Twenty-Minute Menus: Time-Wise Recipes & Strategic Plans for Freshly Cooked Meals Every Day [Paperback]

Marian Burros (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 2, 1995

Now there's one less excuse for not cooking and eating right. In 20-Minute Menus, best-selling author Marian Burros does all the thinking and planning for you: the 100 from-scratch menus have been designed and tested to get the best-tasting meal on the table in the least amount of time.

The perfect book for everyday cooking, 20-Minute Menus is full of tips and strategies to help the cook in a hurry, from stocking the pantry for the 20-Minute Kitchen, to providing a precise shopping list for each meal and a "Game Plan" that guarantees everything will run smoothly and be ready at the same time. Next time you want dinner fast, why not try:

Meatloaf Hamburgers/Mashed Potatoes/Broiled Tomatoes

Curried Shrimp, Peas and Potatoes/Toasted Pitas

Tunisian Chicken/Minted Carrot Salad/Couscous

Annie's Spicy Noodles and Veggies/Whole-Grain Bread

Scrod Provençal/Green Beans and Corn/Rice

Pork Tenderloin with Maple Glaze/Potatoes, Brussels Sprouts and Onions

Fish on a Bed of Salsa/Boiled New Potatoes

Veal with Lemon and Black Olives/Fresh Tomato-Zucchini Sauce with Pasta

Now anyone can put a delicious, creative, freshly prepared and healthful meal on the table in less time than it takes for a pizza to be delivered.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

For those who like to eat well but can't stand the heat of long hours in the kitchen, Burros, New York Times food columnist, advances reliable methods for ever-faster meal preparation; her 20-minute menus (for two to three people, without dessert) are practical, healthful alternatives to take-out or frozen dinners. Burros explains how to trim shopping time to 10 minutes per day (by keeping staples on hand, shopping daily for each menu, buying hard-to-find food through mail order) and suggests buying pre-cut vegetables at salad bars and meats and fish in trimmed and packaged form. Following current diet trends, low-fat chicken and fish dishes are emphasized; cream sauces are made with ricotta and yogurt. Salt is decreased by seasoning food with herbs, ethnic condiments and flavored oils and vinegars. Sensibly, menus often combine the required starch, protein and vegetable components of a meal into one or two dishes, but leafy greens are lacking, and white sugar is used unnecessarily in dressings and tomato sauces. Each menu includes simple recipe instructions and shopping lists. BOMC Home Style main selection, QPBC alternate, Better Homes & Gardens Book Club alternate.
Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal

The title sounds too good to be true, but most of the menus in Burros's latest collection can be prepared in 20 minutes. And, although she relies on salad bar ingredients to save time, she has not had to resort to any "convenience" foods for these simple, healthy, and tasty dishes. A game plan and shopping list accompanies each meal. Any busy cook would find this book handy, and Burros's unintimidating, speedy menus could even make cooks of noncooks. For most collections. Homestyle main selection, BOMC, Quality Paperback, and Better Homes & Gardens alternates.-- JS
Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 256 pages
• Publisher: Simon & Schuster (May 2, 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0684801353
• ISBN-13: 978-0684801353
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 7.3 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,337,254 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Quick, Delicious Meals for 2 or 3, January 22, 2001

By 

Willow One "willowone" (Pittsburgh, PA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Twenty-Minute Menus: Time-Wise Recipes & Strategic Plans for Freshly Cooked Meals Every Day (Paperback)

This is the cook book for everyone who is too busy or too tired to plan meals and cook. All the work has been done for you. This book has everything you need to have on hand, what to buy at the store and an easy to follow work plan. Also, the recipes in this book are low in fat, with little or no salt added. I have tried almost everything in this book and have come to enjoy even some things I didn't think I was going to like. The only thing missing is the nutritional breakdown, (calories, carbohydrates, etc.) I have now bought almost every book that Marian Burros has written. This one is the best. I'm on my second copy, I wore out the first one!

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars GREAT book - SUPER recipes, August 28, 2001

By 

Katrina Hollywood (Staten Island, New York United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Twenty-Minute Menus: Time-Wise Recipes & Strategic Plans for Freshly Cooked Meals Every Day (Paperback)

I LOVE this book! This is the first cookbook I've seen that goes through the whole meal from main dish to side dish to dessert and even gives you the game plan on what to do first so all is ready at the SAME TIME! Imagine that? Coupled with the book Quick Meals for Healthy Kids and Busy Parents, it's all you need to feed your family healthy and even more important TASTY homecooked meals everyday! I definately recommend this one! Great as a gift for anyone with kids or who just don't like hanging out in the kitchen cooking all day!

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars 15 years and I still depend on this cookbook!, July 23, 2004

By 

E. Honig (California) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Twenty-Minute Menus: Time-Wise Recipes & Strategic Plans for Freshly Cooked Meals Every Day (Paperback)

There I was, 30 years old and able to make only one pasta dish and one chicken dish. My friends kindly fed me (well and often) but I could never invite them back. Then I moved to an apartment next to a newly-wed couple and they recommended *20-minute Menus*. "We can't cook either" they said, "but we can follow directions!" Yes indeed. Marian takes you step by step through entire dinners (not just one dish, but 2 or 3 dishes together, the whole meal) telling you when to start heating the broiler, when to blend the ingredients for the sauce, when to start steaming the vegetables... She even breaks down the ingredients into things you should have in your "pantry" (there is a pantry list at the beginning of the book) and things you need to get fresh for this recipe. I actually used that pantry list to stock my kitchen when I bought a second home. Usually the menus take closer to 1/2 hour to prepare (sometimes more) if you include chopping time, but the stress is low and the results are great.

In every way this book changed my life. I was suddenly able to make GOOD FOOD for my friends. I started having people over for dinner regularly. I soon branched out to... Marian Burros' 30-minute menus (*Eating Well is the Best Revenge*) and other cookbooks. But when I want a meal that is complex and tasty in the eating, yet swift and simple in the making, I come back to 20-minute menus. I've probably made 60% of the different menus and only once have I not liked the results (there was also one bad recipe in *Eating Well*). I have 2 kids now and this is the cookbook I use for regular nightly dinners. We all love it!!

Whether you're a seasoned cook looking for some easy and interesting menus, or a total beginner with aspirations to cook sophisticated food, this is the cookbook for you.