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Review - From Dill to Dracula: A Romanian Food & Folklore Cookbook

 From Dill to Dracula: A Romanian Food & Folklore Cookbook

I received an electronic copy of this book via NetGalley for an honest review.

This is a really nice cookbook that offers a good variety of recipes, with clear instructions and primarily ingredients readily accessible to an American kitchen (which is the target audience). The author even provides a recipe for making your own Vegeta, because she describes it as difficult to find in grocery stores (which is not my experience, but then, I regularly shop at Polish ethnic markets). The photography is beautiful (both of food and of Romanian scenery), and I found many recipes that I hope to return and try out.

Not being specifically familiar with Romanian cooking, I can't speak to the authenticity of the recipes. Some of them are very typical of an East-Central European context, others less generalized to the whole region--but as I said, they are well-adapted to the availability of ingredients in North America.

I did not find the folklore segment of the book nearly as strong as the cooking section of the book, and would buy it as a cookbook and not as a reference on Romanian folklore--but it makes for a fun introduction, and explains the title of the book. While there are fascinating divisions in the political and cultural geography of different parts of Romania, this book doesn't dwell on these--which seems to be a deliberate choice. For what the book is, it works--though I don't think that a reader who knows next to nothing about Romania would emerge with a much fuller understanding of its historical or cultural context than they started with, they would probably have a good meal or two in between.

The list of Eastern European markets in the US in the back is a helpful starting point for a reader who wouldn't know where to begin looking, but it is (by its own admission) woefully incomplete. Still, I'm sure not all readers will be in the habit of finding these places to the extent that I often have been. Incidentally, I've visited three of the stores listed--both of those listed for Michigan, and the only one listed for Maine.

The ARC I received could stand another round of proofreading, but that can't be held against the book itself and I hope is all corrected in the book as published.

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