Hello Friends and welcome to Cooking The Books! Each year I try to think of something new to do here to keep both you and me interested! The pandemic brought the idea to cook my way through all the novels of Agatha Christie, my ever-expanding magazine collection brought us my 20 Years Ago Today Posts. My obsession with both old and new cookbooks has now spawned Cooking the Books.  This might be a review of something new and exciting in my collection. Or something old and exciting in my collection. Basically, it’s an opportunity for me to cook from some books that otherwise would be languishing on my bookshelves.  And that’s no way to treat a cookbook!  

Girl Dinner: The Book

Girl Dinner is a new addition to my collection and it is a super fun book! For those of you not familiar with the concept of Girl Dinner, author Jamison Diaz-Imlah explains the concept as follows:

“Girl dinner is a simple meal made by arranging ingredients that are readily available in the store or kitchen pantry. It started on TikTok when a user named Olivia Maher responded to a video mocking medieval peasants who had to eat bread and cheese for dinner. Olivia’s response was simple – “But that’s my dinner!”- and the girl dinner was born”

Friday night has long been my Girl Dinner night – it is ususally something snacky, nearly always includes cheese and is just fun quick food! 

Above all for me, this book was fun!  The recipes aren’t going to win any awards for ingenuity.  This is not Heston inspired food.  But it is simple food, beautifully presented and let’s face it, we’re probably far more likely to cook from this book rather than a modernist creation on a busy weeknight!   Recipes include a Smoked salmon bagel, a croque madame and a Boursin and potato omelette.  But, they are given fun and witty names – Holey Art Thou, Broke Madame and Sometimes You Get The Bear respectively. These really tickled by love of puns!  My favourite name was “All I care about is pasta and like three people”.  Swap out pasta for cheese and that is me in ten words! 

Girl Dinner also contains some great ideas for eating for one.  I feel this is an area where people may tend to skimp on presentation or care for ingredients.  This book acts as a little form of self love in showing that food for one can look beautiful as well as being quick to prepare and mostly healthy!    

I would say, for me, the only drawback to Girl Dinner is that some people may not be able to access some of the exact things that the authors suggest you use as your hack ingredients.  For example, are Greek meatballs and caulilfower gnocchi available everywhere?  I don’t know, I’ve never bought a ready made meatball and I don’t like gnocchi.  Having sald that, I’m sure some type of meatball or gnocchi will be available if not specifically Greek and cauliflower.  Or you could make your own.  Or skip that recipe.  Theres a lot to choose from!  

Girl Dinner: The Look

One word:  Gorgeous! 

But here’s a few more:  Beautiful Food, presented and photographed beautifully.  Here are a few examples:

Can you believe this spectacular salad takes only 10 minutes to make? 

Here is a Turkey and Brie Melt AKA Living for Leftovers 

These Greek Meatballs (Sunday Kind of Love in Girl Dinner language) are high on my list of things to make:

Girl Dinner is fun and vibrant – the authors talk about combining simplicity with style and this is exactly what you get!

Girl Dinner – The Cook

I’ve made three things from Girl Dinner thus far.  Above you can see Holey Art Thou and Sometimes You Get The Bear.  The third thing I made was a Whipped Feta which is called Everyone’s Doing It. 

I made the most amazing girl dinner, using the Whipped Feta in two different ways.  The first was as a base for a Greek inspired salad (pictured above).  

I simply spread some of the whipped feta on a plate, and added chopped tomatoes, cucumber, kalamata olives and red onion.  I usually have dill on my Greek Salad but I didn’t have any so I added some mint from the garden instead.  This was delicious.  So fresh and so easy to do!  This with some bread would be a perfect lunch for me!  I could also eat Greek Salad everry day.  I absolultey love it and this was an interesting play on a classic. 

As I was having this for dinner, I wanted something a bit more substantial.  So I also added my take on Prawn Saganaki.  Again, I used the whipped feta as a base, swirled in some tomato paste, some roasted and roughtly ground fennel seeds, some prawns, chilli flakes and some chopped tomato and red onion.  Ten to fifteen minutes in the oven and voila!

This was so good.  I loved the little kick of pickle brine in there!  It was also great both hot and cold!  Here’s the recipe:

All in all, for me?  Girl Dinner = Girl Winner!!!!

Disclaimer:  I received a free copy of Girl Dinner from the publishers (Thank you so much).  Regardless of this, the thoughts and opinions above are entirely my own. 

Have a great week!