Ina Garten: Go-To Dinners Review

Go-To Dinners: A Barefoot Contessa Cookbook

It's been a while since we reviewed a book from the Barefoot Contessa. In this week's cookbook review, we bring you Ina Garten: Go-To Dinners, the latest cookbook from America's favorite home cook.

In her latest cookbook, Ina presents delicious, crowd-pleasing, go-to recipes that you'll want to make over and over again! Even Ina, America's most trusted and beloved home cook, sometimes finds cooking stressful. To make life easy, she relies on recipes she knows will turn out perfectly every time.

Cooking night after night during the pandemic inspired her to re-think how she approached dinner, and the result is this collection of comforting and delicious recipes that you'll love preparing and serving. You'll find lots of freeze-ahead, make-ahead, prep-ahead, and simply assembled recipes so you, too, can make dinner a breeze.

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Uncomplicated Recipes

In Go-To Dinners, Ina shares her strategies for making her most satisfying and uncomplicated dinners. Many, like Overnight Mac & Cheese, you can make ahead and throw in the oven right before dinner. Light dinners like Tuscan White Bean Soup can be prepped ahead and assembled at the last minute.

Go-to family meals like Chicken in a Pot with Orzo and Hasselback Kielbasa will feed a crowd with minimal effort. And who doesn't want to eat Breakfast For Dinner? You'll find recipes for Scrambled Eggs Cacio e Pepe, and Roasted Vegetables with Jammy Eggs that are a snap to make and so satisfying. Ina's "Two-Fers" guide you on how to turn leftovers from one dinner into something different and delicious the second night.

Sometimes the best dinner is one you don't even have to cook! You'll find Ina's favorite boards to serve with store-bought ingredients, like an Antipasto Board and Breakfast-for-Dinner Board that are fun to assemble and so impressive to serve.

Finally, because no meal can be considered dinner without dessert, there are plenty of prep-ahead and easy sweets like a Bourbon Chocolate Pecan Pie and Beatty's Chocolate Cupcakes that everyone will rave about.

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“I Love You, Come for Dinner!”

For Ina, "I love you, come for dinner" is more than just an invitation to share a meal. It's a way to create a community of friends and family who love and care for each other. Dinner nourishes our bodies, but the connection with the people we love nourishes our souls.

Go-To Dinners is a book about the connection between food and people! Here you'll find recipes for any occasion. Some recipes were just really easy to make and totally delicious. Others could be prepped largely in advance and thrown in the oven just before the meal, while still others could be made entirely ahead of time and reheated before serving.

English Cream Scones can be made in advance, frozen, and baked off for breakfast, tea in the afternoon, or breakfast for dinner. Smoked Salmon Quesadillas can be assembled ahead and pan-fried for appetizers while Panettone Bread Pudding can be put together early and baked off before dinner.

With recipes that are easy to do and never fail, Go-To Dinners is a book that takes the stress out of cooking, leaving only space for fun and mouth-watering food.

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Final Thoughts

Above all, Go-To Dinners is a book about comfort and delicious recipes that work every time. This is a book with easy-to-prepare recipes that are still delicious enough to get everyone to your table so you, too, can create a happy community of family and friends around yourself. We all need that in our lives, and we couldn't agree more with Ina when she says everything starts with dinner.