Title:	The Iberian Table
	Author:	Robin Keuneke
	Published:	October 22, 2024, Bay of Roses Books
	No. of Pages:	474
	Cover Price:	$22.08 Paperback

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The Iberian Table, by Robin Keuneke, who is a natural foods chef touts the Spanish Mediterranean diet, which is said to be the most healthy. The book includes several chapters, mostly about healthy eating and the healthy ingredients in the diet.

One of the first things I noticed is that the recipes aren’t all written in the traditional manner, and are not consistent in their presentation. This is really a negative for most of us who cook, because we want to look at a recipe we are interested in and see a list of ingredients so that we can get the ingredients on a list for the grocery store. I have a large cookbook collection (over 8,000), and am always disappointed when the recipes are hard to follow. A few of the recipes, however, are written traditionally, and those have a list of ingredients with step-by-step instructions. There is no consistency. Another faux pas is that in those recipes that list the ingredients, many are not in the order used. This author may be a good writer, but she needs to bone up on recipe protocol.

Many of the recipes are appealing, and I found several that I want to make at home. The author, however, is obviously not a seasoned cookbook author, since she is more interested in prose rather than the subject of food. TMI isn’t what I’m looking for when trying to find something good for dinner.

In my mind, one of the most important aspects of a good cookbook is that it contain photographs of all or most of the dishes. There are no photos accompanying the recipes, and there are only a few photos in the middle of the cookbook.

All told, this is more of a textbook than a cookbook. Those who are interested in everything about the healthy Mediterranean diet will want to read it; those of us who want to cook good Spanish food, will want to pick up a different Spanish cookbook.

Special thanks to NetGalley for supplying a review copy of this book.