Notes from a slim gourmet

A lot of my diet cookbooks look like they've never been used before. No notes. No food stains. Just pages of untouched recipes calling for unconscionable amounts of nonfat dry milk, cottage cheese, and eggs. The Slim Gourmet Cookbook (Barbara Gibbons, 1976) was different because it was clearly used! Whoever owned this before me actually made the recipes and took notes, so let's check out a few comments.

Apparently, the previous owner was serious about cutting calories. Putting eggs in everything was a staple of those old diet regimes, but this cook didn't buy it.

Why add an egg to the Italian Spinach Meatballs when you can omit it to cut calories? The cook is technically right-- one large egg is about 78 calories. Dividing it by four (the number of servings) means saving a little under 20 calories a serving, which apparently was enough to make it worthwhile for this cook. I also like that the note claims this has a "very interesting taste." Interesting is not generally a word I use when I'm praising food-- It usually means I'm trying to say something nice when I don't actually have anything nice to say. The suggested pairing of spaghetti and "italian zuchinni" seems to suggest this was genuinely meant as a compliment, though. Why suggest accompaniments for something you're never going to eat again?

This cook really seemed to like Italian-ish dishes with zucchini, too.

I was amused by the note that "zucchini makes it seem more robust, spicy." Their spelling of "zucchini" improves when the word is written on the page, so that's good. However, I'm not sure robust is a word I'd ever think to use to describe zucchini, and spicy is definitely not (especially when the only seasonings in the dish are garlic salt, pepper, and oregano)! The underline of "optional" by Parmesan makes me think this cook cut out the cheese to save calories, just like they omitted the egg.

The cook wasn't wild about everything in the book, though.

I love that Sweet and Sour Cod is "good ≠ great but good." Not great. I don't know whether the underline for good is to emphasize that it's still a pretty solid choice despite falling short of greatness, or to emphasize that it's just mediocre at best.

That's not the only note I could read two ways. Spicy Sole has my favorite ambiguous comment.

It's "good - if you like steak sauce." I can imagine the person who wrote this being a steak sauce junky and meaning it as praise, but you know my tone would be unrepentantly sarcastic if I read it out loud.

In short, I loved that this book had some running commentary! The writer just had such an interesting take on the recipes.