Mad Genius Tips: Over 90 Expert Hacks and 100 Delicious Recipes

Chapple, a senior editor at Food & Wine, brings his Web video series into print with a collection of 90 creative uses for everyday kitchen items, and 100 recipes in which to employ this hackery. The 20 chapters are arranged alphabetically by gadget, resulting in each section having an eclectic mix of foodstuffs. The cheesecloth chapter, for instance, includes instructions for making tea bags, roasting chipotle-butter turkey, and decorating Linzer cookies. Some of his suggestions are handy indeed: he gets a lot of mileage out of a baking rack, for example, using it as a chopper for both boiled eggs and avocados. A Bundt pan turns out to be perfect for roasting a chicken upright, with the juices flowing into a surrounding ring of vegetables. Other, more common, ideas include using a wine bottle as a meat pounder, a Ziploc bag as a piping tool, plastic lids to shape hamburger patties, and a pair of scissors to snip herbs. Some tips seem more trouble than they’re worth; why use expensive dental floss to truss a chicken? (Nov.)