The Elegant Taste of Thailand: Cha Am Cuisine

If you love eating at Thai restaurants, you'll love this book. I have a 1989 version of this cookbook, have given multiple copies of this edition away to friends, and am ordering it myself as my other copy has given up the ghost and the pages broken out after 25 years of use. (I wish I could find a hardback of it.)I had several Thai cookbooks before I purchased this one, and I had to experiment, cobble recipes together, and experiment again to get dishes even remotely close to what I wanted. And I wanted basics I found at Thai restaurants, like cucumber salad, satey, padd thai (Thai fried noodles), Tom Kha (chicken and coconut soup), panaeng curry, etc. Then I found The Elegant Taste of Thailand, which had most of my favorite dishes, all easily explained, and cooked the way I was used to eating them -- Cha Am cuisine seems to be the style cooked in most American Thai restaurants.Overall, this is the very best Thai cookbook around, I think. If you love to eat Thai, and you love to cook, you'll love this cookbook. It's easy, got most of your favorite dishes, and they're prepared the way you're used to eating them.Bon appetit!

Some recipes are incomplete. One dish uses lime water (from slaked lime), but book does not provide any data about it, like what it is or how to make it or what to buy.

I bought this on a recommendation from my aunt after asking her for some Lao recipes.She told me I could find a good base for a sai krok recipe and I was disappointed to see that there was no such thing.

I am satisfied with the book. There are a few interesting recipes that we have tried and have been happy with the outcome.

Best thai cookbook. Authentic to taste from thai food. Easy to follow. Good help and pictures. Second time purchased for gifts. People keep wanting

Going to Cha-am is a religious experience for Thai food lovers in the Bay Area. This is a great opportunity to try making dishes at home--and you even get great results. Two words of warning, however: there is not a huge amount of variety in the food presented here (you will still need to go to the restaurant to get many favorites and many Thai standards), and while the glossary was a great idea, the descriptions are confusing and not all of the Thai ingredients that mystify are explained in the glossary.

I have 4 thai cookbook, but I use mostly this one. The recepies are foolproof and simple to follow. I like so much this book that I bought copies for family and friends.

I have used a number of thai cookbooks, but keep coming back to this one. The recipes are well written, and the pictures give the user a good idea of what the final dish should look like. The recipes are a "can't miss".