Appetizers For Dummies

Mexican Cooking
Mary Sue Milliken and Susan Feniger may be “two gringas from the Midwest,” but they fell deeply in love with Mexican food when first introduced to it more than 20 years ago. The two chefs became friends in the late ’70s while working in the otherwise all-male kitchen of a prestigious French restaurant in Chicago called Le Perroquet. After honing their skills in fine restaurants in France and America, they opened their first restaurant, the highly celebrated City Café, in Los Angeles in 1981. These days, they divide their time between their three restaurants, Border Grills in Santa Monica and Las Vegas, and the upscale Ciudad in downtown Los Angeles. They also have authored five previous cookbooks, including Mexican Cooking For Dummies, host the popular Television Food Network series, Too Hot Tamales, and are heard regularly on Southern California radio.

Helene Siegel is the co-author with Mary Sue and Susan of City Cuisine, Mesa Mexicana, Cooking with the Too Hot Tamales, and Mexican Cooking For Dummies. She also is the author of The Ethnic Kitchen series and 32 single subject cookbooks in the best-selling Totally Cookbook series. Her articles have appeared in the Los Angeles Times, the Times Syndicate, Fine Cooking, and on the Web at cuisinenet.com.

Italian Cooking
Cesare Casella was born in a small town outside Lucca, Italy. He grew up in and around his family’s restaurant, called Il Vipore. As a young chef, he transformed Il Vipore into a world-class establishment, earning a well-deserved Michelin star. Since 1993, Casella has been working as a chef at several leading Italian restaurants in New York. He is the coauthor of Diary of a Tuscan Chef and Italian Cooking For Dummies.

Jack Bishop is the author or coauthor of several books on Italian food, including The Complete Italian Vegetarian Cookbook, Pasta e Verdura, Lasagna, and Italian Cooking For Dummies. He is the senior writer for Cook’s Illustrated and writes for various national magazines and newspapers. He has studied cooking in Italy.

French Cooking and Greek and Middle Eastern Cooking
Tom Lacalamita (Long Island, New York) is a best-selling author of five appliance-related cookbooks. Nominated for a James Beard cookbook award, Tom is considered a national authority on housewares and has appeared on hundreds of television and radio shows across the country. With a passion for food, cooking, and all sorts of kitchen gadgets, Tom is a spokesperson for various food and housewares manufacturers. He is the author of Slow Cookers For Dummies and Pressure Cookers For Dummies.

Indian Cooking
Heather Dismore began her career as a well-traveled, highly productive restaurant manager. She left the industry to devote time to her family and her love of writing. In a publishing career spanning over a decade, her work has impacted some 400 titles. Dismore resides in Naperville, Illinois, with her husband, who is a professional chef, and their two daughters. She is the owner of PageOne Publishing, a freelance Web content development company with a focus on the hospitality industry.

Chinese Cooking
Martin Yan, celebrated host of more than 1,500 cooking shows, highly respected food and restaurant consultant, and certified master chef, enjoys distinction as both teacher and author. His many talents are showcased in over two dozen best-selling cookbooks, including Martin Yan’s Feast: The Best of Yan Can Cook, Martin Yan’s Invitation to Chinese Cooking, and Chinese Cooking For Dummies. Yan is the founder of the Yan Can International Cooking School in the San Francisco Bay Area. Yan Can Cook has received national and international recognition, including a 1998 Daytime Emmy Award, a 1996 James Beard Award for Best TV Food Journalism, and a 1994 James Beard Award for Best TV Cooking Show.

Japanese Cooking
Dede Wilson, CCP (Certified Culinary Professional), is a self-taught chef who loves making appetizers and organizing parties. She has worked professionally for more than 17 years as a restaurant chef, bakery owner, caterer, recipe developer, radio talk-show host, and frequent television guest. Dede is also a frequent contributor to Bon Appétit magazine and a contributing editor to Pastry Art and Design magazine and is the food and entertainment expert for CanDoWoman.com. Dede has written three other cookbooks, including The Wedding Cake Book (Wiley, 1997), which was nominated for an IACP Julia Child Cookbook Award. She also authored Christmas Cooking For Dummies and Appetizers For Dummies.

Thai Cooking
Joan H. Moravek left the Securities Industry in 1990 and decided to pursue a career in the food service industry. The last 12 years have led her to explore some of the many facets of the culinary profession. A lifelong resident of Chicago, Joan has traveled extensively and continues to educate herself by researching, cooking, and “eating her way” through the cuisines of many countries.

Kristin Eddy is the Food Writer for the Chicago Tribune and also covers Travel and Health stories for the paper. During 17 years as an award-winning writer, Eddy has worked for the Washington Post, Atlanta Journal-Constitution and the Cleveland Plain Dealer, covering everything from news and health stories to restaurant reviews and the 1996 Olympic Games. As the daughter of a diplomat, Eddy was born in Beirut, Lebanon, and lived in Aleppo and Damascus, Syria; Istanbul, London, and Paris. She has traveled widely on assignment for the Tribune, reporting food stories from around the U.S. as well as Istanbul, Thailand, Vietnam, Indonesia, India, and Jamaica. Eddy has had 14 years of experience in writing about food, developing, testing, and editing recipes for various newspapers.