NancyM's Reviews
Cookbook Reviews
Half a can of tomato paste and other culinary dilemmas: A cookbook
By Jean Anderson and Ruth Buchan
Harper & Row - 1980
There's usually something that could have been done differently to suit my tastes in every cookbook. Well, for this cookbook, I have absolutely no complaints at all! This may just be the most useful cookbook in my kitchen.
The premise of the book is based on the fact that many times food we purchase is packaged in sizes that are not typically used up in one recipe. Tomato paste took first place as the most often cited culprit for being a leftover when the authors polled folks, hence the title of the book. Besides the things that clutter up our refrigerators like bits of cheese, cream, or half a green pepper, staple products are also covered such as molasses, various flours, bread crumbs, corn syrup, and brown sugar. Each food has its own chapter with information and recipes.
Each ingredient's chapter begins with information on that food which is followed by information sorted into these sections: Best Way to Store; Maximum Storage Time; Roles in Cooking; Recipe Uses; How to Use Very Small Amounts; Special Comments; and finally the recipes. This information is comprehensive and extremely useful. No more excuses for throwing out those half empty packages of food!
The recipes are varied and in an attempt to not create more leftovers, are very flexible with multiple substitutions suggested. This is extremely helpful and allows a cook to really use up what one has on hand instead of buying more ingredients that may not be used up fully.
The Appendix - A List of Recipes Categorized According to the Leftovers They Use - is a brilliant addition to the book and one that would be great to see in more cookbooks. It lists all the recipes that a particular ingredient is used in and how much of the ingredient is needed. An addition to this appendix by adding the page number to the recipe would have been helpful; as it is, you need to find the page the recipe is on by looking it up in the index.
This book gets lots of use for inspiration and storage information here. It is a real workhorse of a book. It would be wonderful if the authors did a new revised edition to show us how to take care of the new ingredients we now find ourselves creating leftovers of like canned chipotle peppers, specialty oils, sun-dried tomatoes, coconut milk, and Thai chili paste. But I'll keep this one close to the kitchen for all the ingredients that tend to hang around too long!