A few weeks ago, I wrote my occaisonal “Food Viewer” column for the Times-Gazette about the TV show “America’s Test Kitchens.” In that column, I complained (gently, I hope) that the web site to which you must go in order to look up recipes is heavy on promoting “Cook’s Illustrated” magazine, which produces the TV program.

At that time, I hadn’t actually ever seen the magazine. I saw it in the magazine rack at a local grocery store a few days ago, and bought a copy.

Let me humbly apologize for my earlier remarks. This magazine deserves any promotion it can get. It’s great, stuffed to the gills with recipes, product reviews and other information. The recipes are preceded with readable and informative first-person essays about how they were developed. (“Because pork chops are so lean and mid, I wanted a filling that would add moisture as well as a big hit of flavor …. My first thought was to start with barbecue sauce …. I tried everything from sautéed mushrooms [too mild] to relishes and chutneys [too overpowering] before settling on the sweet flavor of caramelized onions.”)

The inside pages are all black-and-white; some are illustrated with photos, others with the type of line drawings you find in “The Joy of Cooking.” There are color photos of the featured dishes inside the back cover, but they’re too small to be informational, and are apparently meant as a secondary table of contents.

The issue I picked up had a theme of “summer grilling,” and some of the recipes made me want to drop everything and buy a big grill right away. (I have a grill somewhere, but it’s small, almost hibachi-sized.) I don’t know if every issue has a theme or not.

There’s no advertising, so there’s no concern about advertisers trying to influence product reviews or what have you.

I thoroughly enjoyed this magazine and will probably subscribe at some point later on in the summer. It only comes out six times a year, although it supposedly has a sister publication, “Cook’s Country.”