Cold Soup, Warm Salad

Pennsylvania-based cooking teacher Rothschild ( Easy Gourmet Cookbook ) has hit on the happy idea of pairing cold soups with warm salads as a way of coping with hot-weather dining. Using fresh ingredients, her simple preparations yield unexpectedly tasty results. A mango cream bisque is pungent with lime juice; warm lobster salad is sweet with a fruited ``pico de gallo'' sauce of melons, papaya and peppers. Meant to cook from, not to dwell on with a reader's roving eye, the volume abounds in thumbnail prefaces that tell us what to expect from baby stuffed eggplants (an ``upscale version'' of a traditional Middle Eastern dish) and orange beet soup with lime (``a beautiful pale pink''), giving credit to creator chefs when credit is due. However, recipes are written from a professional's perspective: terms such as mache that might be unfamiliar to less experienced cooks are not defined, and culinary methods are not illustrated. The book will interest veterans hungry for new flavor combinations--and may put off novices by its sheer novelty. (June)