Cookbooks, Etc.

[Daisy Pusher]

Surely I am not the only one who reads cookbooks like novels? Any other junkies out there? Talk about your cookbook collection here, swap recommendations, admit how many you own, talk about the worst books, and so on.....

I'll start.

So, last night I went to my favorite locally-owned used book shop to kill some time before meeting friends for dinner and I hit upon a bonanza. Julia's The Way to Cook, Beard on Bread, Paul Prudhomme's Louisiana Kitchen (ha, won't have to check it out from the library anymore), MFK Fisher's The Art of Eating, Shirley Corriher's Cookwise, etc, etc. I went a little crazy. Woot!

I can't wait to sit down with my new Julia, since her Mastering the Art of French Cooking volumes--original editions--are two of my favorite treasures in the kitchen.

[cantienne]

My favorite cookbooks right now are Nigel Slater's. I love the flexibility of the recipes and his conversational tone. For baking/desserts, I love The American Boulangerie, and I've never gone wrong with Dorie Greenspan.

My out-of-print favorite in Roger Verge's Entertaining in the French Style. When I was a kid, I loved making ambitious stuff from that book. I don't think I ever hit on a bad recipe. I recently bought a used copy and am enjoying it all over again.

[viridian]

I really don't cook at all, but I love reading food literature and cookbooks. MFK Fisher's The Art of Eating is a classic. Another one of my favorite food writers is John Thorne (Serious Pig, Outlaw Cook) - while he can sometimes take himself a bit too seriously, he's a great essayist.

I also enjoy the books re-released by Ruth Reichl & Modern Library. Clementine in the Kitchen and The Unprejudiced Palate are both charming and an interesting glimpse of life in the 40s.

[Daisy Pusher]

One of the books I love to read, but have yet to use is called Dining By Rail, which is all about the history of dining cars during the heyday of U.S. rail travel, and the latter half of the book is filled with signature recipes from the various railroad lines.

Some day I want to do a whole multi-course supper from these recipes.

[Deleted]

Cool thread. I have been wanting to learn to cook and the only cookbook I own is the Sesame Street cookbook I have had since 1979 lol. I do make a mean Mr. Snuffleupagus Spaghetti though.

[dwanollah]

kokopelli said:

One of the books I love to read, but have yet to use is called Dining By Rail, which is all about the history of dining cars during the heyday of U.S. rail travel, and the latter half of the book is filled with signature recipes from the various railroad lines.

Some day I want to do a whole multi-course supper from these recipes.

Aaaand off to amazon. Again.

[SGleason]

I've been rereading all my Peg Brackens (The I Hate to Cook Book, etc.) since she died on Saturday.

I have a copy of The Gay Cookbook by Lou Rand Hogan from the early 60s. The copyright page says "All rights reserved, Mary." The seafood chapter is titled "That Tired Old Fish" and the meat jokes . . . they go on and on . . .

[ivy]

I am obsessed with chocolate, so my favorite cookbooks are the ones by Debbi Fields (yes, THE Mrs. Fields). Her recipes are so bad for you, but they are so, so yummy.

And I still occasionally look to those old Company's Coming books by Jean Pare. (I think it's a Canadian thing.)

[tiller]

I love reading old cookbooks and books about culinary history. I'm finishing Six Drinks That Changed the World and when I find the time, I may get the book on salt (I forget the exact title). The train and Ruth Reichl books also sound interesting. I think there's so much you can learn about a culture by what they eat and drink, and by what they don't.

[Daisy Pusher]

One of the books I picked up this week is Fashionable Foods: Seven Decades of Food Fads, and it is a riot. There were some truly horrifying concoctions out there. I am still in the 1920s chapter, and they have a recipe for an American version of "Eyetalian Spaghetti" which involves boiling the pasta for an hour before combining it with tomatoes, flour, cheese and cream and then baking it in the oven! Gugh! You'd need the Roto Rooter man to clean out your colon!