Gift Cookbook Recommendations

Posted on 14 December 2006 under Cookbooks | 3 Comments

A couple days ago I’d blogged about a cookbook Mary had gotten me for my birthday. Ms. Squires asked what I would recommend for a general cookbook. My reply started getting a bit long, so I decided a full blog entry would be more appropriate.

Here’s Sandy’s original question. I’ll follow with a more complete reply:

Funny you should write about a cookbook this time. I was thinking with Christmas coming maybe you could give us some direction on cookbooks as gifts. While I know what I like in a cookbook, it sounds like your collection has a much wider variety then most.

What is a good all around, general cook book for people who get tired of cooking dinner?

There are a ton of general-interest cookbooks out there. The old standbys are still viable … Joy Of Cooking, Fannie Farmer, Betty Crocker, Better Homes & Gardens, etc., etc., ad nauseum. For anyone interested in learning the basic dishes (say, a youngest teenaged daughter who actually ate those pork medallions), if they don’t have one of these, any of them will do. But what if someone does know how to cook, as you suggest? These books will broaden horizons a little, but the person you’re buying for still may want a little more.

For example, on Labor Day weekend we went to Arkansas for a Latina wedding. However, the bride, who I know knows how to cook, had been asking me questions about *authentic* Mexican cooking (i.e., not Taco Bell, Chi Chi’s, etc.) Her groom is not from this country, but as she’s from Arkansas and is more acquainted with standard American dishes, she really wanted to learn more about what he was used to enjoying at meals. Our wedding gift to the two of them? A technique & recipe cookbook by Chef Rick Bayliss, recognized as an expert in the areas of Latina cuisine.

Ok, let’s say the person you want to give a cookbook to likes comfort food. We’re talking southern cuisine for that, and anything by Paula Deen or her sons will work. But at the same time, African-American cuisine, a derivative of southern cooking, is coming into its own, and some wonderful cookbooks are currently being being released on this subject. Still, chicken is not chicken is not chicken! Southern or African-American methods of cooking chicken are different from, say, German methods. If your giftee is more that way, cookbooks from Chef John Zehnder of Zehnder’s in Frankenmuth would be the ones to look at.

Anthony Bourdain is the epitome of French bistro cooking in this country, and his cookbook for his Les Halles restaurant in NYC is the best of its kind. We’re talking old standbys like classic roast chicken, steak frites (the right way to make what we know as French fries), the simplest and best tomato salad recipe I’ve ever seen, and a whole lot more. A word of warning though; The book is hilarious, but is also the only cookbook I’ve ever seen that’s laced with profanities. It’s the first cookbook I’ve ever read cover-to-cover, just to see what he’d write next.

For Italian cooking, Mario Batali and Giada Delaurentiis are the real experts, and for southwestern cuisine, Tyler Florence is the one to read. For grilling, grill manufacturer Weber has some amazing cookbooks out there. For game, that is, if your giftee is a hunter/trapper, the recipe book from Dixie Dave’s up in Birch Run is jam-packed with some seriously interesting concepts that aren’t too difficult … including the specialized instructions for cleaning the meats (in pairs, of course) for Rocky Mountain Oysters … This book is available over at Cabela’s in Dundee.

If you really don’t know you’re giftee, or if they’re a bit of a novice when it comes to cooking, get one of those basic, all-around books I mentioned at first. But if you do know them, and you know just what they like to eat, or even what they’d like to try, it’s not too difficult to go a couple extra steps to make the gift of a cookbook just that much more personal.

On Improvisationalattitudiness

Posted on 12 December 2006 under Cookbooks, Recipes | 3 Comments

One of my favorite cookbooks right now is The Improvisational Cook. Mary had gotten this beautiful book for my birthday, tucked it away … and forgotten all about it! She discovered it a couple weeks ago while straightening up the place she’d tucked it away in.

In this cookbook, author Sally Schneider tries to get home cooks to escape from their current way of thinking and, hopefully, experiment with the recipes they have. One of the main points about this is not to be afraid of the results, of what your diners might think. Instead, use this as a “jumping off” point to make things better.

This is something I learned only a few years ago. Freshly divorced, living alone, and watching something called ‘Food Network’, I started playing around with flavors, even going so far as to buying (gulp) Kosher salt! When my kids started telling me how much they liked what I was cooking, I dove in feet-first.

Then, after marrying Mary in late 2004, when she didn’t seem to mind my experimentations, I dove in head-first and kept going. My German-Polish roasted potato salad came out of all of this, and it’s a favorite now for quite a few folks, including some who don’t like ‘traditional’ potato salad.

Ms. Schneider also discusses kitchen accidents and how useful those might be. I found this out last year after I’d boiled some brats in Leinenkugel’s Apple Spice beer and served them with macaroni & cheese. The next day for lunch I’d nuked these things together, ate the brat, then started on the mac-n-cheese … which suddenly tasted like spiced apples. That weekend, I served the first batch of Baked Apple Macaroni & Cheese to Mary and the kids, and a 9 x 13 dish of it disappeared in no time at all.

Even though I was experimenting and improvising before Mary bought, lost, forgot about, and then found this book, I love it. If you’re into having fun with cooking in such a way that you enjoy exploring variety in your dishes, The Improvisational Cook will be a welcome addition to your collection. Oh, and Thanks, Mary! :-)

The Gift of a Write-In Cookbook

Posted on 8 December 2006 under Cookbooks | 1 Comment

One of the requested Christmas gifts this year is that of a write-in cookbook. Similar to a recipe box, the difference is that this is bound into a book that fits more easily into a bookcase where the rest of the cookbooks are located. And if it’s bound correctly, it lays nice and flat while you’re using it during cooking.

Do you think I could find such a thing? Well, of course not. I’m sure they’re out there, but they don’t seem to be available locally at all.

So I thought for a minute. I’d just completed a template for a ‘fundraiser cookbook’ of my own design, with my own content on those info pages fundraiser cookbooks are bound with, and my own artwork.

Well … how would that look as a write-in cookbook? It didn’t take long to figure that out.

The basic design is complete. There are problems, such as the lines for writing being too close together, and with the ‘Salads & Sides’ section following the ‘Soups & Stews’ section, some of the headers ended up as ‘Salads & Stews’ …

But it’s together, and just needs adjustments and editing. You’re welcome to download an 11-page sample by clicking here. (The sample may take a few minutes to download over a dial-up connection as the file size is about 350k.) You may need to download and install the free Adobe Acrobat Reader in order to be able to see the sample.

If you do download the sample pages, please use the Comments link below to let me know what you think.

I do have a complete 200-page prototype printed and bound, and will be taking it to at least one nearby shop today to see if they’ll want to retail it.

But as the first few are Christmas gifts, if you want one, be patient. If possible, in 2007 I’ll post where they might be available.

We’ll see how it goes.

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