Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I was given this book as a gift. While I VERY MUCH appreciate the sentiment behind the gift, this is not a book I would ever buy for myself, nor is it a book I can recommend to anyone who is interested in learning how to prepare cultured foods. It is not at all in a 'cookbook' kind of format. It seems to me that it is more about the author's 'agenda' rather than teaching people how to prepare cultured foods. If you're looking for recipes or if you're new to lacto-fermentation, I would strongly recommend that you select a different book. If you're feeling perplexed by my negative review in view of all the other positive reviews, then perhaps a trip to the library would be a good thing. I would encourage you to review the book there before deciding to purchase it. You may very well decide to save yourself twenty bucks. The first four chapters are real yawners. If you're already interested in fermented foods, you probably don't need to read four chapters about the history and health benefits of cultured foods. I would have been tremendously disappointed in this book if I had spent twenty bucks on it. If that sounds interesting to you, then perhaps this book will be just the ticket for you. (On the other hand, you can read that information online at no cost to your wallet at all.) However, if you're looking for a 'how to' book of actual recipes, I doubt this publication is going to satisfy you. I agree with another reviewer who wrote "Frequently, the instructions refer in an unclear manner to a different recipe that you need to follow in part, but make some changes." For example, when I see "Mixed Vegetable Crock" listed as a recipe, I expect to go to that page and read a list of ingredients, prep instructions, etc. Not the case at all. Instead the author tells about how he had to hurry to harvest the last of his summer garden before a frost one year and the resulting crock of veggies was very good, especially the baby eggplants. Not a recipe at all. It's a story (and not a very interesting one at that), but definitely NOT a recipe. In the 'recipe' for brined garlic, he talks about eating the garlic at the bottom of the pickle crocks. Again, this is not a recipe for brined garlic at all, but rather just him voicing how much he enjoys eating the 'leftover' garlic after the pickles are consumed. I definitely would NOT buy the book for its information on culturing dairy products, making fermented beverages or sourdoughs. There certainly are much better books available on each of those subjects. Anyone with a genuine interest in any of those topics will not find sufficient information in this book to be truly helpful. Let me be clear . . . I am very familiar with fermentation of veggies, cheese-making, wine and sourdough. I have several cheddars, goudas, mont. jacks, and other cheeses aging right now, plus my fridge is filled with various cream cheeses, yogurt, kefir, mozzarella and parmesan cheese that I've made. I've made most of our bread for the past 40+ years, including sourdough breads from 'homegrown' yeast. I have a crock of dill pickles fermenting as I type this, and several half-gallon jars of other veggies fermenting, too. So, when I say that I found this book severely lacking in information, what I mean is that I cannot imagine a 'newbie' picking up this book, reading the info, and feeling like they have enough information to start a project. In spite of my experience with making cultured foods, I did not find the information provided in most of the recipes in this book to be sufficient to prepare them.