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- Subscribe - Contact Us - Rate Card - Place an Ad Valley&State Backpage O&E Sports Archives Classifieds Faith&Beliefs Obituaries Revels May 11, 2004 Cooking with a conscience By Bill Choy Ashland Daily Tidings The husband and wife cooking team of Stu Stein and Mary Hinds have combined their culinary skills to teach readers the joys of sustainable cooking by releasing a cookbook on the subject. The Peerless Restaurant in Ashland will soon have some of its recipes available for cooking at home through the release of "The Sustainable Kitchen," which was written by co-owners and -executive chefs Stu Stein and Mary Hinds. File photo | Ashland Daily Tidings The couple, executive chefs and co-owners of the Ashland fine dining establishment The Peerless Restaurant, are about the release "The Sustainable Kitchen," a book dedicated to teach those cooking at home not just delicious recipes, but the environmental importance of sustainable cooking. "It's a cookbook that combines the philosophy of sustainability," Stein said. "If we aren't sustainable, there may not be anything left for future generations." The book is being released across the country by New Society Publishers out of Canada and should arrive next week at Bloomsbury Books, where there will a book signing Monday at 7 p.m. "The Sustainable Kitchen" can also be pre-ordered on Web sites such as bn.com and amazon.com Stein said it has been a dream of his to write a cookbook. He and his wife have a collection of more than 1,000 cookbooks. "I'm very excited," he said. "Since I have my own extensive cookbook collection, it's cool having my own cookbook." While the book focus on ingredients found in the Pacific Northwest, each recipe lists appropriate substitutions for those in other parts of the country. The book also explains in depth the reasons the substitutions work with the given ingredients. "We wanted to say that if you can't find this where you live, you can find a sustainable substitute that works," Stein said. The goal for these chefs is to encourage regional food supplies, maintain a sense of community, a strong local economy, foster earth stewardship and protect family farms. "We want to encourage people throughout the country to use local purveyors of sustainable fare," Stein said. "It just tastes better, and it's good for you and good for the Earth." Stein and Hinds, who have been married for four years, made it a point to make the cookbook simple enough for the average cook at home to follow along. "It's meant to be user friendly," Hinds said. "We want to point them in the right direction and get people excited about cooking with sustainable, fresh ingredients." A unique feature of the book is the listing of the proper wines that go with the meal. Stein and Hinds began work on the cookbook last February and worked on it for nearly eight months, creating and revising recipes, many that were inspired by the fresh ingredients brought to the restaurant by local farmers. Besides the cookbook, the pair had the formidable task of running and cooking at their restaurant and were in the process of breaking ground on a new home to boot. But Stein didn't mind the added pressure. "It was a divide-and-conquer type of thing," he said. "But I was in my element. I have the personality where I have to do 25 things at once." Stein and Hinds wrote the cookbook along with Judith Dern, a food writer. The pictures in the book were taken by John Rizzo, a food photographer whose work has appeared in many cookbooks and periodicals. Stein came to Ashland to work at the Peerless in 2000, with Hinds joining him in 2001. DailyTidings.com Home Page Valley&State | Backpage | O&E | Sports | Archives | Weather | Classifieds Columnists | Faith&Beliefs | Obituaries | Revels | Subscribe | Contact Us Copyright 2004 Ashland Daily Tidings and Ottaway Newspapers All Rights Reserved Click Here Site Search: .:Advertisements:. RESOURCES - Mail Tribune News - ODOT Road Cams