My Caribbean Cookbook: Tastes like Home

Type the words “Caribbean cookbook” into Amazon.com’s search engine, and you’ll find some great options for good reading… and cooking. But a gem is on its way. “My Caribbean Cookbook: Tastes like Home”, the freshly published book, by fellow blogger, and Caribbean food lover, Cynthia Nelson of the Tastes like home blog, will be released on January 23, 2009, but you can also get it here now. For someone who has loved cooking since her early childhood, this venture in the foodie publishing world must definitely be a dream come true. Cynthia - who is also a teacher and food columnist for Stabroek News – is one of those people who simply love to cook, and know how to whip up a dish from scratch, and make home-cooking look like a gastronomic extravaganza. Just visit her blog for a sample. Originally from Guyana, she now resides in Barbados, and has travelled to many parts of the Caribbean to taste its varied cuisine. “My Caribbean Cookbook: Tastes like home” is meant for born and bred Caribbean people, who are just longing for the unique savoury and sumptuous taste of the region’s food, as well as international foodies at heart. It also strips away the stereotypes of what Caribbean food is, and shows you our every day cuisine. “When I created ‘Tastes Like Home’ it was because I missed the food of home,” Cynthia writes in one of her weekly columns. "Food had a special way of connecting me to my family, it was what kept me safe and made me feel whole. It helped me to maintain my identity especially at times when I felt like an outsider… “I miss Guyana every day. Still, I have come to realize that home is more than just a physical location. It is something deeper, it is the memories and relationships we carry in our heads and hearts. Food is one of the key ways in which we recreate these memories. Food nourishes our bodies and our souls as well. It is for this reason that, although each year we busily search cookbooks, blogs, magazines and newspapers for new recipe ideas, we always, always include the familiar. We include the dishes that remind us and those that bind us and connect us to our homes and families, a taste of home.” The book’s overview describes it as a journey into the heart and soul of Caribbean cooking, food and culture that invites visitors, cooks and general readers into the Caribbean kitchen by combining recipes from the diverse cultures and an array of dishes found on every Caribbean table. If Cynthia’s blog is anything to go by, we figure that foodies are in for a treat with “My Caribbean Cookbook: Tastes like home”.