El Charro Cafe Cookbook, The Flores Family's

The colorful history of El Charro Cafe and the 150 recipes for vibrant, exciting Mexican food make this book as unique and entertaining as the 80-year-old restaurant itself. It is rumored that in the 1940s, founder Monica Flin would sit on the El Charro patio, sipping martinis from teacups and playing cards with John Wayne, who was in Tucson to film westerns. Today the restaurant is run by Carlotta Flores and her husband, Ray. The El Charro Cafe, America's oldest family-operated Mexican restaurant, is located in a house built in the 1890s by Monica's father (who was also Carlotta's great-grandfather). The restaurant's signature dish is Carne Seca Beef, a Tucson passion. The beef is cured high above the restaurant's patio where strips of thin-sliced tenderloin hang in an open metal cage.

Old favorites and creative new Mexican dishes that are enjoyable to cook and to serve fill the book.

The greatest restaurants in America are its wonderful independent regional restaurants. And there are no greater experts on America's regional restaurants than Michael and Jane Stern. "Coast to coast," said the "New York Times," "they know where to find the freshest lobster rolls, the fluffiest pancakes, the crispiest catfish." Rutledge Hill Press is launching a new series of Roadfood? Cookbooks, each with recipes, pictures, and the history of one of America's greatest regional restaurants.