Tag: cookbooks

Clever Cooks, Gen DIY-er

The best cookbook I’ll ever own

Posted on by must be thrifty

Who doesn’t love a good cookbook? Big and bold with page after page of beautifully plated food, they’re a feast for the eyes of the food-obsessed.

Last time I checked, however, ‘oohing and aahing’ over a photograph of Gelato Messina’s rum baba gelato or Annabel Langbein’s slow-roast lamb with herb crust does not constitute as cooking, and a cookbook that doesn’t inspire a meal belongs on a coffee table, not the kitchen bench.

Most titles I own have a handful of bookmarked recipes. Continue reading →

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Clever Cooks, Glut(tony), Reviews

Relaxed cooking on a budget: Save with Jamie

Posted on by must be thrifty

Save with JamieI’ve collected a few Jamie Oliver titles over the years; none of them get used very much. Jamie’s Kitchen horrified me with its egg-laden Baileys and Banana Bread and Butter Pudding. Jamie’s 15 Minute Meals and 30-Minute Meals demanded too much multitasking for me to really stuck into them. Still, I’m a sucker for budget cookbooks, so when I found a discounted copy of Save with Jamie, I had to have it.

This time round, Jamie Oliver focuses on ‘delicious, exciting food that’s not hard on your wallet’. He’s also enlisted the aid of nutritionists, giving his recipes a transparency that’s sometimes missing from similar titles. Continue reading →

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Clever Cooks, Going Green, Reviews

New bag, old tricks: Frugavore

Posted on by must be thrifty

Organic food. People are either for or against it. Organic converts conscientiously object to the overcrowding of livestock, genetic modification, the use of antibiotics and other chemicals in conventional farming, whilst skeptics will insist that the organic food’s claim to superiority is purely anecdotal, even mythological. Whatever the case may be, there are some of us who want to eat organic. Unfortunately, ‘organic’ is often a byword for ‘expensive’. So how does one eat well without a) spending a fortune on groceries or b) going Gourmet Farmer? In Frugavore, nutritionist and slow-food advocate Arabella Forge shows how it can be done with a mix of recipes and practical advice. Continue reading →

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Clever Cooks, Footnote Frivolity***, Reviews

A frugal diet: Smart Food – 101 recipes that won’t break the budget

Posted on by must be thrifty

All the ingredients can be bought at the supermarket—nothing is exotic or expensive—and the dishes are delicious and simple to make. (blurb from Smart Food)

Using pantry staples such as carrots, canned tomatoes, and mince, the Australian Women’s Weekly’s Smart Food trots out predictable fare: soups, pastas, stews, pies, and the occasional curry or stir fry. A North African pork and cabbage rolls recipe is the only oasis in a culinary dessert, and even then it requires mince and canned tomatoes.

There’s logic behind the lack of imagination. By showing what can be done with a restrictive list of ingredients, Smart Food reduces waste in the kitchen, potentially saving households $1,036 each year*. Continue reading →

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Clever Cooks, Footnote Frivolity***, Reviews

British retro cool: Delia’s Frugal Food

Posted on by must be thrifty

It’s strange how things drift in and out of fashion. Being thrifty was the done thing in 1976, when Delia’s Frugal Food was first published; now*, with rapidly increasing food prices, thrift has made a comeback.

In keeping with the book’s theme, Delia Smith has recycled much of its contents. She ‘felt it had a certain nostalgic appeal in showing how things were thirty-two years ago’. Hence this revised edition is a bit of a curiosity, offering fascinating insight on a bygone era. Continue reading →

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