Perla Meyers' Art of Seasonal Cooking

Nation's Restaurant News, Dec 23, 1991

Meyers, who is fluent in six languages, was a translator for the United Nations in Europea before she decided to point her interests toward food as a profession. Her "Seasonal Kitchen" anticipated the current interest in seasonal cooking, elevating its author to the role of a culinary sage.

The 300 dishes compiled in her current opus are a continuation of the theme for which Meyers became famous. The blending of ingredients, culled from the newest produce on the market today, the use of spices, the adaptation of traditional forms, such as the ragout, to contemporary uses, put Meyers in the vanguard of the most creative cookbook writers.

For spring, for example, she serves up medallions of Maryland crab and shrimp mousse in curry-lemon sauce; fettuccine in saffron cream with a saute of shrimp and scallops; and a casserole of lamb with carrots, pearl onions and rosemary. From the summer kitchen come yellow squash soup with a garnish of summer vegetables; lilac-smoked Cornish hens with grilled eggplant aioli; and creamy gazpacho with lime-marinated by scallops.

Meyers is a genius of a cook. Many of her dishes can be adapted to fine-dining menus.