A SOFTWARE PLATTER OF PIZZAS
A Review of Better Homes and Gardens Cooking for Today - Pizzas
by Susan Davis
Sigh Another recipe program. At least that's what I was thinking at first, when I opened Better Homes and Gardens Cooking for Today - Pizzas program. I had just finished dinner, and I definitely wasn't hungry. I figured that this was the perfect time to test the program's ability to lure me. Within ten minutes, I was practically drooling all over my keyboard. Keep in mind, of course, that I love pizza. I will eat almost anything reasonable except green peppers and anchovies on pizza. But after a while, the standard pizza fare becomes bland, even to me. With Cooking for Today's Pizza recipes, my faith in the eternal pizza has been renewed.
Under Windows 95, the installation routine is smooth and automatic,
and quite easy to complete. Even with the minimum install to save disk
space, the program runs well on my Pentium-133. If I wanted to use the
disk space on the maximum install (which requires approximately 40MB),
I would expect the efficiency of both the display and the search
routines to increase significantly.
When you first start the program, you are greeted with a classy
display, and upbeat music. The screen opens to a clean, well-designed
interface modeled after a web browser. The icons are quite visible,
and the single-click browser method, including the back command, is
both familiar and efficient. The menu system gives you access to a
wide variety of functions, including the recipe list, a personal
recipe box section, a cooking encyclopedia, and the search routine for
filtering recipes.
The program allows you to select multiple recipe programs from
Multicom on installation, so your recipe searches and personal recipe
boxes can be expanded to include favorites from other recipe
compilations. The recipe box provides you with up to five separate
categories for personal organization of favorite recipes. In this
section, you also have the opportunity to add your own recipes, with
instructions and comments. You can even make notes about existing
recipes.
The meal planner section can be helpful, too, at times, especially
with today's hectic work and play schedules. If you are inclined to
plan a day's or a week's schedule of recipes out at once, you can
print them, compile grocery lists, and have the entire week's schedule
at your fingertips.
One of my favorite features, however, is the Encyclopedia of Cooking Terms. This section provides you with descriptive, informative definitions, often including visual details of items, market preparation of the item (if applicable), and cooking hints. You can also use the Encyclopedia sorted by recipe items to quickly look up things that appear in the recipe. This can be handy if you don't recognize an ingredient, or you need to know how to prepare it for the recipe.
The Herb Alternative Guide is part of this section. Listed under the Herb definition is a particularly useful guide of Herb comparisons and explanations for the amateur cook. If you don't have something, check here for potential substitutes, either for a different but complementary flavor, or for a similar flavoring possibility. The Emergency Substitutions section works well for the same kind of help on other types of ingredients. You will also find another useful tool in the ingredient equivalents list. It helps you substitute different forms of the same substances, like slices of bread for bread crumbs, when you don't have something on hand and don't want to buy a large quantity for just one recipe.
However, the best tool for the truly amateur cook is a novel idea that
is missing in many cooking programs the cooking charts section. You
can actually choose a wide variety of foods and get detailed cooking
instructions and preparation times for each one. For example, how long
should you cook flank steak, and what method of cooking is best? You
can find it here.
For the average cook, those tools are enough to send you well on your way to culinary success. But Multicom and BH&G didn't stop there. Large numbers of simple, but instructive video techniques are included to help you master different cooking principles. Everything from how to cut something into thin slices to the proper way to add pasta to the boiling water in the pan.
What's for Dinner? gives you a strong search engine, the main function of which offers you a variety of ways to search for healthy eating options. You can also search by preparation time or by ingredients, if you are in a hurry or have a craving for something in particular. Speaking of cravings, the recipes include not only the traditional pizzas, but dessert pizzas, appetizer pizzas, and pizza spin-offs. Since the more traditional pizzas like pepperoni have been covered infinitely well in other places, this program doesn't waste the space. It concentrates on the truly unique and tasty possibilities found in more creative recipes. Still, you need someplace to start. The Pizza Basics section provides several recipe variations on basic pizza dough and basic pizza sauce, including garlic and herb pizza dough and hot and spicy pizza sauce. This program truly serves up a pizza gourmet's information heaven. Even the pictures can make you drool.
The last feature worth mentioning is the on-line component. While easy to set up, it is a standard feature on the upper scale multimedia programs on the market today. Because of that, you'd expect that Multicom, with so many recipe programs available, would have a more well-designed web page for your use. While the site is functional and has some useful food-related links, it's nothing special. This is definitely the weakest section of the program.
Better Homes and Gardens Cooking for Today Pizzas provides the pizza dreamer in you with pizza possibilities in more ways than you could ever imagine. If you love pizza at all, you won't be able to resist most of these recipes. Even if you don't like the exact ingredients, the one thing pizza has always had in its favor is the flexibility of toppings and preparation. So, explore the platter a little. You're sure to find at least one delightfully new spin on the pizza wheel.
Multimedia Cafe Scorecard
| Product: |
Better Homes and Gardens Cooking for Today - Pizzas |
| Company: |
Multicom Publishing, Inc.
|
| Cost: |
n/a |
System Requirements:
WINDOWS:
33 MHz 80486DX or better
Minimum 8MB RAM
MS DOS 5.0 or later
Microsoft Windows 3.1 or later (Windows 95 compatible)
MPC-2 Compatible CD-ROM drive (2x or faster)
SVGA monitor\display at 256 colors
SoundBlaster compatible audio board
Mouse, Modem or TCP/IP access (required for optional online features).
MACINTOSH:
None
Breakdown:
Entertainment Value 3
Educational Value 5
Concept 4
Depth 4
Interface 5
Overall Score:
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