In addition to her roles as a singer, performer and talk show host, Dinah Shore was also know among her friends and acquaintances as something of a cook. In 1971, she took all that food knowledge and put it into this book, Someone's in the Kitchen with Dinah (lucky for her, she just happened to have the best name ever for a cookbook). She included over 200 recipes, most of which being things she did like to cook at home, as well as a few from close friends. She opens the book up with a chatty introduction and then moves into some party planning tips. One interesting piece of advice is to give two or three parties in a row, so that you can return a number of invitations on the same flowers and boxes of crackers, while keeping the numbers manageable. It makes some sense, although I don't think that there are quite so many rules about the reciprocation of invitations as there once was.
Surprisingly, her recipes are nearly universally good. They all bear the marks of a true home cook, someone who likes to make big, tasty pots of soups and stews or a batch of meatloaf quickly and without fancy ingredients or fanfare. The only suspect thing I spotted was a hamburger recipe that called for a teaspoon of MSG. I guess this was before the days when it was determined that it isn't so good for you. There are a number of recipes I've marked in the book that I'd like to try, including the Fried Chicken Cuffy, the Tennessee Lasagna and the Beef Stroganoff and Kasha (her Jewish upbringing really shows here, which delights me!)
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