Your Organic Kitchen: The Essential Guide to Selecting and Cooking Organic Foods with Over 160 Recipes

In this easy-to-navigate cookbook, Ziff Cool, proprietor of jZcool restaurant in Palo Alto, Calif., and author of Breakfast in Bed, praises the flavor and health benefits of organic produce. A section titled ""Why Organic?"" explains that ""before 1900, all food was organically grown,"" so the fad for heirloom tomatoes is really a return to the food-raising practices of centuries. Cool proudly relates that she raises chickens in the backyard of her suburban Palo Alto home, which is known as the best after-school-snack house among her son's friends. After the first two chapters, which explain how to shop for organic produce, readers may head straight for the closest co-op. However, recipes are organized into eight mini-seasons, so if you're wondering what you should do with those early springtime fresh strawberries, or those portobellos you impulsively bought, recipes such as Strawberry-Chocolate Cobbler and Stuffed Portobello Burgers, with easy instructions and tips, will help. There are also a number of meat and fowl dishes, including Port-Braised Lamb Shanks and Pork 'N' Pumpkin Noodles. Yet some recipes call for ingredients, such as chicken broth in Creamy Autumn Soup, that are not exactly fresh from the farmer's stall. The strongest points are fruit-based recipes and desserts, such as Persimmon-Berry Crisp and Rosemary Grilled Figs. If Cool had included more of the unusual vegetables and fruits that are now available at local farmers' markets, these recipes might have melded better with her laudable philosophy. Photographs by Lisa Koenig not seen by PW. (Oct.)