BOOK REVIEW
FAVORITE BRAND NAME RECIPE COOKBOOK
by the Editors of Consumer Guide
(Beekman House - 1981)
 This is an out-of-print cookbook that's an oldie but a
goodie. It's definitely worth a review, for both fairly new cooks or anyone else who might have missed it the
first time around. Older books don't get a lot of
press, and sometimes that's a shame.
Many home cooks feel that recipes published by the food
companies are the best. If you fall into this
category, then you will likely find this cookbook to be a
great reference.
This book was published at the beginning of the 80's,
that decade when the trend towards new cookbooks all turned
into some variation of "Light" cooking. There are some
low-calorie, low-sodium, and low-cholesterol recipes in here
but tacking the word "Light" or "Lite" onto the recipe name
hadn't yet become popular.
The recipes found in these pages are the tried-and-true
and the most requested of all from the food manufacturers.
These are the recipes from the food labels and the cans and
boxes, tested and re-tested in the test kitchens before
release.
The publication of this book partially solved the problem
of having to dig through a huge, unorganized pile of
clippings searching for a recipe that had been cut out in
the past. At the time, this was the most comprehensive
compilation of brand name recipes that had ever been
published.
Similar books have been, and are still being, published
on this same topic. But it's quite likely that some
recipes in the later publications have been modified or
ignored completely. Even the brand name food websites
don't have room for everything, and this book is a good
source for older recipes.
There are twenty chapters dividing the book into
categories that range from Appetizers to Sauces and Gravies
to Pancakes, Waffles and Crepes. All of the recipes
use brand name ingredients; in fact, it's likely that the
recipe was specifically developed to use for those
particular products by the manufacturer. That's not to
say, however, that substitution brands couldn't be used by a
creative cook.
Athough it does contain several pages of color photos in
the center of the book, it's more of an encyclopedic volume.
Its 384 pages are crammed with over 2,000 recipes.
There are two Indexes--both a General Index and a Recipe
Title Index. Each brand name ingredient has the recipe
titles listed underneath the brand in the General Index.
This is quite helpful if you remember the brand name but not
the exact recipe title, or you're looking for a recipe to
use with an ingredient you already have in your cupboard.
Much of the focus on cooking today is on preparing a meal
in a short amount of time. Yes, we're busy and
overworked, and we still need to get dinner on the table.
Sometimes it seems as if the goal of preparing a meal in
the shortest amount of time possible takes precedence over
the taste of the finished product. It's my opinion
that many of the newer or modified older recipes lack the
zest of the originals.
That being said, none of these recipes are particularly
time-consuming or difficult. They shouldn't be
discounted just because they aren't labeled "Quick and
Easy". After all, they did have to fit onto the
label of the product in the first place.
If you like cooking with brand name ingredients, you'll
find that this book is a valuable resource. This title
was reprinted several times during the 1980's and you can
find it in both softcover and hardcover formats.
Buy this book:
Favorite Brand Name Recipe Cookbook
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