More Cookery Books.

LissaC said:
Does anyone use a book holder to keep the books open while they cook? I've been thinking of getting one so I can start using my cookbooks more (something like this or this one). My aunt gave me this, but it doesn't hold the books open. And some of my cookbooks are huge (600+ pages). Any recommendations?
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I do but I doubt it’s big enough for that monster 600 pager! The biggest book I have is Silver Spoon which I don’t use all that often but when I do I either lay it flat or take a photo of the recipe on my phone and work off that.

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TastyReuben said:
Frequently, especially when a CB challenge kicks off.



Yes, when I get a new one, I read it like a novel, then I go back through and mark the recipes I definitely want to make, and I also mark the ones I definitely don’t want to make. Saves me time later when I’m looking through them for ideas.


Yes.


Yes, and yes. My comments are usually more about whether I liked something or not. I don’t change recipes a lot, except for a minor substitution here and there.


Currently, no. I build them up and build them up, and when I get too many, I donate them, cutting it back to the essentials, then I start over again.



No, not right now.
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You and I are very much alike with regards to cookbooks! I don’t get rid of them though (not that I have an excessive amount - maybe 50 or 60) but in the early days of my cooking journey I was getting TV chef books like Jamie Oliver and Nigella Lawson books, but on learning that they don’t even write their own recipes and it was all just a cash-in those books seldom get browsed nowadays… perhaps I should give them another chance - you can still find the odd gem.
 
caseydog said:
Yeah, it's getting crazy these days. Every site you go to seems to ask you to accept cookies.

CD
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I think it’s because of European data laws. If a site wants to serve pages to residents of the EU it must comply with some regulations?
 
karadekoolaid said:
Frequently

I've only ever read one cookery book from cover to cover. Madhur Jaffrey's " A Taste of India".
Do I browse? Sometimes I don't know what to cook, so I open the fridge and see what's inside. There might be "leeks", for example. I'll start browsing my (far too large) collection of cookbooks, just to see what's on offer. Then I might go online, but often the problem with "online" is that you get the cruddy recipes on the first two or three pages and have to go a bit deeper to find something really interesting.
I don't mark recipes, but I do tend to remember where they are for when I need them again.
And I haven't thrown out a cookery book for a few years now. The last lot were things like " time Magazine's 100 best Pasta Recipes", " Women's Institute Guide to Better Baking", " Mia Farrow's Favourite Foods", that sort of stuff. AND 200 copies of "Gourmet" magazine from the 1990s!
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I’m not good at remembering recipes so it takes me a few tries of one before I can remember them, but for safety I usually refer to the book (unless it’s something I cook very frequently).

Indian recipes are the worst for number of ingredients omg lol.
 
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caseydog said:
Do you have any good used bookstores near you? Here in Dallas, Half Price Books - Wikipedia. is the place to go for bargains on all kinds of books, records, movies, etc. There is a location here in Frisco, and they have a pretty large cookbook inventory.

CD
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Amazon used aggressive tactics in the UK that decimated bookstores. Fortunately they seem to have stabilised as Amazon suddenly decided to stop waging war and collaborate with independent book sellers 👍
The charity Oxfam is the UK's main used bookshop and there are a couple of independents about 40 mins from where I live. Everything else is online.
 
SandwichShortOfAPicnic said:
Amazon used aggressive tactics in the UK that decimated bookstores. Fortunately they seem to have stabilised as Amazon suddenly decided to stop waging war and collaborate with independent book sellers 👍
The charity Oxfam is the UK's main used bookshop and there are a couple of independents about 40 mins from where I live. Everything else is online.
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Barnes and Noble in the US survived Amazon, and is doing quite well. They got big into eBooks early. They do still have brick and mortar stores. We have one in the local Mall here in Frisco.

If I need an actual paper book, I go to HalfPriced Books. Here is our store in Frisco. It is pretty big.

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CD
 
caseydog said:
Do you have any good used bookstores near you? Here in Dallas, Half Price Books - Wikipedia. is the place to go for bargains on all kinds of books, records, movies, etc. There is a location here in Frisco, and they have a pretty large cookbook inventory.

CD
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We have those, and I do like their cookbook section, not unusual to find stuff going back to the ‘80’s, but not much beyond that. I pop into one of those every time I get my hair cut, because it’s just across the parking lot.

We still have B&N here, but about half the locations. Borders was the other chain, but they closed - remember when there was a B&N and a Borders just about everywhere? I used to kill a lot of lunch hours in those.
 
caseydog said:
Barnes and Noble in the US survived Amazon, and is doing quite well. They got big into eBooks early. They do still have brick and mortar stores. We have one in the local Mall here in Frisco.

If I need an actual paper book, I go to HalfPriced Books. Here is our store in Frisco. It is pretty big.

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CD
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The Blackwells and Waterstones chains survived.
Amazon did the usual aggressive move of buying up other online bookshops, promising to keep them going and then closing them. They seem to be working on improving their poor reputation recently.
Will that actually translate into paying their taxes? Pah lol.
 
Morning Glory said:
Have you looked at any of the recipes in this book @TastyReuben?
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Yes, I’ve already flipped through the whole thing and have made potato chips/crisps from peelings I’d have otherwise tossed, and the salad tonight will be dressed in a spicy honey-apple vinaigrette from the book.

What intrigued me (you might want to sit down, caseydog) is that this book is meant to demonstrate the author’s practice (which she teaches at her cooking school) of ditching menu planning and shopping for recipes to that of shopping for what looks good at the moment in the store (mainly meaning fresh fruit, vegetables, and meat), and being able to then turn that into a recipe of your own making. Her examples in the book are just that - certainly they’re to be made, but it’s the concept she’s trying to get across - that and eliminating food waste.

The text is compelling to read, as she mentions more than one study that says menu planning and shopping toward a specific recipe is usually more wasteful and less efficient than shopping for ingredients and then learning to cook creatively with what you have on hand, even though that’s exactly what menu planning is supposed to address.

Don’t worry, I’m still going to be cooking from recipes primarily, but I do like the way she talks about reducing waste by making batches of basic things, then those basic things become ingredients for other dishes later on.

If nothing else, though…I like the illustrations, and for $8, there wasn’t much risk involved.

I’ll share a funny story…when I bought it, the personable young woman ringing me up picked up the book and starting flipping through it, and the first thing she landed on was some squid dish, and she said, “Squid, huh? This must be a gift for someone yah don’t like!” :laugh:
 
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