It doesn't matter if it's boiled . . .

[omorka]

Is it too much to ask that the author of a cookbook not say incredibly stupid things?

First of all, there's the annoying habit that this author has of using artificial sweeteners - and adding them to practically everything, including, say, bean soup. But okay, I'm used to omitting things (the amount of bell pepper I have omitted from various recipes over my lifetime would probably embarrass most cooks).

Then she drops the line "If you grew up enjoying lunches of tomato soup and a sandwich, you're about ready to experience a remarkable flavorfest that will launch you into a new millennium of taste!" Which is just exceptionally bad writing. (The miraculous ingredients that will usher in said millennium are canned mushrooms and dried Italian seasoning, which fail to strike me as all that remarkable, considering.)

Then we get to the recipe for "Old World Cabbage-Rice Soup." The first four ingredients are ground turkey and three tomato products. Yeah, that's old-world. (I suppose I should just be glad that there were no peppers in there.)

I'm seriously tempted to try and return this cookbook as seriously defective . . .

Comments

[memeslayer.livejournal.com]

Mmm... dried Italian seasoning... so tasty... :-D

I mean, yeah, that's awful. And stuff. :-p

[quantumduck.livejournal.com]

Perhaps you have to be the sort of person who grew up eating tomato soup out a can and simple sandwiches to appreciate her. It sounds like a very midwestern set of recipes.

[omorka.livejournal.com]

She's from Iowa, but surely that's no excuse for not knowing basic culinary geography. (Or for attempting to make chili with only two teaspoons of chili powder. My gods, I'm from the Deep South - not a place famed for having much of a peppertongue - and I'd barely be able to taste that.)

[binaryathena.livejournal.com]

old world cabbage soup probably shouldn't have rice either.
old world cabbage soup has cabbage, more cabbage, and eurasian roots, like turnips or rutabagas. Because with beets, it iw borscht

It sounds like a poor cookbook. Which artificial sweetner is it she is heating anyway? Aspartame denatures and is no longer sweet when heated. Sucralose can be boiled or baked, but there are texture differences, and sacharin doesn't bake well at all.

And 2 tsp of chili powder is a individual seasoning packet --

[omorka.livejournal.com]

At least the rice is native to Eurasia . . .

The artificial sweetener she most commonly uses is Splenda - that's sucralose, right? It's a crockpot cookbook, and I don't understand people who insist on sweetening their stews. Once you've cooked the onions for eight hours, they've added more sweetening than any stew should need . . . I always have to add vinegar or salt to make it less sweet.