Rose Reisman Brings Home Light Pasta

Frances Emery is an editor and writer in Nepean, Ontario.

This book is dedicated to helping its readers lower their risk of breast
cancer by teaching them to cook and eat more healthily. Pasta is
naturally low in fat and high in fibre, a good nutritional choice in
itself; it is the sauce that can be tricky. Rose Reisman shows how to
keep that sauce low-fat but delicious.

There are recipes for soups, salads, and sauces, chicken, fish, and
other meats, and all kinds of vegetables and cheeses—all with various
pastas. The author has not tried to give us a dessert pasta dish (thank
goodness), but she has probably included everything else you could want
to know about pasta. A glossary of the various pasta types is useful.
Another section tells how to cook and serve it (now I know why not to
mix the sauce with the pasta until the last moment!)

The nutritional analysis accompanying each recipe is invaluable (and
should be a component of any modern cookbook), and the book begins with
an informative section on pasta and nutrition, written by nutrition
analysts.

The recipes we tried worked well, but we did have some minor
criticisms. The sauces usually seemed to need salt (it is never among
the listed ingredients). The instructions always suggest cooking the
pasta first, but it often took longer to prepare the sauce than to cook
the pasta. Experienced users would soon learn when to put the pasta on,
but novice cooks might find themselves with cold pasta before the rest
of the meal was ready.

Sidebar hints add useful tips and “make-ahead” suggestions (which
would also help solve any cold-pasta problems). Ingredients are given in
both metric and Imperial measures.

I recommend this for anyone wanting a somewhat specialized book that
still provides for a wide variety of tastes. It would be excellent for
the cook trying to tempt a fussy palate with a low-fat
cuisine—especially if that palate already adored pasta. It would also
be good for the beginning cook or one on a budget.