Cookbook review: Home Skillet by Robin Donovan

Home Skillet: comfort-food recipes for easy one-pan meals using cast-iron skillets.

I confess that I love Robin Donovan‘s work including her co-written blog Two Lazy Gourmets, having reviewed her Campfire Cuisine in the past and enjoying her recipes. When she asked if I would review her latest book Home Skillet: The Essential Cast Iron Cookbook for Easy One-Pan Meals, it was an easy yes.

Layout and design:

The book is organized into six chapters: your cast iron primer (don’t skip this!), breakfast & brunch, weeknight meals, weekend meals, breads & rolls, and desserts. The book is beautifully designed with user-friendly fonts and plenty of white space for jotting down notes.

Photography:

Beautiful stock photos open each chapter.

Recipes:

Recipes include chard scallion and goat cheese frittata, Southwestern savory corn cakes, vegetable biryani with charred onions and raita, masala sea bass, crispy chicken thighs with honey-sriracha glaze and cabbage slaw, stir-fried mango beef with broccoli, creole shrimp and cheddar grits, savory Asiago garlic and herb monkey bread, and caramelized banana-brown butter cake. Recipes are traditional and use meat, poultry, dairy, gluten, and eggs. Excellent source of inspiration if you are on a special diet and want to experiment.

What I liked about the book:

Beautiful layout and gave me so many ideas to use my big skillet, including how to properly season it. I hadn’t done so according to her method, and can’t wait to create a true non-stick finish now that I know how.

I wasn’t so keen on:

Recipes were not coded for special diets; nutritional analysis is not provided, which would be helpful for low-sodium eaters.

Recommended for:

Traditional and vegetarian diets

Not recommended for:

Migraine, paleo, vegan, celiac, gluten-free, or low-sodium diets

A note about my cookbook reviews: In the past, I tested at least three recipes from each book, took photos, and described my experience. Due to my dietary limitations (low-sodium, gluten-, dairy-, egg-free), it is no longer possible for me to test the recipes and do them justice.

Required FTC disclosure: I received one copy of this book from the publisher for the giveaway on September 29, 2016.
Here’s the book if you want to see more: