The Best of Cooking with 3 Ingredients

Rating:
Summary: short-cut meals
Review: Ruthie Wornall's neat little book will help you minimize your kitchen time, yet still be able to put varied, nutritious and festive dishes on your table at mealtimes. Kids will be able to use these recipes, which feature ingredients you're likely to have on your shelves already.

Experienced cooks may smile to find to recognize that they may have already put together some of the recipes, when faced with a time or energy crunch! If you like good results without having to fuss, this book is for you. Highly recommended.

Rating:
Summary: Simple, quick, minimal cleanup - a winner
Review: This is a great cookbook for those with little cooking experience. Most other cookbooks have one, or at the most two recipes per page because of the space needed for complex preparation instructions. That is not the case at all with this cookbook. These recipes are simple enough that they only require two to four sentences to explain how to prepare the dish from start to finish.

Of course, when you are limiting yourself to only three ingredients you find that you end up with a lot of side dishes and vegetable recipes. But, there are plenty of main dishes so a well-balanced meal can be prepared. A few of my favorites include Rosemary-Roasted Potatoes, Honey-Orange Glazed Chicken, and June Ballard's Cajun Chicken. To keep the ingredient list to just three the recipes take advantage of many mixes like box cake mixes or stuffing mixes. Basically it hits all the high points for the new or hurried cook - quick and easy to prepare, goof-proof, minimal cleanup, and tasty results.

Another nice feature is the section with complete menu suggestions. Ruthie Warnall has compiled a suggested Valentine Dinner Menu, Easy Dinner for New Brides, Easy Sunday Dinner, Quick Gourmet Dinner, Pot Roast Dinner, Turkey Dinner, Chicken Dinner, and Romantic Dinners for Special Occasions. Each of the dinners contains only items from the cookbook and so are all easy to prepare with minimal fuss.

Comb bound so it lies flat when you are working with it, it is a recommended read for new cooks (or college kids just out of the house) and those with a tight family schedule.