Sunday Cooking, the Italian Slow Cooker, and Healthier Eating by an Expert
by Larry Cox on Jan. 16, 2010, under UncategorizedStrictly Sundays: Making Every Cook a Hero on Sundays by Joe Fitzpatrick, the Blue collar Gourmet with photography by Steven Potter (Book Publishers Network, $19.95)
Sunday mornings are a perfect time to leisurely read the paper and later prepare a stick-to-your-ribs breakfast. A new cookbook makes that task both easy and fun.
Joe Fitzpatrick has tested his culinary skills on who he calls the world’s toughest critics – his family. Each Sunday he stretches his skills by cooking at his Puget Sound home in Washington State for his high school sweetie, Vickie, their three children, and even his grandchildren. Even though he loves to golf, his real passion is in his kitchen.
His new collection is divided into six main sections: Appetizers; Main Dishes; Salads; Soups; Side Dishes; and Salsas. The dishes run the spectrum and include such delicious entrees as a London Broil that features an olive-tomato topping, a Spaghetti Sauce made from pork butt bone, Italian sausage links, and lamb shank, Mom’s Goulash, the comfort food of all comfort foods, and a Sunday Night Football Chili that’s secret is the roasting of peppers. The Salsas, my favorite section, include Orange and Olive Salsa; an unusual Cabbage Salsa; and an outstanding Pineapple-Papaya Salsa.
This cookbook is user-friendly and features many new takes on old favorites.
The Italian Slow Cooker by Michele Scicolone (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, $22)
Michele Scicolone is the author of fourteen Italian cookbooks including two best-sellers: “Sopranos Family Cookbook” and “Entertaining with the Sopranos.” In her latest collection she breaks out her slow cookers and serves up such mouth-watering delights as Tuscan Bean and Farro Soup, Polenta with Pork Ragu, Beef in Barolo; and Mom’s Stuffed Artichokes.
According to the author, you can plug in your slow cookers, walk away and still cook like an Italian grandmother. She backs up her claim with easy-to-prepare traditional dishes including Sicilian-Style Orange Chicken, Osso Buco with Red Wine, and Polenta with Pork Ragu.
In addition to utilizing the slow cooker, each and every recipe is as healthy as it is delicious. Because of the slow cooking, it is also possible to use less expensive cuts of meats. Even the toughest of cuts will be succulent after cooking slowly in a crock pot for six or seven hours.
There are chapters about slow cookers, techniques and tips, slow cooker safety and even stocking the Italian pantry. The recipes are grouped into eight chapters: Soups; Sauces for Pasta; Risotto, Polenta, and Grains; Seafood; Eggs, Chicken, and Turkey; Beef, Veal, Pork, and Lamb; Vegetables and Dried Legumes; and Desserts. If you think the slow cooker is just suitable for meats, you should check out the recipes for Chocolate Truffle Cake and Panettone Bread Pudding.
This excellent cookbook features dishes that are accessible and ones that you’ll be proud to serve to both family and friends.
Food Matters: A Guide to Conscious Eating by Mark Bittman (Simon & Schuster, $15)
Evem though this book features more than 75 recipes, it is much more than a mere cookbook. Mark Bittman, the author of “How to Cook Everything” and “Mark Bittman’s Kitchen Express,” is also responsible for the New York Times column, “The Minimalist.” Originally published in January of last year, “Food Matters” found an immediate readership. According to Bittman, improved health for people and planet could be as simple as eating fewer animals, less junk food, and super-refined carbohydrates.
In his book, Bittman suggests that consumers must rethink consumption and adapt a diet that is manageable, not onerous, boring or puritanical. It doesn’t even necessarily have to be a strict vegetarian one but rather a healthy program that suits both individual tastes and lifestyles. If properly planned, lifestyle choices could aid weight loss, reduce the risk of long-term or chronic diseases, save money, and even help stop global warming.
Bittman’s own struggle with weight gain and health problems and other problems that included high cholesterol, elevated blood sugar levels, a hernia, bad knees, and sleep apnea, forced him to take a long hard look at his diet. The result was a diet that allowed him to eat in moderation the foods he enjoyed instead of giving them up all together. By reducing, not eliminating animal products in his diet, viortally cutting ojut junk food and simple carbohydrates, and consuming more vegetables, fruits, and whole grains, he got a handle on his weight problem and watched his over-all health improve.
This is an excellent book, perfect for the beginning of a new year. The message Bittman shares is at once simple, revolutionary, and timely. With easy tips on sane shopping, stocking the pantry, and navigating restaurant menus, Bittman features a month’s worth of meal plans, and lists more than 75 recipes that will get readers off to a healthier lifestyle. This is nothing less than a roadmap to saner eating and living.
