"There are countless thick, hernia-inducing cookbooks with rewardingly honest recipes. This book is not one of them. This book is for people who have better things to do than cook. This book is for scrappy cheats-like me."
-From the Introduction

Once in a very long while, the publishing world bears witness to a cookbook so visionary that it changes the course of contemporary cooking, inspiring home cooks to ever greater feats of culinary skill. A SLOB IN THE KITCHEN: Entertaining Advice and Recipes from a Housewife Superstar by Karen Duffy is not that book. Rather, it's the author's tongue-in-cheek cooking primer for self-proclaimed kitchenphobes, culinary novices, and anyone who suffers from dinner party paranoia or kitchen appliance anxiety syndrome.

One of the entertainment world's sauciest cover girls, Karen Duffy (aka Duff) is a self-proclaimed slob in the kitchen, whose style is "clamorous rather than glamorous." But that doesn't stop her from hosting lively dinner parties and serving up informal family feasts. Now in A SLOB IN THE KITCHEN (Clarkson Potter, $23.00; On Sale June 29, 2004) she offers a collection of more than 200 irreverent, practical, stress-free, and thoroughly delicious recipes that she's perfected through the years as a scrappy cheat in the kitchen. With chapters on party fare, retro favorites, entrees ("Tastes Like Chicken"), salads ("Dress Me Up, Toss Me `Round"), pasta ("Wet Noodles"), and desserts ("Sweet Talk: For those who consider a cupcake in each hand a balanced diet"), Duff offers something for every occasion.

Picking up where Peg Bracken's liberating I Hate to Cook Book left off, Duff introduces a new generation of readers to the wonders of one-dish "Kitsch-en Classics," hors d'oeuvre shortcuts, and desserts that make the Cake Mix Doctor look like rocket science. And to prove these recipes are so easy even a monkey could make them, she's given each one a code; the chimp dons a dunce cap, mortarboard, or chef's toque depending on the recipe's level of complexity.

As someone who traded the red carpet for domestic bliss with her husband, John Lambros, and their infant son, Duff produces the ultimate combination of crowd-pleasers and kid-friendly selections, including Greek-Style Roast Lamb (a recipe from her husband's family), You-Slaved-for-Minutes Chicken,Kick-the-Can Ice Cream, Whoopie Pies, and pal Candace Bushnell's Key Lime Pie. While the recipes may not carry the Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval, each one does come with the Slob guarantee: "Absolutely every recipe in this wisecracking volume results in a dish that actually tastes like food."

Bringing a much-needed dash of levity and cheerful pragmatism to the daily business of preparing meals for family and friends, Duff counsels that one needn't be a slave to perfection in order to entertain with style. To help demystify the cooking process, A SLOB IN THE KITCHEN replaces all the tricky, bland, and laborious stuff you might find in other cookbooks with breathtakingly simple and delicious recipes (most of which are designed to get you in and out of the kitchen in an hour or less) that your family and guests will enjoy. What could be better than serving your guests something homemade that took less time to prepare than ordering in a pizza?

Though she delivers laugh-out-loud quips on every page of A SLOB IN THE KITCHEN, Duff became inspired to write the book during a serious chapter in her life. Diagnosed in the late 1990s with sarcoidosis, which causes severe neurological pain, she underwent five years of chemotherapy. "The ordeal left me exhausted on many days," she recalls, "and I felt that if I could just make dinner for my family and friends, maybe it wasn't so bad after all." She then spent months perfecting her favorite down-and-dirty recipes, collected here with a strong dose of her signature deadpan wisecracks to come up with a cookbook containing ridiculously easy recipes. (And as a testament to how good the recipes in this book really are: her assistant gained nineteen pounds while working on the recipes for A SLOB IN THE KITCHEN.)

A SLOB IN THE KITCHEN salutes everyday ingredients and offbeat kitchen helpers including G.I. Joe dolls, Cap'n Crunch cereal, and even duct tape. Along with recipes for breakfast fare that anyone can make while half-asleep ("Wake and Bake: Sunny breakfast foods that will perk your butt right up") and for drinks and snacks to enliven any cocktail gathering, Duff offers readers dozens of helpful hints, "Slob Smarts," which ensure that even first-timers will achieve presentable results. And what other cookbook would include important information such as lessons on how to remove candle wax as well as unwanted houseguests; where to find the Jell-O Museum; and the recipe for Duff's Roadkill Helper, her legendary spice rub that perks up tofu and shoe-leather meat with equal zest?

Encouraging, empowering, and hilarious, A SLOB IN THE KITCHEN at last celebrates home cooks who want to have fun in the kitchen, fret less, and enjoy life more. And best of all, the crowd-pleasing recipes will make the cook look like a hero without breaking a sweat - or trashing the kitchen!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Karen Duffy has worked as an actress, model, journalist, and MTV veejay. She is the author of the New York Times bestseller Model Patient: My Life as an Incurable Wise-Ass and has appeared on the cover of numerous magazines and serves as spokesmodel for Revlon. In her film career, she has worked with Woody Allen, Ben Stiller, and Peter Farrelly. She divides her time between New York City and Litchfield County, Connecticut.