Customer Reviews

The Woman's Day Cookbook: Great Recipes, Bright Ideas, And Healthy Choices for Today's Cook

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This book is great, especially for a novice cook. The recipes are clearly labeled: low fat, easy, 30-minute, make-ahead, etc. There's a section called "cook once eat twice" for making a new recipe from the leftovers of another dish. They also have "investment cooking" where you spend 3-4 hours in the kitchen and you've prepared 6-8 completely separate meals to freeze for later. I always hated to cook, but I've been using this book for 3 weeks now and cooking almost every night. It's fun!

As a general cookbook, this one is hard to beat. Geared to the needs of a wide spectrum of users, the book has a huge variety of well-seasoned recipes reflecting many different kinds of ethnic cookery. Each recipe carries a stated range of difficulty from complex to simple, a complete guide to preparation, and an introductory note describing interesting facts about the recipe or its ingredients, the amount of preparation time, and the amount of cooking time.

Divided into the usual sections--such as Grains and Beans, Desserts, Chicken and Turkey--this cookbook has an unusual feature that will delight the busiest cook. At the front of each section is a complete list of the recipes in that section, with individual recipes classified as Easy, 30 Minutes, 60 Minutes, Microwave, Make Ahead, Low Fat, One Pot, and Classic. If a recipe falls into more than one category, it is listed more than once, so that someone looking for Coq au Vin, listed here as Chicken in Red Wine, a classic recipe, will find it under Classics, but also in the Easy, Lowfat, and One Pot categories.

Long boxes on each page, adjacent to the binding, offer helpful tips for cooking, recipe variations, microwave adaptations, and useful trivia (the number of shrimp per pound, depending on size, how to carve a roast, how to get perfectly rounded muffins, for example). Several longer inserts, almost a page long, appear in green boxes and offer the "how-to's" of basic cooking--everything from grilling vegetables to making perfect pie crusts.

The most helpful feature for those who are health-conscious or on special diets is that every recipe provides the counts of calories, carbs, protein grams, fat grams, cholesterol, and sodium, taking the guesswork completely out of planning healthy, nutritious, good-tasting meals. Sections at the end of the book provide menus for a year, special recipes for entertaining and celebrations, and information on herbs, cheeses, and wines.

I initially selected this cookbook to give at a bridal shower, but when I had a chance to get it home and really look at it carefully, I bought a copy for myself. I had used and enjoyed the Joy of Cooking and the Fanny Farmer Cooking School Cookbook for years, but I have now found that this newer cookbook offers so many more features that I use it nearly all the time, in preference to my old standbys. The recipes, very well seasoned, are terrific--I haven't found a single dud!--and I now have many new favorites with fewer calories and fat grams! Recommended without reservation. Mary Whipple

This is the best (and I mean best) cookbook on the market today. There are few "fancy" ingredients and 99% of the recipes can be made with what you have on hand. If you don't have something, it's easy to substitute. Need something elegant, look here. No nonsense, easy to use, and better yet, great recipes!

This cookbook offers challenges for the cook, as well as encouragement for the reluctant cook and refreshment for the cook in a corner. I have appreciated the nutrition information especially, as we struggle to control calories, and the extra commentaries help make me a more knowledgeable cook. I like the philosophical viewpoint of this cookbook, that there is not always time and money to cook every bite from scratch. Judicious use of convenience foods works well for health of the cook as well as the others at the table. Even though it is not hot off the press any more, it is a valuable book in my kitchen with helpful tips and an excellent index.

I checked this book out of the public Library and liked it so much after using it for several soups, I decided I needed it for many other reasons, such as the investment cooking section. I never thought I would need another cook book, but I just couldn"t pass "The Woman"s Day Cookbook.

This has a great variety of recipies and each has nutrition information. Recipies grouped into traditional sections like pasta, chicken & turkey, beef, fish & seafood etc. but each section is organized into the following catagories easy, 30 minute, 60 minute, microwave, low-fat, make ahead, one pot and classic. There are definitions for each catagory at the beginning of the book.

Each individual recipe has all the information you need to decide if you want to make it. Recipe catagories then name how many it Serves, Prep Time, cook time ingredients directions then nutritional information per serving calroies, protien, carbs, gat, cholesterol and sodium. All the information you need to achieve a balanced diet.

There are also many color pictures. The best thing about this book is (p657 -671) the section entitled A Year of Menus. My mom liked cooking but hated the pressure of deciding what to cook for dinner; this is a terrific feature and even if you don't like the menu for each day at least you have something to alter to your likes or dislikes.

My mom had a Woman's Home Companion Cookbook it was a great cookbook and complete reference for keeping house - I have been on a quest to find an updated replacement as the one I inherited from my mom is getting fragile.

While the Woman's Day Cookbook is a great all around cookbook, has nutrition information and 365 days of menus it won't replace a Woman's Home Companion but this is a must have for any home cook and combined with Home Comforts by Cheryl Mendelson you would have a good substitute for a comprehensive reference like WHC.