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I am SO glad I bought this. Colu Henry is a truly gifted cook and this is definitely my kind of recipe collection. The recipes are well-written and they work. It is a great range of spirited pasta dishes that are the kind I and my family like to fix and eat. I have already tried quite a few...Tuscan Kale Caesar Pasta, Scallops Sungolds and a Mess of Herbs, Frutti di Mare with Squid Ink Pasta, Pasta with Pickled Peppers, both pasta with escarole recipes, Roasted Cauliflower with Cavatappi, Baccala and Green Olive Pasta with Olives, and Papparadelle with Duck Confit Olives and Raisins: these are all splendid, absolutely splended, and just a fraction of the greatness that lies between the book covers. Lemony Spaghetti is another.... These are unpretentiously sophisticated but straightforward recipes with a Neapolitan, Southern Italian spirit. A great mix of classic (Cacio e Pepe) and her own very capable creative spins (Fettucine with Crab and Jalapenos). The list of excellent recipes just goes on and on....it is one of the few cookbooks the I really want to cook my way through. Throughout she makes goid suggestions for adapting recipes to meatless. Great use of olives, capers, walnuts, greens and other veggies in pastas...but then, I am a sucker for pasta with walnuts and veggies in varied combos so that won me over. The production value of the booked is truly top quality, with excellent paper stock and binding, beautiful graphics and lay out, excellent photos of the food and of inspiring scenery. The head notes for all the recipes are excellent and very helpful.
Disclaimer, of sorts: this cookbook may not be for everyone, but please, don't blame the cookbook or its author. If escarole, radicchio, broccoli rabe are not your thing, maybe it's not for you (but if they are, you will love this.) Some recipes include ingredients - like nduja, duck confit, baccala, pickled Italian hot peppers (not pepperoncini), ramps - that can be hard to find in some areas so if that is an issue for you...there are plenty of other recipes, but maybe this is not for you (these things are common to our pantry so I am thrilled to work with those recipes...). The style of these recipes (like pasta with walnuts and greens and more...) may not work for some families or folks who are well set within their own particular comfort zone - so maybe not for you. This cookbook is boldly just what it is...the recipes are easy (to me), but it is definitely not "Pasta 101" or Rachel Ray's 30 Minute Weeknight Meals" ... It definitely can call for some ingredients that many people may not have on hand. So good to consider all this when deciding if this is a good fit for you.
But for me... I am crazy about this cookbook and look forward to cooking more of the excellent recipes. A welcome, working addition to my, well, huge, cookbook library. Enjoy!
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Reviewed in the United States on February 9, 2018
In love with this cookbook. The recipes are beautifully written and represented beautifully through their pictures. I enjoyed hearing Colu’s voice through her writing. I have really enjoyed everything I have made from the book. Aglio e olio, Cacio e pepe, pasta puttanesca, her basic tomato sauce, her Alfredo recipe is also great and somehow feels lite. Most of the recipe says in this book require ingredients that I always have on hand/ or they are at least very easy to get ahold of. They are truly recipes you can reach into your “back pocket” for. After only making a couple times I have all of the above recipes memorized. Easy easy easy! Only problem is now I want to eat pasta every night hahah.
Reviewed in the United States on February 9, 2018
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Reviewed in the United States on February 9, 2018
In love with this cookbook. The recipes are beautifully written and represented beautifully through their pictures. I enjoyed hearing Colu’s voice through her writing. I have really enjoyed everything I have made from the book. Aglio e olio, Cacio e pepe, pasta puttanesca, her basic tomato sauce, her Alfredo recipe is also great and somehow feels lite. Most of the recipe says in this book require ingredients that I always have on hand/ or they are at least very easy to get ahold of. They are truly recipes you can reach into your “back pocket” for. After only making a couple times I have all of the above recipes memorized. Easy easy easy! Only problem is now I want to eat pasta every night hahah.
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Kris
Easiest weeknight meals using pasta with a few fresh ingredients and pantry staples
Reviewed in Canada on December 3, 2018
Kris
Reviewed in Canada on December 3, 2018
In the opening section, Here's How it Goes, she quickly outlines ingredients, tools/kitchen set up, and how to properly cook the pasta (salted water, cook to al dente -- that's key, save the pasta water, have the sauce ready, and to toss your pasta in the sauce). These steps sound like a given but, to be honest, the only step I ever observed was the "cook to al dente" one and now that I've incorporated the others my pasta has gone from okay to restaurant-quality. Who knew that just a few simple steps could have such a marked difference on the outcome of a pasta dish? Even my four-year-old noticed! And it is with these basic tenets that the recipes follow: pulling together a few ingredients with a specific pasta shape to quickly come up with a meal that's delicious and comforting.
The recipes follow in four main sections -- Mama's, Powers Street, Brooklyn, Hudson & The Valley, and Travels Near & Far. Her recipes rely on using dried pasta, which is easy to source and very shelf-stable so that you're always prepared. From there you take fresh ingredients or pantry staples (outlined at the end of the book in the section Stocking Up) and you've got yourself a meal within about an hour. Some of the recipes include meat, poultry or fish but there's lots of plant-based love here too. Out of the 10 recipes I've tried already most can be made vegan simply by omitting the cheese or dairy and there's no reason why if you observe a gluten free diet that you couldn't use your favourite gluten free pasta in place of the regular kind. This is the kind of book Henry has written -- one where you can easily mold a dish to your preferences. It's about finding ease in the kitchen when you need it.
When I made her recipe for Baked Ziti with Crème Fraiche and Spinach, I just omitted the Italian sausage since we're a family of vegetarians. It was that simple and the dish turned out so tasty! It always appeared to me that any baked pasta recipe seems involved but even with this recipe it's on the table within an hour! If that sounds like a long time, there are recipes that can be ready in less than twenty -- take her recipe for Two-Step Tortellini en Brodo. Any type of tortellini paired with any type of stock and there's dinner! I always keep fresh tortellini frozen for quick use and my daughter loved this "noodle soup," as she put it.
Back Pocket Pasta is all about flavour -- less is more it. When my husband and I first met over 17 years ago he was always trying to get me to make pasta with Alfredo sauce, but I thought it was too fussy -- anything with a roux always seems like more effort. Fast forward those years and you've got Carla Lalli Music's recipe for Fusilli Alfredo included in Henry's book. Lalli Music says, "Whoever you make this for will know instantly that you love them very much" and (without a word of a lie) when I served this to my husband, he took one bite and said, "You must really love me!" What I loved about this recipe is that it doesn't contain cream, milk, or flour yet you still end up with the most luxuriously creamy alfredo sauce (as a side convo I didn't have any fusilli on hand, so I used strozzapreti, I felt no stress about not having the exact ingredients on hand and no need to make a trip to the store).
All the recipes in Back Pocket Pasta are tried and true -- handed down within Henry's own family or from her friends. Just as the Alfredo came from Lalli Music a few of the other no-fuss recipes I tried, such as, the Pesto alla Trapanese and the Pasta with Spinach and Goat Cheese, hail from others who are close to Henry. If Henry doesn't have a recipe for it, she knows just the person to call upon. I appreciate how she can point the home cook in the right direction for whatever type of pasta dish they're in the mood for. Bonnie Slotnick's Pasta with Spinach and Goat Cheese is divine! At only 4 ingredients it proves that a homecooked meal is never more than one pot away!
The one section I have yet to really explore is the section on Salads and Sides. Here you'll find several gorgeous salads along with her husband, Chad's, Garlic Bread. There's also a guide on pairing up your meal to a great wine or cocktail. She's thoughtfully included these little extras to round out the book and, in this way, I feel like Back Pocket Pasta acts as both a cookbook as well as a guide to simple, beautiful weeknight meals. There's something to be said for sitting down to a meal that picks you up rather than stressing you out.
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Samantha Briggs
Amazing recipes. Easy to follow for inexperienced cookes and ...
Reviewed in Canada on August 18, 2017
