Okra - (Savor the South Cookbooks) by Virginia Willis (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

Passionate okra lovers crave this bright green, heat-loving vegetable, whether fried, grilled, steamed, roasted, boiled, broiled, pickled, raw, whole, sliced, or julienned. With Okra, Virginia Willis provides "the key that unlocks the door of okra desire" to okra addicts and newcomers to the pod alike.

Topping eight feet, with gorgeous butter-yellow flowers that ripen into the plant's signature seed-filled pods, okra has a long association with foodways in the American South. But as Willis shows, okra is also an important ingredient in cuisines across Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Featuring gardening tips, a discussion of heirloom varieties, and expert cooking directions (including a list of "top ten slime-busting tips"), Okra brilliantly showcases fifty delectable recipes: twenty-six southern dishes, ranging from Southern-Style Fried Okra to Gulf Coast Seafood Gumbo, and twenty-four authentic global dishes, from Moroccan Lamb and Okra Tagine with Preserved Lemons to Cuban Pork with Yellow Rice, Okra, and Annatto Oil.

Review Quotes

"[A] splendid series." -- Los Angeles Times

"Intriguing." -- Edible Charlotte

"Okra can be a challenge even for good cooks. Thank goodness there's a great cook like Virginia Willis here to help those of us who love to eat it but have been challenged by cooking it." -- Los Angeles Times

"Virginia Willis can do magic with okra, frying it crisp, turning it into gumbo and also shares African, Mediterranean, Caribbean and Indian recipes for this odd vegetable. This book is a must for okra lovers, but also those, like me who don't have a clue how to prepare it." -- Cooking with Amy food blog

"50 delicious recipes, both southern and worldwide, and just about everything else you would ever want to know about okra." -- Foodsite Magazine

About the Author

Chef and food writer Virginia Willis hails from Atlanta and is the author of Bon Appétit, Y'all, Basic to Brilliant, Y'all, and the James Beard Award-winning Lighten Up, Y'all.