That sounds so good: 100 recepten voor elke dag van de week

by Carla Lalli Music

Whatever works , dat is Carla's motto. En binnenkort ook dat van jou.

Genres: Cookbooks, Cooking, Food, Nonfiction, Culinary, Food and Drink, Cuisine

Hardcover

First published October 12, 2021

About the author

Carla Lalli Music is the James Beard Award-winning author of Where Cooking Begins (a national bestseller) and the host of Carla’s Cooking Show. The former food director at Bon Appétit, Carla is known for anchoring the hit YouTube series, “Back to Back Chef,” and appeared in many BA test kitchen videos. Her second cookbook, That Sounds So Good, was a New York Times bestseller, and Borderline Salty, her podcast with Pineapple Street Media, was one of Time Magazine’s best podcasts of 2022. She lives in Brooklyn with her family, animals, and backyard wood-burning oven.

Reviews

[karen]

i have made Fat Noodles with Pan-Roasted Mushrooms and Crushed Herb Sauce



and it was



very delicious

[Linda Bartiste · Rating 1 out of 5]

Recipes sound good, but I made 5 of the recipes and only 1 was worth repeating--and it's hardly a unique recipe: chopped red cabbage with a mustard vinaigrette. I followed the recipes exactly, am a seasoned cook, and each of the recipes was bland, boring, and not anything I'd cook for anyone else, let alone repeat for my family.

I also found some of the writing clunky. One pasta recipe says to cook the pasta to "very al dente" because it will cook the rest of the way when added to the sauce. But then, Carla instructs us to stir the pasta into the sauce until the pasta is "very al dente"--what's the difference between these two? I knew the level of al-dente I wanted so followed my own instincts and the pasta was just right in tenderness, but the cook with less experience might certainly find this confusing.

And while there were a few tips, nothing really throughout the book is all that interesting, new, or revelatory. Her 'spin' suggestions are fine, but after cooking 4 recipes exactly with the original ingredients suggested and finding all of them to be meh, I would worry that the 'spins' would be even greater taste-killers.

I'm sorry to dislike the book so much, because I've always enjoyed Carla's videos--which is why I pre-ordered the book in the first place. And with so many cookbooks and cooking videos and instagram recipes, it's got to be challenging to offer a new take. I thought it would offer lots of fun recipes and fun takes on cooking, something we've all been doing A LOT over the last 15 months. But...not so much. Sorry.

[Caroline Heywood · Rating 4 out of 5]

I asked one person if reading all the extra story text of a cookbook and flipping through all the recipes counts as reading a book, and she said yes. so here we are. but we’re actually here because this cookbook made me cry (!) not once (!!) but three times (!!!) while reading. it’s clear that Carla and I share a mutual love language: cooking for others. it’s thread throughout the book, and I can’t wait to start testing the recipes.

[Gem · Rating 5 out of 5]

Every recipe I’ve made of Carla’s is better than the last. I love her advice on substations. It makes me more confident in the kitchen even when I’m not making something of hers. Love love this book.

[Kris Springer · Rating 3 out of 5]

Pretty pictures and solid advice about substitutions and how best to shop (choose freshest, best ingredients and figure out what to do with them). But many dishes I can’t imagine making (celery salad doesn’t sound good, regardless of the season) and probably couldn’t recruit anyone to eat. I do love to read about food though and always feel like reading cookbooks is another way to enlarge my world and possibilities. Thanks cookbooks and cookbook authors!

[Eustacia R. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Carla's approach to food and life brings me so much joy! I have not made everything in it (yet), but I have made a recipe from each section, and her descriptions and tips are fantastic. If you enjoy the book (or are just curious about it) you should have a look at her YouTube channel to see her in action.

[Meggie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Carla’s You Tube channel is so fun, I had to check out her book and writing. She’s just as fun there! While few if the recipes were up my alley, I loved her essays on cooking for family as well as many of her tips on efficient, joyful, delicious home cooking.

[Katy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Moving this to the “to buy” wish list. Made the Tuna Salad Sandwiches and the Ginger Lime beef. Both were great and so many more I want to try now that we have an oven again!

[Liquidlasagna · Rating 3 out of 5]

well not everyone will want

Spaghetti with Melted Cauliflower Sauce

but four anchovies and a lemon will kill off the collie fur
for less bark

[Becca Sloan · Rating 4 out of 5]

The photos in this book are GORGEOUS, and I really like Lalli Music’s voice as a recipe writer. I am giving it 3 stars because a few recipes I made were just sort of meh, and there are many beautiful recipes I will simply never make 😢 (Looking at you, Grilled Squid w Blackened Tomatoes and Banana Galette w Cashew Frangipane). However, in all fairness, most of the recipes I have made were simple and scrumptious and I truly loved the adaptability built into the nature of her cooking with the “spin it” section of each recipe. I love that her best outcome is to help create more confident, flexible home cooks. Perhaps this is actually more of a 4 star as I review it. Maybe it’s between, but I refuse to trade in half-stars. Four stars it is.

[Sarah · Rating 5 out of 5]

Easily one of the best family cookbooks out there. The food that I’ve made from this book is delicious. Uniquely, it’s organized by days of the week - so fast meals for weekdays and prep/longer meals for the weekends. Carla’s writing is real and not pretentious. It takes a lot for me to choose a cookbook over looking up something online these days, but this cookbook is now on my wish list after taking it out from the library. My eldest who is 12 is also thrilled with it and we can’t wait to add it to our cookbook shelf.

[Ruth · Rating 5 out of 5]

Umm this cookbook is exactly what I love- this book is divided into "weekday" and "weekend" meals that all have suggestions on how to substitute for ingredients you may not have. It's chef-y enough for the side of me that loves to cook, genuine and approachable for working home cooks, and is peppered with essays. Can't wait to cook from this all summer!

[Susan · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book has some great sounding soup recipes! I can’t wait to make some! As well as salads, mains and dessert!

[Bonnie · Rating 4 out of 5]

The title of this cookbook is perfect in my opinion. Whenever I browse through recipes and look at photos, I often will say that it sounds so good. I think this book is a great go to cookbook for finding recipes that one is in the mood for and will provide great tasting meals without too much fuss. I like how at the bottom of each recipe, a list is provided for ingredients one may need to shop for and one with ingredients one most likely has on hand. There is also a spin it suggestions for substituting or replacing an ingredient with something you might prefer or have on hand. I love the stovetop suppers chapter. There are many recipes that are drool worthy. Some of my favorites are the one-pot chicken and rice with blender green sauce, fat noodles with pan-roasted mushrooms and crushed herb sauce, and skirt steak with potatoes and black pepper-horseradish sauce. The salad section has some great ideas with charred broccoli with spicy avocado sauce being my favorite. The most drool-worthy section is the S is for Sunday Soup, Stew, & Sauce. I can't choose a favorite from this section as there are many that are good. The pictures has me wanting to eat the dish now. I think this cookbook is a great one to have on hand. I've received a free copy from Clarkson Potter in exchange for a free and unbiased review.

[Catarina PBatista · Rating 4 out of 5]

The food and recipes and a delight to look at 🥰 the same enthusiasm that we feel in her youtube channel seeps through the pages to us and makes us want to cook! An amazing cookbook!

[Sara Brockunier · Rating 4 out of 5]

Beautiful pictures ... they say that pictures say a thousands words and that you eat with your eyes first! And every photo made me want to try the recipes! Love that it is arranged by Weekday and Weekend recipes really makes it easy to use ... I like the recipes but I will say some had a little too much spice for me ... but it probably is not spicy to others. Think you will like this cookbook ... it lives up to the title. I received a free copy from Clarkson Potter in exchange for a free and unbiased review.

[Leah · Rating 5 out of 5]

Love Carla, love love love this cookbook. It’s structured by type of cooking – quick weekday meals you can throw together after work, longer-cooked dishes that are mostly hands-off so you can start them on a weekend day and then take a nap, dinner-y salads, nutrient-dense meals to help you feel better after a food-and-bev bender, desserts that make an impact without fussiness, snacks for day drinking.

She encourages improvisation and using what you have on hand instead of going to the store for one ingredient. She’s just very chill, and I love that. I really liked her first cookbook (which won a James Beard Award), but this one is even more approachable and cookable.

To illustrate how much I loved this: Typically I’ll read a cookbook cover to cover over a few months, and cook at least five recipes from it before I consider it “read.” I read this one in a week and cooked 10 recipes from it in the span of two weeks. I have tons more bookmarked, and I am so happy at the prospect of luxuriating in these fab dishes.

[Lauryn · Rating 3 out of 5]

I’ve made 5/100 of these recipes and they have all been “meh” at best. I’m at the point in the cookbook journey that I’m not sure if I’ll ever open this again. Almost every recipe has been an obnoxious amount of grease/oil (1/3 cup of oil to cook green beans that’s never drained? 6 tablespoons of butter to cook a pound of shrimp…) and then comes out just tasting bland. There’s a few recipes for chicken leg quarters too which I also learned are *not for me* and there’s a reason they’re the cheapest cut at the store. Pretty pictures, I like the author, but skip this and buy Molly Baz’ “Cook This Book” instead.

[Michael Hanley · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’ve loved most of the recipes that I’ve tried in this book! I also love that it is a cookbook chock full of recipes instead of having a lot of copy and fewer actual recipes! But, that said, it does have just a bit of copy that tells us something about the authors real life. The book is also attached to a YouTube Chanel by the author and you an watch her make the recipes! All good in my book!

[Kathryn · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an interesting (in a good way) cookbook, with a lot of positives going for it.

First, it's by Carla Lalli Music, one of the former BA chefs. She now has her own YT channel which I'd encourage you to check out, especially if you're interested in this cookbook. She's been demoing a lot of the recipes and it's really nice to be able to see the recipes prepared. Often it answers any questions you might have just from reading the recipe.

Second, I love the "spin it" sections - basically ideas for how you can substitute out ingredients that you either don't have on hand or don't like (or have allergies to, etc). This is a great idea and encourages the idea that cooking doesn't require you to make trips to 5 different stores to make a single recipe. If you have a decently stocked pantry, you should be able to make something delicious.

Third, I like that the recipes are split into "weeknight" (quicker prep/cooking) and weekend (longer cooking/project cooking) sections.

Fourth, I like the author's choice to build parts of the prep into the downtime in the active cooking rather than having a long list of pre-prepped ingredients before you start going. She acknowledges this and make notes of where that won't work, i.e. if you're doing a stir-fry recipe it all needs to be pre-prepped because once you start cooking it comes together super fast.

For the negatives - I was frankly a little disappointed with the quicker cooking (weeknight) selections. A lot of them are vegetarian or vegetarian leaning, which I'm not. I get that as a culture we need to cut back on our meat consumption and this is probably a responsible approach in the cookbook, but I'm personally not quite there yet. Not too many of the weeknight selections appealed to me, but I will say watching Carla's channel, some of them are more appealing on seeing them made than the names suggest (the polenta with floppy broccoli in particular comes to mind).

The only other thing I'll note is that the book somewhat expects you to have an extensive "refrigerator" pantry - i.e. things you always have on hand that aren't shelf-stable. Well, I don't, because unless I know I'm going to be using those items I don't want to buy them and have them spoil. Dry goods or frozen, sure, I can handle that, but I don't really see myself always having buttermilk on hand. Luckily there are good substitutions offered.

My last thought - the book leans a bit heavily pasta and Italian-ish. This makes sense as it's Carla's background, but my house doesn't do quite that much pasta. I think this might be why I didn't totally go in for the weeknight meals as much, several of them are veggie pasta or if not vegetarian, then at least no-meat pasta dishes.

[Allie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love the format of this cookbook, with the weeknight recipes separated out from the weekend ideas-- along with the acknowledgement that they aren't necessary harder recipes on the weekend, just easier to do when you are not in a time crunch. I always want lots of vegetarian-friendly recipes in addition to omnivore recipes in a book, and this has lots of both. I also love her "Spin it" section that helps with substitutions (be they for pantry lacks or diet/allergies or taste preferences). I love how the newest crop of cookbooks is all about helping us to become more flexible, confident, and adventurous with our own cooking while still leaving us a map! Carla Lalli Music does an especially nice job of pointing out what we probably already have in our decently well-stocked pantries vs what will take a trip to the store (or Instacart!) to complete.

I read the book cover-to cover in a single sitting and bookmarked 20+ recipes right off the bat, mostly in the weeknight category because that is what I am interested in right now. But I also LOVE the end chapter, "Also Seen on the Table" with all the great sauce and dressing and basics-type recipes I will for sure be using! Great little cookbook with a wide-variety of flavors.

[Emily · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars. I love the organization of this cookbook. There are sections for weekday vs weekend cooking, and the recipes in each are accurate. In other words, the weekday recipes were actually easy to accomplish on a weekday, and the weekend ones felt more like projects. I also cooked a majority of the “burning clean” recipes, all of which proved to be ones featuring vegetables and leaving me mildly proud of myself for making good choices. The recipe blurbs were short and sweet, and I love that multiple ingredient substitutions were included. The main problem I have with this cookbook is that I only wanted to make two of the recipes more than once (the spicy tofu and green beans the lime pickle kale and sweet potatoes). This was perfectly fine by me since I borrowed the book from the library, but I think I’d be disappointed had I purchased it.

[Ninja Neko · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not my style of cooking/eating...
One of my pet-peeves when it comes to cookbooks is the lack of vegetables in what is presented as dinner dishes. Sure Carla provides chapters with salads & veg separately. A lot of those recipes also have meat/cheese in them. I don't care for salad every night, nor do I want to cook two dishes for dinner every night.
I get that this comes with the Italian eating culture - but I honestly can't be bothered with that most of the time. The only thing I bookmarked was a crispy tofu concoction (tofu! I know!).
Reminded me a bit of Dinner: Changing the game but less extensive/varied.

[Katie · Rating 4 out of 5]

4 stars for now… just might be 5 after I try more recipes!

Only ones I’ve had at this point are the Tomato Confit Bruschetta, and Carole’s Fried Bread. Both were yummy!

Really liked that there was at least one picture for each recipe. Organized well. Only a couple “rare” kitchen ingredients. The author also lists substitution suggestions with every recipe.

There are so many recipes that look delicious but a few I really look forward to trying are the:
Spaghetti w Melted Cauliflower Sauce,
One-Pot Chicken & Rice w Green Sauce,
Spicy Cucumber & Watermelon w Pan-Fried Peanuts,
Crispy Smoky Rice,
Split Pea Soup w Mustard-Chile Sizzle,
and all the desserts look scrumptious!!!

[Gwen Daniels · Rating 4 out of 5]

You’ve probably heard the spiel about this cookbook — two sections, divided into efficient weeknight meals and lazy weekend projects, with instructions written in chronological order, never assuming you’ve peeled your carrots or diced your onion ahead of time. Love it!

We’ve enjoyed all the recipes we’ve tried, especially the shrimp in kimchi sauce and the Asian-inspired short ribs. I’m knocking off one point because many of the vegetable recipes, which Carla positions as mains, aren’t substantial enough to stand alone without protein in my opinion.

[Lauren · Rating 2 out of 5]

Seems like a harsh rating for a cookbook lol but out of all the cookbooks I own, it wouldn’t shock me if I never made a single recipe out of this one. I really appreciate the format with recipe swaps, what to buy at the market vs. what to keep in your pantry, and the thoughtful layout (how to prep ingredients while other things cook, and even the book itself featuring weeknight vs. weekend recipes). But unfortunately this is like Molly Baz’s cookbook but less “weird in a good way” and more “mehhhh why would I ever make this” haha.

[Darlene Messenger · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Cooking is a feeling that makes you feel things”. This cookbook is laid out differently than most. The author has some serious credibility in the foodie world. Separated into three main sections, this book is informative and helpful with common sense meal planning and preparation. She focuses on basics first then week day meals and lastly weekend meal prep. There is something for every home chef here.
Sadly, mine was a used copy and is missing some pages and some pictures were oddly cut around. Didn’t detract overly from the text but for a few missing recipes.

[Sylvia · Rating 3 out of 5]

Beautiful pictures, and I'm sure many would find the recipes delicious and up their alley. However, for me, the recipes were too eclectic using unusual ingredients that can only be found in specialty stores. Although she does offer substitutions for some of the ingredients - that means it's a completely different recipe, and even some of the substituted ingredients are not easily found. I certainly wouldn't consider these "real life recipes."

[Kris · Rating 4 out of 5]

I bought this as a fan of Carla’s YouTube videos and was not disappointed in her book, although most of the best recipes that I would want to cook I had already seen her demonstrate. I like the way this book is divided into sections based on how much active time is required (quick weeknight meals vs. “Set and forget” type Sunday suppers etc.). I have tried a few salads, most of the weeknight meals, and some “burning clean” recipes and all have been very good! Low effort with lots of flavour.

[Katherine · Rating 5 out of 5]

Made "Herbed Rice with Shrimpy-Kimchi Tomato Sauce" (p. 45) and it was incredibly good and so easy. Want to make nearly every recipe in this book so will have to pick up my own copy. A few other recipes I flagged for making:
- Spicy Cucumber and Watermelon w Pan-Fried Peanuts (p. 84)
- Chickpea Pancakes w Shaved Vegetables (p. 108)
- Split Pea Soup and Mustard-Chile Sizzle (p. 206)
- Banana Galette w Cashew Frangipane (p. 266)