The Great American Meat Book

Carnivores will thrill to this good-natured overview of meat dishes. Historical favorites like Second-Best Chili (so-named because it uses second-best meat) and Basic Meat Loaf are interspersed with newer ideas like Lemon Pork in Cream and Curried Kabobs with Peanut Butter Sauce, made with lamb. A few less successful adaptations of ethnic dishes (Ham and Vermicelli Carbonara; Mexican Beef Stir-Fry) float in a netherworld between the two. The 536 recipes are generally easy to follow, and the abundant tips on cooking methods, preparation and cutting techniques are comprehensive and useful. Ellis offers readers who haven't previously sought out a neighborhood butcher prime motivation to do so: some ingredients will not be found in the supermarket meat section. Lamb Rib Chops with Tarragon Mousse are encased in a layer of caul fat, and a chapter devoted to offal, called ""Odds 'n' Ends and Innards,"" contains Brains and Scrambled Eggs, Pigs' Feet and Sauerkraut and even Rocky Mountain Oysters. The writing here is folksy, drawing on the author's career as a butcher and the history of meat-related topics like cow branding and barbed wire, although Ellis (Cutting Up in the Kitchen, 1975) might better have stayed away from apologies and explanations. His lengthy responses to common protests about veal-raising ring awkwardly defensive and are not likely to assuage readers with those concerns. For meat eaters and cookers, however, this is a valuable overview of a venerable culinary tradition. (Sept.)