The Gourmet Light Menu Cookbook: Exciting New Recipes for the Health-Conscious Cook

As in her previous cookbook, Gourmet Light, Underwood has an inspired knack for inventing light and healthy recipes so good that one doesn't think of what's being missed. The more than 150 recipes, which include information about cholesterol, salt and other nutritive banes, are organized into menus for every occasion, from formal dinners to easygoing pasta parties. For example, one menu calls for poached swordfish with lemon-dill sauce, sweet-potato fries, zucchini pancakes with tomato relish, and nectarines and peaches in minted orange sauce (this last a typical contrast on Underwood's part to the conventional and dull dieter's dessert of plain fruit). Among the author's calorie-cutting tricks are replacing ordinary pastry dough with phyllo and using arrowroot instead of a flour thickener. She refuses, however, to substitute margarine for butter, dry milk powder for cream or low-salt canned chicken broth for real stock. This is a creative, welcome book. (November)