Month: June 2025

Posted in Book Reviews

You Can Trust a Skinny Cook: 140 Recipes That Love You Back

Posted on by Reluctant Retiree

o-host of Lifetime’s Cook Yourself Thin Allison Fishman shows you how to eat great—and look even better!

In You Can Trust a Skinny Cook, Allison Fishman teaches you how to stay thin and trim without giving up on the good things in life. She shows you how to take control of your health by taking charge in the kitchen with delicious, healthy meals served in the right portions.

You’ll learn how to cook with confidence, making your neighbors jealous both for your cooking skills and your great figure. Recipes include handy “Kitchen Tips” that make cooking simple and “Skinny Kitchen Tips” for cutting out the calories without losing the flavor. Recipes like Slow Roasted Salmon with Lemon Dill Sauce, Three Cheese Mac and Cheese, New England Clam Chowder, and even decadent desserts like Berry Cobbler with Buttermilk Biscuits are so good, you’d never know that they’re made with healthy ingredients and techniques.

  • A smart guide to enjoying great food and great health
  • From Lifetime and TLC star Allison Fishman, an authority on healthy and delicious cooking
  • Features recipes that cover every meal of the day, including desserts and snacks
  • Full of simple cooking instructions and nutritional information per serving

You Can Trust a Skinny Cook is the only guide home cooks need to eat the foods they love in a healthy way. So live it up—without giving anything up!

Posted in #Recipes

75 Classic & Creative Italian Dinners That Are 100% Nonna-Approved

Posted on by Reluctant Retiree

While we love Italian pizza and pasta, there’s tons more Italian-inspired dinner ideas that’ll have you feeling like you have your own Italian nonna on-call to teach you how to make all the classics. These 75 Italian dinner recipes will help you venture outside the Olive Garden and highlight some of the many diverse flavors in Italian cuisine. Our traditional recipes for Sunday sauce, chicken Parm, the best homemade lasagna ever, and more will have you feeling like you’re running your own Roman trattoria in no time.

Think outside the pasta box with our favorite homemade Italian classics that will make any weeknight feel like a special occasion. Our dream Italian feast? We love pairing a hearty main like osso buco or chicken scallopini with a decadent pasta side, like our orzo al limone, our spaghetti all’assassina, or our creamy risotto. Add a Caprese salad, our sheet-pan panzanella, or our antipasto salad on the side, and you’ll be sure to get more than few chef’s kisses. Okay, maybe add a glass of vino or a negroni for good measure too.

There’s no coincidence that the “eat” portion of Eat, Pray, Love took place in Rome, and we’ve got plenty of Italian pasta recipes to prove it. And we’re not just talking about spaghetti & meatballs either. There are actually four classic Roman pasta dishes: pasta alla gricia, bucatini all’amatriciana, spaghetti carbonara, and cacio e pepe. No surprise: They’re all wildly good. But don’t stop there! Try our recipe for homemade pasta dough, homemade cavatelli, and ricotta gnudi for the most authentic pasta night ever.

Cooking Italian food for dinner is one of the better decisions to be made all week long. The absolute best idea? Pair a fun Italian dessert to go with this feast—but hey, it’s your party! Mangia!

delish!

Posted in Book Reviews

Sunday Soup: A Year’s Worth of Mouth-Watering, Easy-to-Make Recipes

Posted on by Reluctant Retiree

Bisques and gumbos, chilies and chowders—a recipe for every week of the year: “The best of the best . . . a winner.” —James Peterson, author of Splendid Soups

Sunday is the perfect day to slow down and enjoy a heartwarming meal. From spicy chilies to steaming chowders, Sunday Soup features sixty recipes: one for each Sunday of the year, and then some.

Gulf Coast Shrimp Gumbo is best for staving off the winter cold, while Dreamy Creamy Artichoke Soup welcomes the bounty of spring’s vegetables. When it’s too hot to turn on the stove, chill out with Icy Cucumber Soup with Smoked Salmon and Dill. Plus, a great selection of “Soup-er Sides” will turn any bowl of soup into a hearty meal. No matter the season, Sunday Soup offers all the inspiration you needs to pull out a stockpot and start simmering a new family tradition. Soup’s on!

Posted in #Recipes

Barbecue Lasagna

Posted on by Reluctant Retiree

Barbecue lasagna has the essential gooey cheese and noodles, but in a shocking plot twist, it packs a punch with a smoky, savory, sweet homemade barbecue sauce.

I love a good food mashup. Barbecue lasagna combines two icons of the comfort food world in one casserole pan, setting them up to become the power couple they never knew they could be. This isn’t your Nonna’s lasagna (unless your Nonna wears cowboy boots and grills ribs on the weekend).

To build this beast, you’ll layer ground beef, three cheeses and a homemade barbecue sauce so tangy and sweet it might just kick tomato sauce out of your pantry. Serve this baked pasta if you need to shock your in-laws into silence with flavor, for weeknight dinners when you’re feeling a little rebellious, or whenever you want to blow minds with something cozy, cheesy and unexpected.

Ingredients for Barbecue Lasagna

  • Ground beef: Use a blend of 80% lean ground beef for the most flavor. Leaner blends work too.
  • Barbecue sauce: This homemade sauce is sweet, tangy and bold, and combines ketchup, chopped green pepper, diced onion, brown sugar, lemon juice, cider vinegar, Worcestershire sauce, prepared mustard, minced garlic, clove salt, pepper, chili powder and lemon-pepper seasoning.
  • Lasagna noodles: Traditional noodles work well here, but you can also use no-boil noodles to skip a step (and a pot). Just add a bit more sauce for moisture.
  • Mozzarella cheese: Mozzarella brings that classic lasagna meltiness. Shredding the cheese yourself ensures a better melt.
  • Sharp cheddar cheese: Sharp cheddar cuts through the sweet barbecue sauce.
  • Colby cheese: Mild and melty Colby rounds out the flavor party and balances the sharper flavors.
  • Cottage cheese and egg: This lasagna filling uses cottage cheese and an egg instead of ricotta. If you like the finer texture of ricotta, drain the cottage cheese and blitz it in a food processor until it’s smooth.

Taste of Home

Posted in #Recipes

40 Spicy Recipes That’ll Blow Your Top

Posted on by Reluctant Retiree

Time to turn up the heat! These spicy recipes are just what you need to kick things up a notch.

Taste of Home

Posted in Book Reviews

Recipes from Around Our Family Table 

Posted on by Reluctant Retiree

Make dinner the Carrabba’s way tonight, with these tasty, Italian family recipes.

For twenty-five years, Carrabba’s Italian Grill has offered its amici (Italian for “friends”) an extraordinary dining experience. Serving hand-prepared, contemporary renditions of traditional family recipes, Carrabba’s makes everyone who walks through the door feel right at home. Each meal is served in the time-honored tradition of warm Italian hospitality and authentically prepared food made from the heart.

Now, you can re-create the Carrabba’s experience in your own kitchen with delicious recipes inspired by generations of family cooking. In the true spirit of generosity, Recipes from Around Our Family Table shares not just these mouthwatering signature recipes, but also the cooking secrets that make them so good.

Features 75 authentic Italian recipes and Carrabba’s favorites, including:

  • ·       Chicken Bryan
  • ·       Mama Mandola’s Sicilian Chicken Soup
  • ·       Pizza Margherita
  • ·       Cozze in Bianco
  • ·       Pollo Rosa Maria
  • ·       Garlic Mashed Potatoes
  • ·       Pasta Weesie
  • ·       Lobster Macaroni and Cheese
  • ·       Prosciutto-wrapped Pork Tenderloin
  • ·       Sogno di Cioccolata
  • ·       Limoncello Bread Pudding
  • Also offers tips on successful grilling, preparing perfect pasta, finding the best ingredients, mastering homemade pizza, and more!
Posted in #Recipes

49 Irresistible No-Bake Chocolate Desserts

Posted on by Reluctant Retiree

No oven, no problem! Get your chocolate fix in with these no-bake desserts like chocolate dipped cookies, fudge and more.

    Taste of Home

    Posted in Book Reviews

    5 Ingredients or Less Slow Cooker Cookbook

    Posted on by Reluctant Retiree

    The easiest slow cooker recipes ever, from the New York Times–bestselling author of Make It Fast, Cook It Slow.
     
    Stephanie O’Dea, author of Make It Fast, Cook It Slow and 365 Slow Cooker Suppers, is back with her easiest assortment of recipes ever in 5 Ingredients or Less Slow Cooker Cookbook. A breeze to throw together, these recipes are still full of flavor and creativity.
     
    O’Dea shows how to make standard slow-cooker fare delectable, with recipes like Pulled Pork Jalapeño Dip, Pureed Pumpkin Soup, and Cornbread Casserole, while also providing plenty of unexpected slow cooker dishes like Ginger Glazed Mahi Mahi, Artichoke Angel Hair Pasta, Flan, and Cheesecake.
     
    Also included is a whole chapter for vegetarian meals, as well as gluten-free options for every recipe in the book—and all with five ingredients or less!

    Posted in #Recipes

    75 Summer Chicken Recipes You Can Enjoy All Season Long

    Posted on by Reluctant Retiree

    We’ve all heard the adage, “chicken is “what’s for dinner”… We say that’s especially true come summertime. Chicken pairs perfectly with all our favorite summer veggies, like summer squash and tomatoes; takes to all our favorite warm-weather cooking techniques, like grilling and air frying; and makes for some of the best potluck dishes for picnics and BBQs. Check out our 75 summer chicken recipes for ideas—from mains to sides, they’re ALL winners.

    Did you know you can shop for all the ingredients for these recipes with the click of a button? Look for the Shop With Instacart button and simply click, shop, and wait for your delivery to arrive. Dinner truly made easier.

    When it’s hot out, we love getting out of our warm kitchens and into the great outdoors, and we’re taking chicken with us. You can turn it into a super-easy weeknight dinner on the grill with our paella-inspired party packs, our cilantro-lime chicken skewers, or our grilled Persian chicken. It’s also great for celebratory dinners (for Memorial Day or Father’s Day, maybe?)—check out our tequila-lime chicken thighs, our pineapple teriyaki chicken (served in a pineapple), or our brick chicken recipes; they’re sure to impress. You could also turn them into surefire summer party crowd-pleasers, like our curried chicken salad, chicken pasta salad, or our sheet-pan green chile chicken nachos.

    We wait all year for our favorite summer fruits and veggies, so we take advantage of them as often as we can when they’re in season. That means if we’re serving chicken, it’s getting paired with all our faves, like bell peppers, zucchini, and corn. Check out our elote (Mexican street corn) tacos, our chicken chowder zucchini boats, and our honey mustard chicken, tomato & zucchini foil packs for ideas. One of our favorite tricks? If you’ve got a favorite winter or fall chicken recipes, summer-fy it by adding some grilled veggies or juicy summer fruit—you never know, you might discover a new favorite!

    Want more summertime inspiration? Check out our ultimate grilling recipes, our fave summer salads, and our top summer desserts too.

    delish!

    Posted in #Recipes

    23 Recipes That Will Use Up Every Last Fruit & Veggie From Your Garden (Or Local Farmer’s Market!)

    Posted on by Reluctant Retiree

    Though I have admitted recently to being a little sick of summer, I’m not a complete monster. I know I’ll be sad when many of my favorite warm weather fruits and veggies—peaches! tomatoes! zucchini!—become less readily available, particularly because we created and updated some especially GORGEOUS recipes this year (I mean, just look at our blackberry-peach salad😍). To celebrate them and say goodbye to summer right, I’m making these 23 dinners, drinks, sides, and more one last time. They’re all pretty easy (much of the glory of summer produce is how it pretty much does the work for you), and are wonderful whether you enjoy them solo on a weeknight or serve them to friends at a end-of-summer dinner party. Best part? They’re all pretty versatile, so use whatever produce you over-bought at the farmer’s market or that grew rampant in your backyard garden to make them.

    delish!