Lisa Messinger's
Cookbooks of the Week

Looneyspoons!
Low-Fat Food Made Fun!
By Janet Podleski and Greta Podleski (Perigee)

If you giggle at chapter titles like "Meatless in Seattle," "The Bowled and the Beautiful" and "Fishing for Compliments," then there is also lots more that will make you chuckle in Looneyspoons. The clever Podleski sisters (their other humorous best-selling cookbook is Crazy Plates published by Perigee and this repackaged version of their self-published 750,000-copies-sold smash Looneyspoons is to match that edition) hammer home points about low-fat cooking with bushels of cartoons and jokes in a colorful format more reminiscent of a kids' book than a cookbook. The recipes aren't only fun, they are easy and while no one—not even the cartoon characters in the book—would call the recipes gourmet, the sisters are major talents at making low-fat fare taste like rich comfort food. Some of the standouts: Roast Feast (a top sirloin roast basted in barbeque sauce, beef broth, Worcestershire sauce, garlic, dry mustard, black pepper and lime juice and served with roasted cabbage, onions, potatoes and sweet potatoes); Dressed-to-Grill Pork Chops (marinated in spicy tomato juice, garlic, brown sugar, Worcestershire sauce and chili powder); Slim, Trim and Scalloped Spuds (oozing with cheese); Glazed and Confused Carrots (shiny with peach jam, orange zest, Dijon mustard and ground thyme); and deceiving desserts like No Pudge Fudge, Deep-Dish Peach Pie and Chocolate-Banana Cream Pie.

RECIPE: SLIM, TRIM AND SCALLOPED SPUDS