Skinny Italian - Teresa Giudice

So I'm still digging through my ancestry looking for the Italian link. It must be there somewhere, because when I cook Italian...making my own pesto, or making homemade ricotta, or making tomato sauce with slow-roasted plum tomatoes...I get all TINGLY and WARM inside. But of course there are all those pesky carbs and cheese and things, but when I read about Skinny Italian from Kathy @ Bermudaonion, I figure I'm buying what they're sellin'.

This isn't your mother's cookbook (no offense to mom). Teresa, who starred on "The Real Housewives of New Jersey", is all-woman, all-Italian, and loves a big plate of pasta. She looks like a million bucks, but doesn't really like exercising much (except in the bedroom), and kvetched over having her "bubbies" done (but who would blame her after four kids??). She not only provides us with some great low-calorie recipes, but gives loads of practical advice in the kitchen, like:

* How to spot true Italian food, versus a knockoff

* How to pick out a good bottle of olive oil, then how to cook and bake with it

* Everything you'd ever want to know about spices, including when to add it to food, and how to store it

* 6 rules for loving your food and having it love you back

* The truth about pasta, and which kind is best

* How to make a quickie tomato sauce, and how to can it

* How to get the kids involved in the kitchen

All good stuff, this. But she does it in a way that will have your Chianti coming out your nose because you are laughing so hard. Anybody that entitles a paragraph "OO, VOO, EVOO, WTF?" or calls all the bad foods "stripper foods" (foods that are also stripper names like Cookie, Candy, or Cupcake), well, they have my attention.

Never mind that she seems to cook in clothes that I would wear to a Christmas party. Whatever she is doing, it is working for her.

I made several recipes from this book before I had to return it to the library...it was on hold unfortunately, so I couldn't renew. First, I made the Quickie Tomato Sauce, a double portion, and used it all week for various recipes. It took 10 minutes!

I also made something called Pork Chops Alla Salvia, which was a pan-fried bone-in pork chop that used herbs and some of my tomato sauce. Everyone ate it and was happy, without complaint.

Then my piece de resistance, Gabriella's Bolognese Sauce, which uses my tomato sauce, chopped veggies and lots of garlic (minced in my case so the kids couldn't see them), ground pork and veal, and some wine, and simmered it all afternoon. My husband was almost rolling around in it, and claimed he could have that dish once a week (a big complement from him, the king of wanting new recipes all the time).

I thoroughly enjoyed this cookbook, almost to the point where I might just need to own it!

Weekend Cooking is hosted by Beth Fish Reads and is open to anyone who has any kind of food-related post to share: Book (novel, nonfiction) reviews, cookbook reviews, movie reviews, recipes, random thoughts, gadgets, fabulous quotations, photographs. If your post is even vaguely foodie, feel free to grab the button and link up anytime over the weekend. Please link to your specific post, not your blog's home page. For more information, see the welcome post.