The Dinner Doctor

The doctor's back, and now she's curing dinner woes! Anne Byrn, the award-winning food writer and author of The Cake Mix Doctor and Chocolate from the Cake Mix Doctor does for dinner what she did for dessert-shows how to take common, convenient supermarket ingredients and turn them into meals that taste like they're made from scratch. Making excellent use of the Crock-Pot and other labor-saving appliances, incorporating hundreds of shortcuts and tips, and cooking from a pantry of prepared foods-whether canned, frozen, jarred, dried, or fresh from the salad bar-the Dinner Doctor shows how to make over 200 fast and kid-friendly appetizers, salads, soups, sides, and main courses. Take, for example, a can of tuna, and think outside the sandwich: Add beans, tomato, and a vinaigrette, and it becomes a Tuscan Tuna and White Bean Salad. Turn that healthy mixture into a pasta salad with the addition of cooked penne. And make a speedy pasta supper by tossing the salad with sautéed zucchini and a generous shower of shredded Parmesan. Or, whip up a Tuna Noodle Casserole like mom used to make-but faster and healthier-by lightening the traditional cream of mushroom soup with lemon juice and lowfat milk and using precooked pasta and frozen peas. There are dozens of ways to doctor deli-counter basics into stunning hors d'oeuvres. Five quick casserole toppers. Five zippy garlic breads and 30 ways to dress up frozen peas and frozen spinach. And the "15s"-15 cold pasta sauces, 15 ways to doctor deli chicken, 15 meals made from summer tomatoes, and more.