First off, I have to say that Cookin’ With Coolio is the first cookbook I’ve read from cover to cover, and it’s also the first cookbook that has made me laugh out loud. A companion book to Coolio’s online cooking show, the book contains seventy-six of Coolio’s favorite recipes, explained in clear, easy terms, even if you don’t understand ghetto-speak. There is an abundance of profanity, so if that bothers you, you’d probably better go back to Martha or Julia, but this entertaining book is overflowing with recipes that sound really tasty, easy to make, and most are very inexpensive to put together.

The first chapter tells you “How To Become a Kitchen Pimp,” listing the necessary ingredients and utensils needed for an efficient “pimptry.” The second chapter is Coolio’s “Ten Cool-mandments,” with interesting and practical kitchen advice. From there we roll right into a dizzying array of recipes from Soul Rolls and Cool-a-cado to Coolius Cesar, Backyard Grass Salad, to Finger-Lickin’, Rib-Stickin’, Fall-Off-the-Bone-and-into-Your-Mouth Chicken, Kompton Fried Chicken (KFC) to Pimp My Shrimp to Banana Ba-ba-ba-bread. I can’t wait to start trying some of these recipes! One of Coolio’s coolmandments is to have fun in the kitchen, and this book looks like a good start to making that an easy rule to follow.