A Complete Basic Cookbook
A Review of Woman's Day Cookbook
Judy Pozar
There are scads of cookbooks on CD-ROM now. The Woman's Day Cookbook, while not head-and-shoulders above the rest, offers a solid basic cookbook with over 500 recipes, plus helpful instructional videos and chapters on a wide variety of useful topics. In addition, you can add and modify recipes to make your own custom cookbook.
The Woman's Day Cookbook includes many of the functions we have come to expect from online cookbooks. You can browse the recipes alphabetically or by chapter. You can search for recipes based on ingredients, preparation time, calories, amount of sodium, fat, or cholesterol, etc. Recipes include complete preparation instructions and nutritional information, and many include photographs. You can create shopping lists, organized by grocery store section. Of course, you can print recipes, ingredient list s, shopping lists, etc.
A number of videos are included. You can watch and learn how to roll out pie dough, or peel squash, for example. In addition, the cookbook includes a lot more than recipes. There is a cheese primer, weekly dinner menus for a year, tables of equivalents and conversions; chapters on wine, herbs and spices, party ideas, and so on. You can even learn how to control bugs when entertaining outdoors.
The worst features are the index and search functions. Recipes are organized alphabetically by title within chapters. I couldn't find Apple Pie when I looked under A in Desserts. Why? Because the recipe title is "Old-Fashioned Apple Pie," filed under O , of course. A search for recipes using the ingredients apple and flour turned up nothing. Why? Because the apple pie recipe calls for "all-purpose flour." Similarly, searching for recipes using cocoa, as well as those using chocolate, did not find Choc olate Mousse. The reason: the ingredient is listed as "unsweetened cocoa powder." These limitations greatly diminish the potential usefulness of the search function.
Aside from these flaws, this cookbook is complete and easy to use. It is not full of elaborate dishes aimed at the gourmet chef. Anyone who enjoys preparing basic, healthful, delicious food will appreciate the recipes and educational text and videos on this CD-ROM.
School House Scorecard
| Product: | Woman's Day Cookbook |
| Company: | Multicom Publishing, Inc. |
| Cost: | $19.95 |
System Requirements:
IBM or compatible PC:
33 MHz 486DX or better, Microsoft Windows 3.1 or later,
SVGA monitor, 8 MB RAM, CD-ROM drive,
Sound Blaster compatible sound board, mouse, printer.
Macintosh:
68030 pprocessor or better, System 7.1 or later,
8MB RAM, Color Macintosh, CD-ROM drive.
Breakdown:
Entertainment Value 3
Educational Value 4
Concept 4
Depth 4
Interface 3
Overall Score:
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