Keys Cuisine: Flavors of the Florida Keys

Woe betide the innocent cook who buys this book in the belief that Keys cuisine can be easily transplanted. The author's recipes depend on regional ingredients for their character, and unless your local purveyors stock conch, yellowfin snappers and yellowfin tuna, alligator steaks and the celebrated Key lime, you can relinquish all hope of reproducing the tropical temptations included here. A moderate amount of kitchen savvy is also a prerequisite: although Gassenheimer owned and ran a cooking school in England, she doesn't make concessions to the beginner who may wonder, say, how much oil is needed to fry fritters or how finely a given ingredient should be chopped. More feasible are Keys drinks, such as one prepared with white rum, pineapple juice, passion fruit liqueur and juice; garnish this with fruit and a condom and call it, as a Key West restaurateur does, Safe Sex in the Afternoon. Illustrations not seen by PW. (Sept.)