Amazon.comTime for Dinner: Strategies, Inspiration and recipes for Family Meals Every Night of the Week, by Pilar Guzmán, Jenny Rosenstrach, and Alanna Stang (editors at Cookie magazine). Chronicle Books, $24.95

I've seen umpteen cookbooks meant to make life easier for busy moms and their picky kids. Some of them tell you to hide the vegetables in muffins and cupcakes. Some of them give you recipes to cook with your kids (in other words, "double your cooking time"). And some just throw in the towel -- here, have another recipe for mac and cheese!

The thing is, maybe we don't need new recipes. It's not that we don't know how to cook -- it's just that, so often, after a long day of work, we don't have the energy to strategize around what we already know how to do. Reading another recipe is the last thing we need. In their new book, the editors of now-defunct Cookie magazine don't promise you that one magic recipe that will solve everything. Instead, they offer mom-centric tips and kitchen-hacking strategies that work in real life. The recipes are, essentially, a bonus.

The book works on an expanded definition of dinner, and it's organized accordingly. There are sandwiches, there are dishes each family member can customize for themselves (like sesame noodles and pizza), there are fast meals and strategic Sunday dinners like braised pork or grilled vegetables that give you leftovers for three days. My favorite chapter, "I Want to Use What I Already Have," contains nothing but flow charts showing you how to use up stuff in the fridge, as in: "So you have an eggplant."

There are ingenious tips scattered through the whole book, penned in the voice of that one scary-smart friend you have who nevertheless somehow doesn't give you an inferiority complex. Use your waffle iron for a panini press! Fill a bin with kitchen toys so your 3-year-old can "help" without getting in your way! Mash up fruit for your toddler. The leftover peaches go into a martini. The "essential fridge" has beer in it. You get the point.

Thanks, ladies, for bringing the protein-veg-carb equation back to reality. For the first time, I'm giving a book the highest rating the Bookshelf has to offer: 5 out of 5.

Rating: 5 whisks

Ratings system: 1 - 5 whisks
5 - Must have; will use weekly
4 - Highly recommended, good gift or addition to collection
3 - Inspiring but not user-friendly, or user-friendly but not inspiring
2 - Unrealistic or poorly executed
1 - Useless on all counts