NY Times

TEST KITCHEN
Homemade or Semi? A Bake-Off
By AMANDA HESSER

Published: October 1, 2003


IN the world of Sandra Lee, cookbook author and self-proclaimed
"lifestylist," life is hectic and people are busy. Cooking food from
scratch takes too much time, and is too difficult and too expensive. And
while Ms. Lee believes that cooking food for someone is the greatest gift,
it really isn't worth too much of your time.

Ms. Lee also believes she has the solution for these problems: food that
is "Semi-Homemade" (she has registered this name). In her first book,
"Semi-Homemade Cooking" (Miramax, 2002), which according to Nielsen
BookScan sold more than 61,500 copies and landed her on the New York Times
best-seller list, Ms. Lee explained her philosophy: "The Semi-Homemade
cooking approach is easily done by combining several prepackaged foods, a
few fresh ingredients, and a `pinch of this with a hint of that' to make
new, easy, gourmet-tasting, inexpensive meals in minutes."

Ms. Lee calls this technique "a new way of cooking." But it is not. Her
approach merely underlines a way of cooking that is rapidly growing in
American culture. While cake mixes and convenience foods have been around
for decades, it is only recently that attitudes toward using them have
shifted from embarrassment to allegiance. In 1999, Anne Byrn wrote "The
Cake Mix Doctor" (Workman), which is filled with recipes for tweaking cake
mixes with ingredients like vanilla and lemon zest so that they taste
better. It sold 1.3 million copies and was followed up by another best
seller, "Chocolate From the Cake Mix Doctor." ("The Dinner Doctor" is
forthcoming.) Recipes on the Web site for the Pampered Chef, a cookware
company that sells directly to consumers with Tupperware-like parties,
include mixes and convenience foods. Recipes in Bon Appétit magazine, with
a circulation of more than 1.3 million, occasionally rely on packaged and
brand-name ingredients.

All of which can add up to a kind of faux-cooking. Ms. Lee's slant is no
different, except that she is savvy: she has made it into a brand. Miramax
Books is publishing her second book, "Semi-Homemade Desserts," this month,
and according to Ms. Lee's Web site, www.semihomemade.com, she has
recently signed a contract with Miramax Films for a variety of publishing,
merchandising and television projects.

Ms. Lee's beliefs are based on some degree of truth. People are working
longer hours. People are commuting farther. And people have more choices
of things to do with their spare time.

But does this mean that people have less time to cook or that people make
less time to cook? Ms. Lee puts forth the notion that there are lots of
people who like to eat well, but who do not have time to cook. And who,
apparently, don't want the bother of actual cooking. She emphasizes
repeatedly that her recipes will allow you to get out of the kitchen
sooner so that you can spend more time with your family. But since when
did cooking have to be solitary? And since when were people unable to talk
with their children or spouses while they cook? She herself reminisces in
"Semi-Homemade Desserts" about the "happy hours" spent in the kitchen,
baking with her grandmother.

And, in fact, if you look at changes in kitchen design over the last
decade, you'll discover that people not only like to be in the kitchen,
but their spending habits would indicate that they actually would like to
spend most of their time there. According to Gopal Ahluwalia, vice
president for research of the National Association of Home Builders, the
kitchen has become the focal point of the home. People are devoting more
square footage to their kitchens and making them more multipurpose, with
room for sofas, computers and play areas. And in the kitchen itself, he
said, Americans are spending more money on stoves, refrigerators and
cooking equipment.

And yet, who isn't lazy? If someone tells you often enough that you do not
have time to shop at a good butcher or to measure a cup of flour, you may
start to believe it. And that is just how Ms. Lee wins you over. Using the
same strategy that has been so successful for the food industry, she seems
more intent on encouraging people to create excuses for not cooking than
on encouraging them to cook wholesome simple foods.

Any good cook knows that a roasted chicken and a salad take about two
tries to perfect and about 15 minutes of actual work time, but such
classic food doesn't leave much room for the kind of product references
Ms. Lee likes to have in her recipes.

As opposed to the recipes in Anne Byrn's "Cake Mix Doctor" books, in which
good quality ingredients are used to sharpen the bland manufactured ones,
Ms. Lee's more often than not rely on bland manufactured ingredients to
mix with bland manufactured ingredients.

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Gnocchi Dippers, whose problems don't end with their name, are sauced with
olive oil, onion, jarred garlic, milk, Tabasco sauce, sour cream and thyme
— all good, so far — but then she adds Velveeta. With hundreds of
delicious and interesting cheeses available in this country, many of them
in supermarkets, it is difficult to understand how a responsible author
could choose a tasteless, industrial cheese like Velveeta to prepare what
she calls "gourmet-tasting" food.

And although Ms. Lee courts home cooks on a budget, she never explores
whether making things from scratch is more expensive. The ingredients for
the Triple Lemon Poundcake in Ms. Lee's "Semi-Homemade Desserts" (which
includes cake mix and instant pudding) cost about $6, whereas the
ingredients for a made-from-scratch lemon poundcake in Ina Garten's
"Barefoot Contessa Parties!" came to just over $3.50. In several
instances, Ms. Lee calls for prepared mashed potatoes. A 22-ounce bag of
frozen Ore-Ida mashed potatoes (the only prepared mashed potatoes I could
find), which contain margarine and "natural butter flavor," among other
things, was $3.17. You need to add milk to prepare them. Bulk potatoes, on
the other hand, were 99 cents a pound. You can boil them while you do
something else, and add milk and actual butter to your taste.

Some of Ms. Lee's recipes are simply odd. In "Semi-Homemade Cooking," she
gives a recipe for pesto, when so many decent prepared versions are
available. In the recipe, she calls for fresh basil, but jarred garlic. In
the same chapter, she offers a recipe for a hollandaise sauce made in a
blender. So, rather than preparing it classically with simply a saucepan
and a whisk, you have to wash your blender and all its parts. It leaves
the reader wondering just how much cooking Ms. Lee has done.

Ms. Lee insists that naming brands in recipes helps to keep the results of
her recipes consistent. It also makes shopping an incredible pain in the
neck. For Anthony Edwards's Superdad Banana Nut Sandwiches, I got all but
one of the ingredients at one store, then had to run to two others looking
for Betty Crocker Rich & Creamy cream cheese frosting. I was unable to
find it, or any other cream cheese frosting, at any of the three stores.
Since I had the makings for the rest of the dessert, I bought an
ingredient you can find at any grocery store — cream cheese — and made my
own icing from scratch (the cream cheese frosting from "Joy of Cooking"
took five minutes and was delicious).

Ms. Lee's reliance on brand-name products feels forced. There is a chapter
in "Semi-Homemade Desserts" devoted to celebrity recipes. It is hard to
believe that when she rounded up recipes from people like Katie Couric and
Nathan Lane (not to mention Mr. Edwards), they all happened to call for
brand-name products.

In a recipe for Anjelica Huston's Having-It-All Caramel Shortbread, Ms.
Lee calls for 20 Brach's Milk Maid soft caramel candies, unwrapped. I
timed myself to see how long it took to unwrap them. Three minutes. It's
not a long time, but it is an incredibly annoying task. The caramels must
then be melted in a microwave oven, which takes another few minutes. It
took me only 15 minutes to make the same amount of caramel from scratch.
The difference in time was negligible, while the difference in taste was
significant. Homemade caramel has the texture of taffy and tastes of
butter. Brach's have a waxy texture and taste of sugar.

The Duncan Hines Creamy Home-Style chocolate icings that Ms. Lee calls for
in her Crispy Orange Coconut Balls (truffles, really) do not allow you to
have control over the quality of the chocolate — the main flavor of the
dessert. If you were to use your own, you would have an array of good
quality chocolates to choose from that would make the finished truffles
taste that much better. I made a second version using a truffle base from
"Chocolate Desserts by Pierre Hermé" by Dorie Greenspan (Little Brown). I
replaced Ms. Lee's icing with Scharffen Berger semisweet chocolate and
heavy cream, and the recipe's Cocoa Rice Krispies with regular Rice
Krispies. The rest of the ingredients were perfectly acceptable. (The two
recipes are printed at bottom left.)

The truffles I made did not use up any more dishes or require any more
labor than Ms. Lee's. Surely, they were more expensive, but truffles are
not food for everyday. They are a special treat, and in my view, a special
treat should taste like one. Hers tasted grainy and flabby, like partially
hydrogenated vegetable oil, and left a coating of grease on my tongue.

There are a number of recipes, particularly in Ms. Lee's first book,
however, that are great ideas for simple and quick dishes. In
"Semi-Homemade Cooking," for instance, the roasted pepper soup is bright
and sharply flavored. And if you used higher quality brands than the ones
she suggests, it might even qualify for the word delicious. Another smart
recipe is the one for Ricotta Berry Bursts, which call for pre-made graham
cracker crusts and have a filling of fresh ricotta, jam and orange juice.

Had Ms. Lee turned out a book full of original recipes like the roasted
pepper soup, it would have been an accomplishment. Had she turned out a
book full of prettied-up cake mix recipes, that wouldn't have been
terrible either. Instead, she has produced two books in which she
encourages a dislike for cooking, and gives people an excuse for feeding
themselves and their families mediocre food filled with preservatives.

But Ms. Lee gets fairly close to offensive when, in the early pages of her
first book, she writes this of "disposables": "Making life easier can be
so simple if you utilize disposable products. Paper plates, napkins,
plastic utensils, baking dishes, serving bowls and platters are all
readily available. Disposable items provide quick preparation and cleanup
— you'll minimize your work while maximizing your leisure time."

So you can whip up your Gnocchi Dippers with Velveeta and blithely pollute
the environment. But hey, your time is worth it.

@ @ @ @ @
Crispy Orange Coconut Balls

1 16-ounce container dark chocolate fudge or milk chocolate frosting,
preferably Duncan Hines Creamy Home-Style
2 3/8 cups confectioners' sugar, sifted
2 teaspoons pure orange extract, preferably McCormick
1 1/2 cups chocolatey sweetened rice cereal, preferably Kellogg's Cocoa
Rice Krispies
2 cups sweetened flaked coconut, toasted, preferably Baker's.

1. Line cookie sheet with wax paper. Beat frosting and sifted
confectioners' sugar in large bowl until well-blended. Beat in orange
extract. Stir in rice cereal.

2. Using tablespoon or 1-ounce cookie scoop, shape mixture into balls and
place on cookie sheet. Cover and refrigerate for 20 minutes, or until
slightly firm. Roll balls in coconut to coat. Cover and refrigerate until
ready to serve.

Yield: About 2 dozen.

Adapted from "Semi-Homemade Desserts" by Sandra Lee (Miramax Books)

Time: 45 minutes plus 20 minutes' chilling
_____

@ @ @ @ @
Orange Coconut Truffles

9 ounces best-quality semisweet chocolate, finely chopped
1 cup heavy cream
3 1/2 tablespoons unsalted butter, at room temperature, cut into 4 pieces
1 teaspoon orange extract
1 cup Kellogg's Rice Krispies
2 cups sweetened flaked coconut, toasted.

1. Place chocolate in a heatproof bowl. In a small saucepan, bring cream
to a boil over high heat. Pour cream over chocolate and stir gently until
completely smooth. Let rest for a minute, then stir in butter, two pieces
at a time. Stir in orange extract. Cover and chill at least 3 hours. Check
after 1 hour. When mixture is cold and stiff but not hardened, stir in
Rice Krispies.

2. Line a baking sheet with wax paper. Place coconut in a wide shallow
bowl. Spoon up a scant tablespoonful of chocolate mixture and drop into
the coconut. Roll to shape into a ball as you coat it with coconut. It
doesn't need to be perfectly round. Continue with remaining chocolate.
Place each coated truffle on baking sheet. Cover and chill until ready to
serve.

Yield: About 40 truffles.

Time: 30 minutes plus three hours' chilling time
_____













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