Six Seasons: A New Way with Vegetables

As an avid home cook and vegetable enthusiast, I recently delved into the culinary world presented in "Six Seasons: A New Way with Vegetables," and it has completely changed the way I approach cooking and savoring vegetables. This cookbook, written by Joshua McFadden, takes a refreshing and innovative approach to vegetable-centric cooking, divided into the six distinct seasons of the produce calendar. Each season celebrates the bounty of vegetables available during that time, inspiring me to embrace the seasonal variations and experiment with new flavors and ingredients. One of the book's strengths lies in its thoughtful organization and informative content. The author's deep understanding of vegetables shines through, as he shares insights into the unique characteristics of each vegetable and the best ways to highlight their flavors. From root vegetables in winter to tender greens in spring, the recipes are tailored to make the most of the seasonal offerings. I appreciate the simplicity and elegance of the recipes presented in "Six Seasons." While some cookbooks can be overwhelming with elaborate techniques, McFadden's approach is approachable and encourages home cooks of all skill levels to explore and enjoy the pleasures of vegetable-focused dishes. Each recipe is well-written and easy to follow, and the accompanying photographs beautifully capture the vibrant colors of the dishes. The emphasis on fresh, locally sourced ingredients resonates with my desire to create sustainable and wholesome meals. The cookbook has inspired me to visit farmers' markets and explore a wider range of vegetables, opening up a whole new world of culinary possibilities. As I worked my way through the recipes, I found myself experimenting with flavors and textures, gaining a newfound appreciation for the versatility of vegetables. The dishes are not only delicious but also nutritious, making it easier to incorporate more plant-based meals into my diet. In terms of value for money, "Six Seasons" is a treasure trove of vegetable-based culinary inspiration. Its timeless appeal and focus on seasonal cooking make it a book I will turn to year after year. The wealth of knowledge and culinary wisdom within its pages make it an invaluable addition to any home cook's collection. In conclusion, "Six Seasons: A New Way with Vegetables" is a must-have for anyone looking to elevate their vegetable cooking game and embrace the joys of seasonal produce. Joshua McFadden's approachable style, insightful guidance, and mouthwatering recipes have enriched my culinary journey, and I highly recommend this book to all vegetable lovers and aspiring chefs alike.

If you are into vegetables, if this title has piqued your interest, (and obviously it has since you are reading the reviews on this product page), then "Six Seasons, a New Way with Vegetables" is a book you must seriously consider. Whether you have your own vegetable gardens or get a weekly CSA box or patronize a thriving farmers' market, you owe it to yourself to pick up a copy of this book. If you would rather eat veggies than meat, you have to have it. I haven't seen such an exciting and creative vegetable-themed cookbook in a long time. Besides dealing with the vegetables themselves, Joshua McFadden has loaded this book with wonderful vinaigrettes, sauces, and butters. He makes valuable and experienced recommendations of his favorite flavor enhancers, too. I am so enamored of this book that it sits on the edge of my ottoman where I prop my feet up, and I re-read some part of it daily: It is that time of the year when veggies really come into their own--exciting and varied and so obviously fresh--that I can't get enough of them. It is so, so satisfying and rewarding to have so many terrific recipes to refer to for the vegetables and herbs and greens that I have at hand, in hand. We do get a CSA half-bushel box each Wednesday, and I always have an assortment of fresh vegetables in our refrigerator bins, with overflow in a cooler on our porch. I also have a thriving herb garden, and a small raised garden of leafy greens. Plus my tomatoes are ripening, and sweet corn is ready in my area. (The corn recipes in this book are great!) So, this cookbook is right up my alley, and it came available at the perfect time. And, get this: He encourages us to eat our green salads with our hands. Tried it and loved it and will continue to eat salads with my fingers from here on out. He does an excellent job of training the reader to season properly. He salts, peppers, and dashes vinegars on his fresh greens, then tastes and adjusts. Then he adds olive oil for richness and mellowness. The technique works well for me. McFadden has a technique that I find invaluable: Dry-grill veggies. After many years of trying, I had finally discontinued grilling vegetables. Period. Didn't like the taste of most veggies on the grill. McFadden claims that off-flavor is the oil in the marinade or simply the oil that one uses to "grease" whatever vegetables get put on the grill. Solution? Don't oil them, put them on the grill without adornment, and dress them after you take them off the grate. Simply amazing how well this technique works. He also is a fan of refrigerator pickles. I am too, and I am always searching for and buying cookbooks that contain new ideas for frig pickles. There are two charts for frig pickles--listing vegetables along with appropriate seasonings to go into a basic brine. There is a longer list of vegetables that go into a cold brine, a short list suited for a hot brine. I like that he incorporated grains into his veggie dishes, too. And the idea of six seasons? It’s about time we acknowledge them. Those of us who garden vegetables know in the back of our minds that there are many differences between early and late summer. Those of us down South, (I grow in south-central Texas), can even call out Early Spring and Late Spring, and Early Fall and Late Fall, rather than the three Summer seasons that are called out in this book. But it is good to acknowledge them all: For me, acknowledgement spurs me to plant earlier and more. Recipes in this book are arranged by season, then alphabetically by main vegetable. There are line drawings in addition to full-color photos of the veggies themselves, how-to photos and finished dishes. The pages are a nice, heavy stock, and the books is a hardback. My favorite recipe at this point is a fairly simple one: Grilled Carrots, Steak, and Red Onion with Spicy Fish-Sauce Sauce. I could make it all grilling season long. And I don't need the steak. And I can make it with summer squash, too, but the carrots and onions is a must. And the Spicy Fish-Sauce Sauce comes together in a few minutes of prep work. (I use Red Boat fish sauce as McFadden recommends). The sliced Hakurei turnips with herbs, yogurt and poppy seeds is almost too awesome looking to eat--but we did, and can't wait until those turnips come back into season. How much do I love this book? I am a reviewer of cookbooks. It's one of my hobbies. And I first received this one as a temporary download from the publisher. I worked with the recipes for quite a while before this book was published a few weeks ago. But, as you can see from the "Verified Purchase" tag at the top of this review, I had to have my own copy. And, now that it is in my hot hands, I can say that it's even better than it was in its preliminary form.

Finally, a book geared towards seasonal vegetables. Genius. The seasons are separated by Spring, Early Summer, Mid Summer, Late Summer, Fall and Winter. This book is so helpful to create fresh vegetable dishes when the flush of summer harvest is coming to an end. I am truly excited about this book, the layout, recipes and how much information the author offers up. McFadden is an incredible writer and I will collect all of his books. He is an inspiration!

This cookbook was a total revelation to me, and has now dictated what I plant in my own home garden. The recipes are divided not by "mains" and "sides" or even "meat" and "veg" but rather by what's in season and when. The book begins with some basics, like simple flatbreads that you can use as a base for the things that follow; easy pickles, to preserve the things you might grow too much of (I have become obsessed with pickled cherries as a result of this book), and simple compound butters to enhance easy meat and vegetable dishes. In the winter, when I'm craving anything that isn't a meat and potato, here are recipes using things I can readily find that will bring some life and brightness to a meal. From there it eased me into what to do with all of the tomatoes, zucchini, and chard I had overplanted. I'm not a great gardener, but I try--I'd never eaten a fava bean in my life (you can't find them fresh or frozen in stores where I live) and I had enjoyed every recipe I'd tried, so I grew some. I will never NOT plant favas again. The recipes are simple, beautiful, balanced, fresh, and delicious. If I had to give up all of my cookbooks but one, this is the one I would keep.

I love this cookbook! I am a VERY novice chef. I hesitate to even associate myself with the word chef because I consider myself a waffle box level recipe follower! That said, every recipe in this book that I’ve tried to make turns out incredible. The author Josh McFadden has a way of writing the instructions that make it easy to follow and interesting to read. I have bought this cookbook for almost every person in my family And it is one of my favorite gifts to give! Not only on the recipes, fun and unique, the pictures are beautiful! I went to his restaurant in Portland a couple times just before Covid and now that I live in St. Louis, I’m trying to make these recipes more just to bring me back to some of the amazing dishes I had at his restaurant.

This book's recipes immediately appealed to me and I found myself wanting to cook everything! First I made the pea salsa verde. I used frozen peas because frozen peas are high quality and very rarely do you need to go out and buy fresh peas for a recipe (usually if you want to use the pods is a reason to do so) and made pickled carrot ribbons, which I knew would pickle faster and thought they would look beautiful, and they did. I'd do ribbons all the time, now, and I will be making this again as it's a delicious light, fresh, satisfying side that is great with any number of proteins. I paired it with some seared bratwursts from a local butcher. I thought his pickle brine was a touch sweeter than I prefer, and I'll be cutting back on the sugar in the future, but it's a minor quibble. Next up was the steak with broccoli and caper raisin vinaigrette, which really does taste like Chinese beef with broccoli due to the umami, sweet, and tangy elements in anchovies, raisins, and vinegar, respectively. I did switch this up a bit choosing to char the broccoli on my griddle rather than steaming it the way he does, and I used skirt steak. In any case, it makes for a wonderful meal, the crispy breadcrumbs soaking up the dressing so you get more of it in every bite. I do wish he'd say how many anchovies should be in the dressing, rather than calling for a can, since I usually have a jar of anchovies instead. I figured out based on taste and consistency, though. You really will want to have a batch of this vinaigrette in your fridge at all times. It's addictive stuff. I also made the couscous with English peas, apricots, and lamb meatballs and while delicious, the best part was easily the couscous, which even a day later straight out of the fridge tasted great. The meatballs weren't bad, but they weren't my favorite lamb meatballs by any stretch and I'd probably make different ones if I were making this meal again. And now for my one major gripe: there is no way that the meatballs pictured in the book were baked. They were clearly fried. Trust me when I say that if you bake any meatball for just 8-10 minutes at 450 you will get a gray blob. You really should just fry them. Pan-fried would be my preference. You'll also get a better crust by frying. If you really don't want to fry, then BROIL them. But you need that high heat to get color on them. You just can't get that beautiful brown of the picture by baking, especially for such a short period of time. I was going to give this book 5 stars anyway because I'm completely enamored of it and it is an exciting cookbook to look through for me, but I thought some might take issue given I pointed out some flaws, and dishonest photos like the meatballs are kind of a no-no in a cookbook, so I'll take off one star. Adding a note: I'm fairly certain he's not much of a cilantro fan because it is noticeably absent from this book. There are two recipes in the index that feature it. Recipes where it would surely be used instead have parsley, mint, and chives. For some, I'm sure that's great news. For myself, I'll probably be using cilantro instead of what he calls for if the flavor profile fits (ahem, corn)… I'm really looking forward to cooking my way through this book. Hell, I am even kind of looking forward to cooler weather to try some of the heartier fall and winter foods, and I hate cold weather. If you are an omnivore who loves vegetables, pick this one up. He does a great job of balancing flavors and textures in delicious ways. Edited to add: the celery salad with dates, almonds, and parmigiano is worth the price of the book alone. That salad is a stunner!

This is one of the best cookbooks ever written. This book has so many incredible recipes and so much knowledge to learn and add to your culinary insight. Absolute must have book, can’t say that enough.

Six Seasons: A New Way with Vegetables Living in Arizona we really don't have a full "Six Seasons" like the book describes, but we do have access to many of these ingredients. As I continue my quest to cook and eat healthier, I was very interested in picking up this cookbook. This is far more than just a book that says "My food rocks, you must cook this before you die. Here are my recipes, have fun!". It takes you through a journey of each vegetable in each season (sometimes the same veggie in different seasons) which really allows the reader to learn and understand how the ingredients work. If you have an understanding, you're going to be more likely to adapt the recipe or cook more of this on your own. Fantastic! PROS: Huge book - Even though I saw how many pages it was when I was ordering I didn't realize that this is practically a 3" thick cookbook, which is awesome. Tons of photos - Nothing irks me more than 1 photo per 5 recipes in a cookbook. I don't know what the veggies, cuts, and plating are supposed to look like. This book assumes it's teaching you about the veggies individually (which it does) and shows it patience along the way with plenty of photos. Organization - I love that Joshua starts the book off with a multitude of recommendations regarding staple ingredients, as well as sauces that you'll see throughout the book. Generally I find that sauces are at the end, but here you discover the sauces and you can't wait to see how they are incorporated in the future. Vegetable Introduction - With each veggie comes many explanations... when to harvest it, how to slice it, how to prep it for a salad versus heating, etc. It's such a nice introduction that focuses each time on the single ingredient as the star. Helps you understand more comprehensively how the veggie works which is one of the best ways to learn. CONS: I only have one... More recipes. I know this sounds silly since it's such a huge book but there are a couple of veggies where you're wanting to see more and there's only 2-3 recipes. Thankfully that's not common in this book, and it's just a minor con for me. Buy this book!

This book is great! Reading it makes you wanna cook and savory vegetables with the same intensity and love as the author. I find it a great reference book to day to day meals, specially to help you vary with vegetables.

De plus en plus, au fil des saisons, je vois tous les légumes présentés dans ces recettes trouver leur place sur la table du marché, et je suis attiré par ce livre pour des idées simples, nourrissantes et gourmandes. Je pense que c'est le livre parfait pour quelqu'un qui veut inclure plus de légumes dans le régime alimentaire familial. Une excellente caractéristique des recettes du livre est que j'ai souvent tout ce dont j'ai besoin pour une recette donnée sans avoir à faire des courses specials.

Lovely approach to seasonal cooking. Great photography. Beautiful recipes.

This is a unique cooking book. Although not a completely vegetarian book, the vegetables are the stars in the recipes. Each vegetable has its own chapter, organized by the seasons. The recipes are very innovative, new ways of seasoning and preparing vegetables are introduced, still most of it is not complicated food, the steps are easily explained and if you follow then, you will get delicious dishes.

I'm a private caterer and always in search of new and interesting recipes that I haven't seen countless times before. I haven't had this long but I'm already turning to it for inspiration. The structure of the book is helpful and easy to use. Not only is it divided into 6 rather than 4 seasons but within those seasons, recipes are grouped together by main ingredient making it easy to flick through and see quickly if there's anything you fancy. Whilst veg based, some of the recipes include meat. So far my favourite recipe has been the raw butternut squash salad with brown butter. Yum!