• monasli on December 28, 2018

  The chicken parmesean meatballs are great as is the chicken piccata. The cold water pasta cooking method works well too.

• Smokeydoke on March 21, 2017

  I've cooked eight recipes from this book, I think this is the most I've cooked from any cookbook all 2016! I've cooked more Alton Brown recipes than from any other chef. I think his recipes are great and this book is no different. My favorites are the Grits with Shrimp, Chicken Piccata and the pizza dough, but the Open Sesame noodles and Chocolate Chess Pie were good too. Even though the recipe are good, I'd refer to my notes for each one, I've had to adjust them to make them suitable for my palate. I find AB likes his food salty and bland.

• Aggie92 on March 12, 2017

  Here's the link for the book's corrections and clarifications: http://altonbrown.com/everydaycook-corrections-clarifications/

• Sharongrondin on March 12, 2017

  I cannot find the erratum on his website. What is the correction to the butterscotch pudding please (it must have something to do with the eggs)?

• MarshaG on January 17, 2017

  Be sure and look at the errata listed on Alton Brown's webpage; the information could be crucial for some recipes. (The butterscotch pudding is truly wonderful/sinful, even though I wish I had read the errata first!)

Notes about Recipes in this book

• Blackening powder blend

  • ethedens on November 05, 2024

    Definitely not my favorite. Would not make again. 2/5

• Breakfast carbonara

  • Jojobuch on March 05, 2017

    Interesting take on carbonara; I wouldn't use this as a replacement for my standard recipe (which has more flavor) but it was a nicely filling for a late Sunday breakfast. The orange zest is a bit unusual at first but a nice addition.

  • twoyolks on April 23, 2020

    This was good enough but I didn't like it better than a traditional carbonara. The breakfast sausage I used didn't have that much fat so the pasta stuck to the pan which caused the eggs to stick to the pan.

• Oatmeal banana bread

  • twoyolks on February 05, 2019

    The bread has a lot of banana flavor and isn't too sweet. I found that the bread was a bit dry and it was rather fussy to make.

  • dprostrollo on February 07, 2019

    This is a fantastic bread. The oaty-ness really stands out (I blitzed mine just slightly shy of a true "flour" consistency) and it was great. The frustration I have with other banana bread recipes is that the banana puree sinks, or it never bakes through, etc. etc. and this is a nice light(er) option that toasts up nicely with a pat of butter.

  • katie_1pdvf0 on April 11, 2026

    Best banana bread I ever!

• BCLT tacos (blackened catfish lettuce tomato)

  • ethedens on November 05, 2024

    So good and so easy. Will definitely make again, but with different blackening seasoning. 4/5

• Little brown biscuits

  • Smokeydoke on March 21, 2017

    I was not crazy about these. He uses wheat flour, which I found off-putting. I mean, if you're going to use lard in your biscuits, might as well go all the way and use all white flour, right? C'mon AB, who are you foolin'? And I found the baking time too long, I would take them out after eight minutes, thirteen resulted in burnt biscuits. The biscuits were a tad too salty for my taste, I'd dial back the salt to 1 Tbsp. The texture is unbelievably tender and flaky. They were delicious drizzled in butter and honey.

• Grits with shrimp

  • Smokeydoke on November 16, 2016

    These are absolutely amazing. I didn't follow the measurements exactly, it needed more Old Bay Seasoning for my taste and I like my grits with more butter and some cheese. However the tried and true combination of Old Bay Shrimp with bacon, green onions and grits is always a winner. And AB's is no different.

• Overnight coconut oats

  • Jojobuch on April 28, 2020

    These have become a go-to recipe in our house - quick to set up and delicious

• NItrous pancakes

  • laurenlangston on February 24, 2017

    These were awful! I tried the recipe, housemate tried the recipe, we each followed it to the absolute letter with our super-accurate, to-the-tenth-of-a-gram scale, and the batter just dribbled out of the whipped cream dispenser. (The whipped cream dispenser works just fine for whipping cream.) The only difference is that our dispenser is 0.5L when AB says to put it in a 1L. Googling doesn't yield any sites that tell me that this would make a difference. Hopes: dashed.

• New Year's...Southern style

  • Dollhouse_Cuisine on January 02, 2025

    Everything was great. We may make these 3 dishes every New Year's going forward -- possibly with some grits, and probably with the Southern Pecan Pie recipe from my card file.

• Apple spice bundt cake with rum glaze

  • Smokeydoke on November 11, 2017

    Woah, now this is a spice cake! It includes a hefty gram of nutmeg, ginger, cardamom and allspice. 8 grams of grains of paradise! And some rosemary, star anise and 100 grams of crystallized ginger. Did I like it? Not really, the spices were really strong in this one, and it started to taste like dreaded fruitcake. I think I like the idea of a strong spice cake more than I really do. It was a lot of work for a cake, a lot of ingredients and a lot of prep. I'd also cut down the cook time from 75 mins to 65 mins. Even at 65 mins, the cake was a bit dry and hard, but I think that's the way it's suppose to be. It's not like an American cake. His glaze instructions are perfect, it looked too thick, so I added more water and that's why I ended up with a sloppy mess. Photo included.

• My big fat Greek chicken salad

  • Smokeydoke on May 05, 2017

    Delicious! Great way to use up leftover rotisserie chicken meat. Requires a lot of ingredients but it's well worth the effort.

  • Smokeydoke on October 29, 2017

    I made this recipe again, subbing half chicken, half vegetable rotini, and I loved it!

  • twoyolks on August 27, 2018

    This was fine but I didn't think there was quite enough flavor to make this great.

• Mushroom wheat berry pilaf

  • Aggie92 on March 06, 2017

    Yum! I really liked the earthy flavor of the mushrooms and wheat berries. The cooking time for the wheat berries was spot-on in my Instant Pot. I used white mushrooms since they were on sale. The dish needed a little acid to finish, so I squeezed a little lemon juice on top. Would also be good with a sprinkling of parsley and/or some grated Parmesan.

• Roasted Thanksgiving salad

  • ethedens on November 04, 2022

    I make this almost every fall (without parsnips, mind you). Delicious!

  • Ecngreg5 on April 09, 2023

    I made this for our Easter lunch and it was absolutely wonderful! Well reviewed by everyone! Will definitely make it again!

• Black beans/brown rice

  • twoyolks on February 28, 2017

    This is about as good as you can get with black beans and brown rice. Using brown rice provides some extra flavor and it's well seasoned from the olive oil and salt. The black beans pick up a lot of flavor from the garlic and as they're sautéed. Baking the brown rice is pretty easy but I'd probably just cook it in a rice cooker in the future to save time.

• Not just another kale salad

  • ethedens on December 09, 2024

    This was fine but nothing special. 3/5

• Kick-in-the-pants smoothie

  • laurenlangston on October 03, 2022

    Great for breakfast! My substitutions, since I didn't have everything on hand and didn't feel like a run to the store: oat milk for almond, buckwheat honey for dark agave, and instead of cold brew I added some instant espresso powder and doubled the milk. So: quite adaptable. Thumbs up.

• Chewy peanut butter cookie

  • joanhuguet on October 27, 2016

    These flourless cookies have an intense peanut butter flavor. Even after they were baked, though, they had a brown-sugar grittiness that made the cookies crumbly instead of chewy. Next time, I will try beating the peanut butter and sugars together in the stand mixer instead of mixing by hand as written. These are both gluten-free and dairy-free, which is a hard combination of food sensitivities to accommodate in a baked good.

  • bching on December 18, 2016

    We like the flavor but like the previous reviewer notes, our cookies weren't chewy.

• Cucumber lime yogurt pops

  • ellabee on October 16, 2016

    Pretty tenuous "online link": 17 min of audio interview that you have to listen through to get the recipe. I know, a feeble complaint from someone being given "free ice cream", but...

• Fiery ginger ale concentrate

  • joanhuguet on October 27, 2016

    I was skeptical, but somehow using candied ginger does produce a more intense flavor than fresh ginger and sugar.

  • ethedens on November 04, 2022

    Not actually all that firey.

• Chicken piccata

  • Smokeydoke on December 26, 2016

    The chicken is unbelievably tender and mouth-watering. So delicious! Alton does it again.

  • vickster on March 22, 2017

    Very good chicken dish! But I adjusted the timing a bit so chicken would brown. We had for dinner with broccoli and brown rice, but would be delicious with pasta.

  • jenmmcd on October 13, 2019

    Best chicken piccata recipe with the thighs. It’s our go-to recipe. We don’t bother with the mushrooms though

  • Madpalice on August 02, 2020

    I love this recipe so much, I've made it many times. Half the family doesn't like mushrooms but I tell them just to scrape them off because I really enjoy them :)

  • vegabond2016 on May 05, 2024

    This was delicious. The only thing I didn't like is that I didn't feel like there was enough sauce to cover all the chicken thighs adequately. I will make this again, but make more sauce next time.

• Mussels-o-miso

  • ethedens on March 10, 2025

    Way, way too salty. 1/4 cup of miso is too much. 2/5 as written

• One pot chicken

  • twoyolks on February 27, 2017

    This was a really good and simple roast chicken that's also pretty easy. The chicken by itself is pretty good but it's excellent dipped in the mix of jus and schmaltz (make sure to dip it in both!). The skin is nicely browned by flabby (as noted in the recipe introduction).

• Heavenly orbs of Belgian goodness

  • bching on December 23, 2016

    Good and easy. Excellent sidedish for simple grilled fish.

  • twoyolks on April 11, 2020

    These roasted extremely well. I didn't find that the fish sauce, sesame oil, or red pepper flakes really add much flavor given the minuscule amounts used.

• Bacon maple sprouts

  • Smokeydoke on March 21, 2017

    This was an interesting take on Brussel sprouts. Like AB, I can eat my weight in Brussel sprouts, so even though I have my tried-and-true method of roasting them, this was a good alternative. The sweet from the syrup and the tang from the mustard were good foils for the bitter sprouts. It was an easy recipe, simply assemble it and put in the oven. The sprouts don't get as caramelized because of the syrup, but that's ok.

  • twoyolks on March 28, 2020

    I liked this for the most part but the Brussels sprouts were a little undercooked and not particularly browned. I think there may be a mistake in the recipe because this recipe calls for them to be baked at 350F for 20-25 minutes and the recipe above calls for them to be baked at 425F for 20-25 minutes. But there's no mention of this in the errata.

• Pumpkin cheesecake

  • twoyolks on October 30, 2018

    A bit fiddly to make but the pumpkin flavor was good without being overpowered by pumpkin spice. I made it in a 10" spring form pan and it baked perfectly.

• Mushroom Stroganoff

  • TxChef77 on April 07, 2024

    sub boursin for goat cheese, no need to de-gill mushrooms

  • spacebaby on January 24, 2026

    Very good but husband wanted beef hahah. Used a pound of button mushrooms, added garlic and used normal onion. Used half sour cream and half Greek yogurt just for calories sake.

• Roasted chile salsa

  • Aggie92 on March 08, 2017

    Not too sure about this one. It has a bitter edge to it that I don't find very pleasing. Broiling the dried chiles with the rest of the veg resulted in burned to a crisp chiles. You can't tell when they go from their natural color to burned by looking at them, but you can sure smell it. So I threw those away and just added soaked chiles to the salsa. Needs more lime juice and salt.

• The last pizza dough I'll ever need

  • Smokeydoke on December 08, 2016

    This was a really good crust! Inside was chewy, outside was crispy, I liked it a lot. The dough is a bit tricky, it's a dry dough, so it's not as pliable as other doughs I've worked with. It wouldn't stretch easily. My pizza was more 9" rectangular-rhomboid rather than circle. Also the dough puffed up a lot in the oven, I recommend stretching out the dough till it's very thin. I left less than half an inch for crust, they blew up into huge breadstick-like things (still very tasty). And it's a tough dough (I don't know if AB did this on purpose so the beginner cook could man-handle it or what) but err on the side of caution and be gentle with it. Always use a soft touch with pizza dough.

  • D.Barker on October 13, 2021

    This was good! A bit finicky for weeknights for me, but worth trying again. (For perspective I have two young kids so dinner is hectic) I also think it makes more than two pizzas worth. Maybe I misread, but it was a lot of dough!

• Chocolate chess pie

  • Smokeydoke on January 08, 2017

    I thought this was great but Mr. Smokey gave it a rare 2. Yikes! We only did the pie, not the meringue, but I plan on doing it later and adding it to my second pie. We used two 8 in crusts (store-bought, as AB recommends) because there was a lot of filling for one pie. The cooking time was longer than instructed, 30 mins at 375, then 15 mins at 350, and the filling was still jiggly. Do not pre-bake the crust as instructed on the package, my crust came out too done. The pie is different, there's definitely a salty note and it's not creamy, it's more sticky and chewy. You're either going to love it or hate it. I thought it was fabulous and addicting, I loved the taste of salty, chewy chocolate. But if you're looking for traditional french chocolate silk, this is not it. Photo included.

  • Smokeydoke on January 09, 2017

    Added the recommended meringue to my second pie. The meringue is delicious! And it adds something special, especially for presentation. Mr. Smokey still can't get over the salty chocolate. Oh well...

  • shoffmann on March 22, 2019

    Good pie, though very rich and very sweet. Especially with the meringue topping, this has the sweet and salty thing which I love in desserts. I also found this took quite a bit longer to bake than indicated by the recipe - filling had a bit of skin on it after 35 minutes, but was still pretty much liquid at that point. Lost track of how much time it ended up taking altogether, but probably at least 10-15 minutes extra.

• Meringue topping

  • Smokeydoke on January 09, 2017

    Best meringues ever!

• Midnight mug cake for 2

  • laurabead on April 03, 2019

    This is a fast, delicious desert--it's almost a cross between a chocolate mousse and a mud cake. Fabulous eaten warm with a dollop of ice cream.

  • toribryan on April 16, 2026

    As the recipe itself says, it’s not pretty, but neither am I at this time of night! Good quick treat when you want something sweet. Definitely would be good with the recommended vanilla ice cream

• Cider house fondue

  • ethedens on October 01, 2024

    I felt so capable smoking the apples, but I don't know that they added much to the final dish. This was addictive at room temp but didn't feel like fondue at room temp. Was too sweet once warmed. Good with sausages. Would maybe make again? There's a good recipe in here somewhere. But seriously, what monster serves room temp fondue? 3.5/5

• Kitchn

  Alton takes a sentimental, rather than scientific, approach to cooking ...sharing recipes he cooks most often for himself and his teenage daughter...

  Full review

• Food52

  The recipes are a motley assortment of the food he cooks and eats every day...As such, the tips and techniques he teaches are useful for everyday cooking.

  Full review