The Best of Cooking Light: Over 500 of Our All-Time Greatest Recipes

I don't think I could ever ask for a better cookbook. This one has EVERYTHING! Ethnic dishes, great desserts, vegetarian and meaty dishes! You'll never need another cookbook. And the best thing? TONS of *large* mouth watering pictures. At least 1/3 of the dishes listed are accompanied by a picture. I sit down and flip through this book even when I'm *not* the one cooking dinner! Only thing to keep in mind that the meals in this book are only light when the suggested serving size is consumed. However, the book makes it easy for us healthy eatters by providing the calories, fat, protein, carbs, cholestoral, icon and sodium percentages of each dish! I can't say enough good things about this book! Buy it!!... and while you're at that, buy one for your mother, sister, best friend and third cousin-twice removed too!

99% of the recipes I've tried have been a hit with my family, which includes 2 grade-school-age kids. (If you subscribe to Cooking Light Mag., you know the recipes are hit-or-miss, but this book compiles all the best ones--staff and reader nominated.) I do have to disagree with another post that said the recipes are easy and use ingredients you already have... if you don't have time to cook, some of these recipes will be too cumbersome for you. (Think roasting and peeling your own peppers for an otherwise simple guacamole.) The ingredients lists are also quite long for most recipes. They will force you to use lots of things you may not be used to, especially veggies and spices. That said, I have had great fun trying new things. Cooking Light does a great job of emphasizing flavor without much fat. The pizza recipes are great; you can skip the homemade dough for the crust and use frozen. I've had some great sandwiches, too.

"The Best of ...." books are ideal for people who don't subscribe to the magazine, and I don't. What this book does is clearly point out that the idea of cooking light doesn't have to be the usual bland stuff. When I opened the book it fell open to Roasted-Poblano Guacamole. Wow! Then I flipped a few pages and came up with Buffalo-Style Catfish Strips. Double Wow! There's a whole section on breads. I don't normally bake, but their Jamaican Banana Bread just happened to fit the ripe bananas sitting on the counter. The rum, pecan and coconut topping for the bread sounds great. The bread has just finished cooking as I write so I can't tell about it yet (too hot). I had to sample the topping while preparing it and it's wonderful -- just like the whole house smells. This book is organized by the big dishes: breads, meats, soups, desserts, etc. The only real question is how light can these foods be, yet the banana bread took half or less of the sugar that most banana bread recipes require. That's a lot lighter. Highly recommended.

I am rarely a collector of "Best of" anythings, usually finding them too confusing and incomplete. Besides, who's deciding the "best"...? This book is an exception. As a seriously addicted Foodie, my new cookbooks are read as I would a novel; from cover to cover. If there is a recipe that I want to try I mark it with one of those little colored post-its. This book is full of little purple post-its. Even though I subscribe to the magazine of the same name, and make at least one thing out of it each month, there is something quite satisfying about having all 500 of the "best" recipes in one volume, without all the ads. Pictures are divine. The instructions clear as a bell. It has recipes for novice and intermediate cooks alike. Some recipes are quick to prepare and others can take awhile. But none are very complicated. I made the "Gorgonzola Fettuccine with Asparagus" in about 25 minutes (including preparing the asparagus) for a surprise lunch guest, and the very nice "Eggplant Parmesan Lasagne" in about an hour when my guy and I decided last minute to nix dinner "out". The "Caesar Potato Salad" was oh-so-good with a roasted chicken on a busy Sunday (the touches of anchovy paste and vermouth were fun.) Almost every recipe makes some sort of substitution in the name of lower calories and fat, satisfying the "light" part of the title, but this is not a low-carb book (thank goodness...) I like having the nutritional information handy, even if I don't feel like planning a meal around it! Bottom line...nothing out-of-this-world innovative or exotic or too new, really. But good, interesting, easy to prepare, lower calorie, everyday recipes in ONE volume. A great book to add to your collection or give to the beginning "foodie" in your circle!