While many contemporary cookbooks present unusual and rather time-consuming recipes with hard-to-find ingredients, Monica Sweeney took the opposite approach in her cookbook Skillet & Sheet Pan Suppers. She provides a nice selection of simple, basic recipes that even the least skilled home cook can prepare with ease. Yet these are not recipes we find in the cookbooks of the 1950s. Her food is well-seasoned and is up to today’s flavor standard. The ingredients are readily available, making your marketing effortless. This cookbook is for those who are ready to take the next step from prepared meals to homemade. Sweeney uses either a skillet or a rimmed sheet pan, and she even suggests lining the pan with foil to minimize cleanup. Many ingredients are prepared foods (frozen pizza dough, frozen meat balls, canned mushroom soup). Simplicity is also shown by this basic but well-illustrated trade paperback. Many of the photos are simple and lack professional quality; others are purchased from stock photo supplies (having much better quality). The recipe layout is very good, and so are the recipe instructions. The head notes are nice and are worth reading. Sweeney divides the book into Beef/Pork, Poultry, Veggies, and Seafood. The index is excellent.
