Auntie Tsehai Cooks: A Comprehensive Guide to Making Ethiopian and Eritrean Food

The recipes in this book are authentic, and the spice level can be varied to your taste. All the classic Ethiopian restaurant dishes are here: Doro Wat (spicy chicken), Yebeg Key Wot (spicy lamb stew), Misir Alicha (mild red lentils), Dincha Alicha (mild potatoes and carrots, Yabesha Gomen (collard greens) Key Sir Tibs (mild roasted beets) Medericha Wot (spicy eggplant), and dozens and dozens more. There's even a section on how to make injera, the steamed sourdough bread--although this recipe takes days, and it's easier to order premade injera from suppliers in major cities. The instructions are very clear, and there are helpful pictures of each recipe--and sometimes of each stage in a recipe. There's an index to help with Ethiopian food vocabulary--which was priceless when I went to order Ethiopian spices from Brundo.com to make the recipes. You'll want to have spice mixes like berbere and finishing spices like Mekelesha and Alicha Kimam on hand for true flavor. Ethiopian cooking uses Mekelesha or Alicha Kimam like Indian cooking uses Garam Masala--sprinkled over the dish at the end for that extra special something. I've been cooking recipes from this book and eating homemade Ethiopian food for dinner for about a month now, and there don't seem to be any weak dishes in this lineup.

I have absolutely loved using this cookbook. The authors break down Habesha cooking and don't assume you're already familiar with the ingredients or techniques. I have found it so helpful in learning to cook the food my husband grew up with for our family.

I think this is a good book but I don’t think it’s structured properly. Like for the parts on injera the information is kind of all over the place. I tried following the Teff Injera recipe and when I added the water to the teff, following directions, I ended up with a kind of clay and not batter. I had to rely on another cookbook to perfect my batter.

Really comprehensive book on Ethiopian food with loads of pictures. All the standard recipes plus many, many more! I've been waiting for a book like this to be released. Step-by-step photos and descriptions for making several different types of Injera. Well worth the cost. If you like Ethiopian, just get it!

The recipes sounded very boring until I read the section about spices in the beginning - discusses 3 layers of spice: the cooking oil (or niter kebbe ghee); during cooking; and then the finishing spices - for example, a mixture called alicha kimem for the milder dishes, or mekelesha for the spicy dishes. Turns out it's the finishing spices that give it the amazing rich flavor you find in restaurants. But, the recipes in this book don't list the finishing spices, not even "1 tsp mekelesha." So I ordered spice mixtures online, and I'm guessing how much finishing spice to add at the end - I massively over spiced some yellow split peas :-(

Ethiopian food is a favorite of mine, but intimidating at first. Although the product seems more glorified photocopy, the content is priceless. It is more thorough than other cookbooks that I've found, both in terms of variety of recipes and in scope of directions. The writer takes her time to teach step by step, wisdom acquired through years of experience. Thank you!

I bought this book several years ago. I really appreciate how it focuses on technique and approach to cooking. I also appreciate the fact it's mostly vegetarian. I lent it out and unfortunately my copy got misplaced. Just reordered. Only complaint is that it's only available on Amazon and there's no ebook available.

I liked that the essential components at the root of nearly every dish was covered in depth. Onion paste to the correct color of berbere is covered in fine detail. Expensive, but covers every essential aspect of making this amazing cuisine.

I’ve several books on Ethiopian and Eritrean cooking, and use them all. Auntie Tsehai Cooks, however, is the best of the bunch: comprehensive wonderful! For one thing, the injera recipes and methods in her book are the very best I’ve ever found, and yield results that are as good as any found in the half-dozen or so fabulous Ethiopian restaurants we’re so lucky to have here. Can’t recommend this book highly enough; in fact, I’ve bought several copies to give as gifts.

First of all I want to emphazise that the dishes are very good described, also the instructions to make this ethopian bread are very good. And my girlfriend loves the illustrations as well as the stories. But as a german 😉 I have to say that it is not structured very well. Instead of separating the cooking instructions from the hole storie content, that is also contained in this book, they mix it up all together. The next disadvantage is that they do not describe how to make the spice mixes.

Clear layout with simple, easy to follow recipes. Full of great dishes that have all, so far, been excellent. Could have used a section for recipes to make your own space mixes but have found these easily enough online. Would definitely recommend - a book made with a real love of food, aimed at sharing that joy.

an outstanding book for those that love Ethiopian food ; especially the section re. injera bread-making . Great photos and descriptions .

Have tried about 10 recipes and they have all turned out very well. This book seems to be a more practical Ethiopian cookbook as some of the recipes are less elaborate then what I've made in the past. If you have an Ethiopian Bakery or some shop that sells Injera nearby then this cookbook will be great to have on hand.