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Nantucket Open-House Cookbook
Sarah Leah Chase, co-author of The Silver Palate Good Times Cookbook , knows that summer means long, lazy days of fun and getting together, of throwing the doors open and inviting over everyone you know for the pleasures of good company and good food. Now, cooks everywhere can create more than 250 of the recipes that have drawn hungry visitors and residents to her popular gourmet shop, Que Sera Sarah on Nantucket Island.
The author's eclectic combinations center on the freshest of seafood and produce, and induce hearty summer appetites to indulge in a unique chilled clam chowder, a fresh beachfront salad of Scallops with Orange and Chervil Vinaigrette, savory empanadas and turnovers, or a beautifully grilled bluefish redolent with lavender. Sumptuous meals must end with the proper an extravagantly rich Chocolate Bombe or a fruit tart glistening with a fortune of fresh raspberries and blueberries.
Complete with just-baked muffins and breads for breakfasts best enjoyed in a huge wicker chair and cool summer drinks for whiling away long afternoons, Nantucket Open-House Cookbook is for anyone who wants to make the most of fair-weather dining all year round.
Over 214,000 copies in print.
The author's eclectic combinations center on the freshest of seafood and produce, and induce hearty summer appetites to indulge in a unique chilled clam chowder, a fresh beachfront salad of Scallops with Orange and Chervil Vinaigrette, savory empanadas and turnovers, or a beautifully grilled bluefish redolent with lavender. Sumptuous meals must end with the proper an extravagantly rich Chocolate Bombe or a fruit tart glistening with a fortune of fresh raspberries and blueberries.
Complete with just-baked muffins and breads for breakfasts best enjoyed in a huge wicker chair and cool summer drinks for whiling away long afternoons, Nantucket Open-House Cookbook is for anyone who wants to make the most of fair-weather dining all year round.
Over 214,000 copies in print.
336 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1987
36 people are currently reading
163 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews
July 29, 2015
I was first introduced to Sarah Leah Chase at a relative’s party buffet late in the afternoon during a very hot summer. The table was filled with a wide variety of different and delicious salads from this cookbook. I immediately bought the cookbook and still use it frequently for meals and reference.
Every recipe I have ever tried has been good – many however have been fantastic. I particularly like the incredible salad recipes (both side dishes and main courses.) This is an Open-House cookbook after all - Nantucket style with beaches, barbequing, outdoor entertaining, drop-in friends and relaxation. Many of Sarah’s recipes come from her catering and take out shop called Que Sera Sarah in Nantucket. Some recipes are traditional favourites with a twist. Others are unusual and introduce new spices and ingredients. All are to savour in a relaxed atmosphere with friends and family.
Several dishes that I make quite often for home, entertaining or for potlucks are Scallop Puffs Que Sera, Steak, Mushroom and Hearts of Palm with Béarnaise Mayonnaise, Tortellini with Sun-Dried Tomato Pesto, Moroccan Carrots, Asparagus with Sesame Mayonnaise, Curried Chicken Salad, Classic Chicken & Grape Salad, Moussaka and much, much more. All of her chicken salad recipes are based on a “no fail” poaching method in the cookbook guaranteed to produce moist, succulent chicken breasts.
There are at least 50 salad recipes included - 3 potato salad recipes as an example. Plus there are recipes for nibbling foods, dips, soups, veggies and unique side dishes, grilling and oven recipes, even Thanksgiving and Christmas recipes Nantucket style. There are cottage comfort recipes and all kinds of fish, seafood, poultry, meat, curry and other main course recipes – 275 recipes in all.
The recipes are eclectic and fairly international and are great to mix and match together or to add to your own favourites for a very special meal. There are no pictures just great recipes and you really don’t need pictures because Sarah describes things so well, your imagination starts you salivating. Some of the recipes use very few ingredients. Some however use a few more ingredients. The preparation methods are always well explained and usually quite simple and the end results are delicious.
A really terrific cookbook you could cook from every day for half the year and never get tired. It’s that good and that eclectic.
Every recipe I have ever tried has been good – many however have been fantastic. I particularly like the incredible salad recipes (both side dishes and main courses.) This is an Open-House cookbook after all - Nantucket style with beaches, barbequing, outdoor entertaining, drop-in friends and relaxation. Many of Sarah’s recipes come from her catering and take out shop called Que Sera Sarah in Nantucket. Some recipes are traditional favourites with a twist. Others are unusual and introduce new spices and ingredients. All are to savour in a relaxed atmosphere with friends and family.
Several dishes that I make quite often for home, entertaining or for potlucks are Scallop Puffs Que Sera, Steak, Mushroom and Hearts of Palm with Béarnaise Mayonnaise, Tortellini with Sun-Dried Tomato Pesto, Moroccan Carrots, Asparagus with Sesame Mayonnaise, Curried Chicken Salad, Classic Chicken & Grape Salad, Moussaka and much, much more. All of her chicken salad recipes are based on a “no fail” poaching method in the cookbook guaranteed to produce moist, succulent chicken breasts.
There are at least 50 salad recipes included - 3 potato salad recipes as an example. Plus there are recipes for nibbling foods, dips, soups, veggies and unique side dishes, grilling and oven recipes, even Thanksgiving and Christmas recipes Nantucket style. There are cottage comfort recipes and all kinds of fish, seafood, poultry, meat, curry and other main course recipes – 275 recipes in all.
The recipes are eclectic and fairly international and are great to mix and match together or to add to your own favourites for a very special meal. There are no pictures just great recipes and you really don’t need pictures because Sarah describes things so well, your imagination starts you salivating. Some of the recipes use very few ingredients. Some however use a few more ingredients. The preparation methods are always well explained and usually quite simple and the end results are delicious.
A really terrific cookbook you could cook from every day for half the year and never get tired. It’s that good and that eclectic.
June 1, 2022
Yesterday, after 23 years in my cookbook library, I decided to donate my paperback copy to the local thrift.
It bothered me all day, that decision.
I thought back to when the book was purchased, and how doing so made me feel: Hopeful, mature, competent, maybe even respected if I had some measure of success attempting a recipe or two from the summery, breezy narrative. Nantucket had been a summer port in my childhood, daughter of sailing parents. This island, a favorite old-salt stop among other seafaring and whaling ports we visited - Block Island, the Vineyard, Edgartown, Cuttyhunk... I'd have to look at a chart to recall the others. Those destinations held magic and history and, as a young adult, memory of those trips, just the four of us.
This cookbook, so I imagined in 1987, would bring me back to those freckled, roaming summers. But, at 23, I was one of three women working on the floor of the NFYE (I was a trading clerk), and intermittently acting in regional theatre. There was little time and even less confidence in my skills for steak and bleu cheese sauce or grilled pork tenderloin with port, plums, and apricots. On the ferry, I imagined preparing crunchy corn sticks with chilis and cheddar; Nantucket scallop bisk; broiled oysters with cider sabayon, and pumpkin biscuits with smoked pheasant. Over time, the book became a staple of my library, if only to provide daydreaming into the future and remembering the past. Someday, I'd have the time and resources. It never came and other, less intimidating cookbooks joined the shelves.
This morning, I browsed through the recipes one last time before heading off to the thrift. At 58, they don't seem as daunting; maybe it's the 35 years of cooking under my apron, maybe it's that I have a day off and some free time. Either way, they feel approachable rather than overwhelming.
I'll starting with the gazpacho and see where we go from there. Perhaps, blueberry raspberry galette??
Summer on.
It bothered me all day, that decision.
I thought back to when the book was purchased, and how doing so made me feel: Hopeful, mature, competent, maybe even respected if I had some measure of success attempting a recipe or two from the summery, breezy narrative. Nantucket had been a summer port in my childhood, daughter of sailing parents. This island, a favorite old-salt stop among other seafaring and whaling ports we visited - Block Island, the Vineyard, Edgartown, Cuttyhunk... I'd have to look at a chart to recall the others. Those destinations held magic and history and, as a young adult, memory of those trips, just the four of us.
This cookbook, so I imagined in 1987, would bring me back to those freckled, roaming summers. But, at 23, I was one of three women working on the floor of the NFYE (I was a trading clerk), and intermittently acting in regional theatre. There was little time and even less confidence in my skills for steak and bleu cheese sauce or grilled pork tenderloin with port, plums, and apricots. On the ferry, I imagined preparing crunchy corn sticks with chilis and cheddar; Nantucket scallop bisk; broiled oysters with cider sabayon, and pumpkin biscuits with smoked pheasant. Over time, the book became a staple of my library, if only to provide daydreaming into the future and remembering the past. Someday, I'd have the time and resources. It never came and other, less intimidating cookbooks joined the shelves.
This morning, I browsed through the recipes one last time before heading off to the thrift. At 58, they don't seem as daunting; maybe it's the 35 years of cooking under my apron, maybe it's that I have a day off and some free time. Either way, they feel approachable rather than overwhelming.
I'll starting with the gazpacho and see where we go from there. Perhaps, blueberry raspberry galette??
Summer on.
July 2, 2019
Back in the day the The Silver Palate Good Times Cookbook was my go-to. I saw a listing for this cookbook and was intrigued. What I found felt stale, with seemingly every recipe I flipped to swimming in cheese. Ah, well. I'll remember the Good Times.
September 14, 2021
I've had this cookbook for years and seldom used it. Decided to read it again and try some more recipes, but I found I have other cookbooks/recipes I like a lot more than these, so this is another book to donate to the library book sale. Very attractive cover. God willing and the creek don't rise, we'll visit Nantucket for the first time in 2022.
January 5, 2019
Like an 80s time capsule. Most of the savory recipes seem vile now, akin to those horrible recipe cards from the 1950s people love to mock. I’d bake any dessert or bread in a heartbeat, but the rest was like hate-reading an old Town and Country.
November 7, 2025
I purchased this cookbook after reading so many novels based on the island of Nantucket MA. It has wonderful food but the recipes are a bit complicated for the average home cook I found! That in no way makes it a bad cookbook to have on hand!
April 6, 2018
I love some of the recipes but the introductions and stories more
May 16, 2024
Excellent cookbook. The chapter about Thanksgiving is particularly nice.
August 9, 2025
Enjoyed making recipes of clams casino, duck a l’orange and the New England burger. Delicious.
August 19, 2025
I liked the descriptive language more than the recipes-3.5
January 18, 2013
This book and her 'Cold Weather Cooking' cookbook are two of the best cookbooks I have (and trust me, I have a lot). The recipes are creative, tasty and are reliable. The recipes will work and will be quite yummy!
July 29, 2011
outstanding cookbook, and I always make the corn pudding from here for both thanksgiving and xmas
January 15, 2014
One of my favorite cookbooks - one of the few that aren't packed away. Excellent recipes for entertaining as well as for every day.
December 5, 2024
The curried chicken salad is one of the best things I have ever eaten. I donated, though.
Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews