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Cookbook Project, Books #51 and 52
May. 18th, 2009 12:23 pm"Naomi's Home Companion," Naomi Judd
I am ashamed to own this book. I am not a fan of the Judds, and it's not really a very good cookbook; my only excuse is that it was on sale for $1 on the impulse buy table near the checkout at a bookstore. And books for a dollar, especially shiny cookbooks, are a serious weakness of mine, as I'm sure this project has demonstrated again and again. And hey, if you can ignore all of the flavor text, pictures, and trite bits of "wisdom," some of the recipes don't look *too* bad. And part of this project is self-honesty - admitting to the crap I have on my cookbook shelf as well as the treasures. So I couldn't skip this one.
That said, there were actually a few good-looking recipes. And when I was looking through it we were having a string of hot, sunny, no-cooking-weather days, so the Avocado Sandwiches sounded like a good idea. And much to my surprise, they were.
Okay, not so much to my surprise. It's hard to go wrong with avocados, fresh tomatoes, mozzarella, and good whole wheat bread. Still, there were a couple other ingredients I wouldn't have thought of, and the end product was absolutely worth eating, and worth making again. I might even have to break down and try some of the other recipes in here.
"Taste of Home 2003 Annual Recipes"
This is the last of my Taste of Home cookbooks, unless I break down and actually look at the email they sent me where they're selling their back editions for $5 each. So far I've managed to be strong - the last thing I need right now is more cookbooks - but... there are years I don't have the magazine issues for, and their earlier stuff *was* really good.... anyway, I digress. Taste of Home. Good recipes, white trash sensibilities, stuff I use on a regular basis. We had a friend coming over for dinner, and I wanted something fairly reliable.
This was another instance where, instead of one dish, I wound up making an entire menu. This book includes a green bean recipe that is utterly to die for; they call it Nutty Onion Green Beans (okay, the food is good but the names are stupid, I accept that) but aside from the dumb name, green beans with pecans in an orange-mustard sauce is damn yummy. And their Coconut Fried Shrimp are both tasty as anything and remarkably easy.
And, to make sure that I was trying at least one recipe that I hadn't tried before, I went ahead and made Raspberry Cheesecake Pie for dessert. I was a bit skeptical of any cheesecake-like recipe that called for cottage cheese, but it wound up being a lot better than I had worried (though fresh raspberries go a long way towards making anything better). It did convince me, though, that I need to just get off my lazy butt and make my own pie crust from now on.
Okay, that's most of the backlog, I think. On to new and more fascinating cookbooks, if I can just escape the seductive lure of my sofa and "I Am Legend" on HBO. Give me strength - I'm in enough of a blue mood as it is; if I actually watch this movie I may sob myself into a coma.....
I am ashamed to own this book. I am not a fan of the Judds, and it's not really a very good cookbook; my only excuse is that it was on sale for $1 on the impulse buy table near the checkout at a bookstore. And books for a dollar, especially shiny cookbooks, are a serious weakness of mine, as I'm sure this project has demonstrated again and again. And hey, if you can ignore all of the flavor text, pictures, and trite bits of "wisdom," some of the recipes don't look *too* bad. And part of this project is self-honesty - admitting to the crap I have on my cookbook shelf as well as the treasures. So I couldn't skip this one.
That said, there were actually a few good-looking recipes. And when I was looking through it we were having a string of hot, sunny, no-cooking-weather days, so the Avocado Sandwiches sounded like a good idea. And much to my surprise, they were.
Okay, not so much to my surprise. It's hard to go wrong with avocados, fresh tomatoes, mozzarella, and good whole wheat bread. Still, there were a couple other ingredients I wouldn't have thought of, and the end product was absolutely worth eating, and worth making again. I might even have to break down and try some of the other recipes in here.
"Taste of Home 2003 Annual Recipes"
This is the last of my Taste of Home cookbooks, unless I break down and actually look at the email they sent me where they're selling their back editions for $5 each. So far I've managed to be strong - the last thing I need right now is more cookbooks - but... there are years I don't have the magazine issues for, and their earlier stuff *was* really good.... anyway, I digress. Taste of Home. Good recipes, white trash sensibilities, stuff I use on a regular basis. We had a friend coming over for dinner, and I wanted something fairly reliable.
This was another instance where, instead of one dish, I wound up making an entire menu. This book includes a green bean recipe that is utterly to die for; they call it Nutty Onion Green Beans (okay, the food is good but the names are stupid, I accept that) but aside from the dumb name, green beans with pecans in an orange-mustard sauce is damn yummy. And their Coconut Fried Shrimp are both tasty as anything and remarkably easy.
And, to make sure that I was trying at least one recipe that I hadn't tried before, I went ahead and made Raspberry Cheesecake Pie for dessert. I was a bit skeptical of any cheesecake-like recipe that called for cottage cheese, but it wound up being a lot better than I had worried (though fresh raspberries go a long way towards making anything better). It did convince me, though, that I need to just get off my lazy butt and make my own pie crust from now on.
Okay, that's most of the backlog, I think. On to new and more fascinating cookbooks, if I can just escape the seductive lure of my sofa and "I Am Legend" on HBO. Give me strength - I'm in enough of a blue mood as it is; if I actually watch this movie I may sob myself into a coma.....
