I picked this cookbook up at a used book sale and was pleasantly surprised by how useful it is. If you know the premise of the show Chopped you might expect some really weird ingredients, but the approach is more about helping you make creative use of the items in your pantry, and learning what kinds of things go together.

The book is broken down into sections about specific kinds of ingredients you might have lying around, from dried pasta to eggs to grains (also meat and seafood, though I'm not sure who just has mussels lying around their house). There are also really handy charts to help you make tons of different sauces and dressings by combining various essential components.

One pitfall of a lot of celebrity/TV show cookbooks is they often have a lot of content on the people or the show process while being light on actual recipes and lessons, but this book doesn't have that problem. There are a few quick Q&A sidebars with the Chopped judges but it's not intrusive in any way.