Fig Heaven: 70 Recipes for the World's Most Luscious Fruit

by Marie Simmons

They come fresh or dry, in yellow or purple, from California and Mediterranean and Middle Eastern countries. They are in restaurants, supermarkets, fruit stands, backyards, and inside some very famous cookies. What are they? They're figs -- one of America's favorite fruits. From Mission and Kadota figs to Adriatic and Calimyrna varieties, award-winning cookbook author Marie Simmons leaves no fig or fig leaf unturned in this extraordinary book about this most extraordinary Fig Heaven . Figs are harvested in late summer and early fall, but, fortunately for us, they are easily dried and packaged, so they're available all year long. Packed with vitamins and antioxidants, plump, fragrant figs are guilt-free indulgences that can be enjoyed in countless ways. Fig Heaven is an inviting, comprehensive cookbook offering 70 recipes for both fresh and dried figs. They range from appetizers, salads, and sandwiches to entrées and desserts. On the savory side, you'll find Open-Faced Dried Fig and Melted Blue Cheese Sandwiches; Fettuccine with Fresh Figs, Lemon, and Rosemary; and Lamb Pilaf with Artichokes and Dried Figs. If your sweet tooth needs some real satisfaction, there's a Fresh Fig and Peach Crumble, Dried Fig and Walnut Biscotti, and Molten Chocolate Roasted Figs with Vanilla Custard Sauce.

Genres: Cookbooks, Cooking

176 pages, Hardcover

First published May 1, 2004

About the author

"I am an award winning cookbook author, prolific food writer and popular cooking school teacher, but mostly I am a passionate and dedicated cook. Most days you will find me in my sunny Mexican tiled kitchen cooking for friends and family and coming up with great tasting recipes for my blog, magazine features and cookbooks.

You might be familiar with my recipes through the Cooking for Health column I wrote for Bon Appetit magazine for many years. Or, perhaps you have one of my cookbooks in your collection. Some of my most popular books are the award winning The Good Egg and Lighter Quicker Better (written with Richard Sax), Fresh & Fast, Fig Heaven, Sur La Table’s Things Cooks Love, The Amazing World of Rice and the best selling 365 Ways to Cook Pasta. My latest, just released book is Fresh & Fast Vegetarian: Recipes that Make a Meal.

The hours I spend in my kitchen bring me back to childhood play dates cooking beside my mother and grandmother. These two excellent family cooks taught me how important it is to make sure everyone has something good to eat. Every day, I hear their words, and I do the same."

Reviews

[Stephen · Rating 3 out of 5]

For the first fifty years of our marriage, my sweet bride told me she disliked figs; she waited until this year to disclose that she, after all, likes them very much. So I have been attempting to make up for lost time, cooking all manner of fig-based or fig-related dishes for her pleasure. She liked the fig pizza with bacon, caramelized onion and blue cheese. She liked the fig jam smeared on whole-grain crackers with cream cheese. She liked the fig, chicken breast, basil and cinnamon apple on brioche. I think I'm on a roll. Marie Simmons book can only help. After a quick introduction to the lore and literature of figs, she moves into a brief agricultural dissertation and then plunges boldly into how fig flavours match up with others. For the creative cook, this is the most important part of the book. Recipes are fine for those who use them (and there are plenty). Knowing which note on the palate harmonizes with another, which tab fits into which slot, which blush goes with which lipstick, which gear-box ratios in the transmission go with which gear-ratios in the rear end ... these are like much fine gold. In the recipe section, I am much enamoured of the dried-fig, walnut and rosemary focaccia, the fig-stuffed pork loin roast, the fresh-fig galette, and the fig-ripple cinnamon ice cream. Not so attractive are the fresh-fig smoothie (probably only edible by those who wear cross-trainers with a suit) and, worse, the fresh-fig sorbet which looks atrocious. There are a number of accompaniments to the main text. She offers a brief section on how to can and how to freeze figs. She offers information on where to buy the trees (if you are really really enthused and live in the right climatic zone). She shares the clever trick of spraying the blades and bowl interior of one's food processor with vegetable cooking spray before chopping figs to reduce the stickiness. Best of all, she pulls the shade of secrecy off the making of fig newtons such that a mere mortal may make them at home! Hands up, whoever knew how many different kinds of figs there are. Given that different varieties are better for different uses, one could be happily occupied for the next fifty years trying to sort which is best with what.

[Trunatrschild · Rating 5 out of 5]

The only thing that I don't like about this cookbook is that I think my own recipe for fig newtons is better.