At 69 years of age, it has been many years since I’ve been inspired to buy a cookbook. Why now, you might ask? Three major reasons: 1) I have realized over time that the easy access to recipes online is not as convenient as I had thought it would be. I’m tired of the screen going dark when my hands are goopy with ingredients. Also, the online recipe ratings can be subjective, leading to happy results for the rater, but not necessarily for me. 2) I traveled to a Central Asian country six months ago and was exposed to fantastic flavors, marvelous produce, and intriguing cooking methods that I had not known before. 3) The only restaurant in my hometown that served dal (an ethnic dish from India), closed during the pandemic. I live in cattle country and my town’s restaurant offerings are fairly meat-heavy.So I’ve been wanting to attempt to recreate the flavors of my overseas trip at home. This marvelous cookbook of curated recipes from appetizer through dessert is beautifully formatted, photographed, and organized. Most importantly, the recipes originated from an authentic Persian cook from the Azerbaijani tradition.Secrets? Yep! The cookbook contains the proprietary family recipe for Persian Spice. (To save your time, the author also gives the brand name of a similar blend you can purchase.) Tips and secrets for ensuring a successful result are generously sprinkled throughout, indicated by the pomegranate symbol.If you feel your cookbook shelf just can’t handle yet one more addition, invest in this cookbook anyway. Heck, pick up two or three. It will make a lovely birthday, graduation, shower, housewarming, or wedding gift for anyone! And you might realize after you receive it that you want to keep one for yourself after all. :-)Hint to readers: Persian cucumbers aren’t available where I live. But I am not going to substitute grocery store cucumbers. Having tasted crisp, crunchy cucumbers on my Central Asian trip, I know that American cucumbers won’t guarantee a happy outcome. I won’t use the recipes requiring cucumbers until I make a trip to a larger nearby city.