Among the myriad foods and culinary subjects defined and explained are cooking tools and techniques, meat cuts, breads, pastas, and literally everything else related to good food and enjoyable dining. Handy appendices cover many topics including suggestions for substituting recipe ingredients, a microwave oven conversion chart, recommended safe cooking temperatures for meats and fish, and much more.

The New Food Lover's Companion is a reference guide--not a cookbook--but it includes hundreds of cooking tips plus an extensive bibliography of recommended cookbooks. More than 7200 entries plus line art are included in this seminal work.