patrick's Day are not included. Rather, ten out of the sixteen are 'moveable feasts' in that the menu is appropriate to just about any occasion. Some are limited by season such as 'Outdoor Grill' and 'Canoe Trip', but many are generic indoor excuses to have a good time, such as 'Sunday Breakfast', 'Pizza Party', and 'Fireside Dinner'.

Unlike Stewart's book, there is really not much serious advice on how to organize for parties. Much of it is common sense plus clever ideas for special events, such as the idea to pack picnic portions in Chinese takeout cartons.

Garten has the advantage of claiming with full justification that her recipes are all specifically developed and test to work in a small party environment, as she has been in the catering business doing just this thing for many years. On reading her recipes and seeing many of them done on her Food Network TV show, I believe almost all of these recipes are simple and short in prep time, if not very cheap. The few recipes which take more than a page of large type are the baked goods. As Garten says herself, many are more a matter of 'assembling' than they are of cooking.

Next to books from publishing house Alfred A. Knopf, cookbooks from Clarkson N. Potter have the most distinctive style. Where Knopf's books tend to follow the sedate style of Julia Child's classics, Potter's books for Stewart and Garten go for lots of large, glossy, very good photographs. Following the maxim that one eats with their eyes before their mouth, this may even help sell cookbooks with it's appeal to the visceral. Unfortunately, a rational look at the content versus the price suggests this book is a bit short on value. I will give Garten credit for referring to recipes in her earlier book rather than filling pages in this book with repeated recipes. I may be visually challenged, but photographs in cookbooks rarely create a positive impression and often create a negative impression if they are poorly done. In this book, I think they are a wash. They are too caught up in being artistic to give great value to the culinary, but they are not bad photos, so, they do nothing for my appreciation of the recipes.

At $35 list price for sixteen menus and about eighty new recipes, I say this is only a modest value for the cost. The tie-in to the TV show adds some value, but not much. I would recommend Sheila Lukins' book 'Celebrate' as a serious resource for family gatherings. I already suggested Martha Stewart's book as a better source for larger events.

I recommend this book to any Ina Garten fans plus anyone who already has the other volumes recommended in this review, and simply needs more ideas. Professional caterers are an obvious choice. The book delivers the expected content in an attractive package. Nothing more.

you shouldn't believe your own success
First off, yes, I like Ina Garten's books--and her cooking. Most of the recipes here are simple; the food, satisfying. But this book is too enamored with its own success. Most egregious are the listed recipes that are not found in the book, but are simply referenced to her first book. Savvy marketing, no doubt. It makes sure you buy both books. But irritating, nonetheless. And there's just so much rank sloppiness going on. The party for twenty? Look at the yield in the recipes--some are for 6 people, some are for 8, others, more. So what do you do if you're indeed having twenty over? Someone, I think, just slapped together a bunch of recipes and thought, well, we're already a success. Why sweat the details?

In Ina's words...FABULOUS and What's not to like?
This volume is typical Ina: easy, delicious, wonderful, and guaranteed success. Although this book is not for catering to large crowds, the recipes can be easily multiplied. Her themed menus help anybody who is planning an event, yet doesn't know exactly want to serve. On the other hand, you can mix and match, and still be guaranteed success. This book is a must have for any Ina fan, as well as the beginner, intermediate, and experienced cook, as well as anybody who caters. There is something for everybody in this book, even the picky.

One of the biggest draws of this book is that Ina preaches that just because you are the host or hostess of the party, that doesn't mean you have to spend all the time in the kitchen. Most recipes are easily made ahead of time, and just prepped when guests arive or at serving time. This book allows you to throw a hugely successful party, while allowing you to be a "guest" at your own party.

Fabulous...what's not to like?