My cookbook collection is one of my great joys! I usually ask for a new cookbook every Christmas and one of my favorite traditions is grabbing a few off the shelves in those quiet weeks of late December and early January and re-immersing myself in recipes (and the stories behind them) to invigorate a new year in the kitchen!
I also enjoy actually reading my cookbooks, Delia Smith is a favourite although I don't make a whole lot of her recipes - I did really like her cooking show years ago. And I know I am not the only one who dislikes getting a recipe off a website because you have to read through a novel about the ingredients and the prep and the tools needed etc etc while pop up videos auto play and banner ads appear at regular intervals!
There is nothing more fascinating to me than the food we cook; why do we make it, who gave us the recipe/idea? I love that the recipes (both in my cookbooks as well as my binder with my own collected recipes) I make often come via specific people I love. There is the sugar cookie recipe from my dear friend Lindsey (which actually came from her mother!), the corn chowder I first ate 15 years ago made by my friend Carrie, my grandmother's whole wheat buns (written in her handwriting!), and my grandfather's recipe for homemade root beer. And I am adding to the collection over the years, changing and adapting and tweaking recipes (often doubling or tripling them!) to fit our family.
Thank you for writing this. I'm not cooking right now because I just had a baby (my 7th!). But now I feel like spreading out all my cookbooks on my bed. There's really nothing like sitting down with a good cookbook and the comfort that comes with long before any food has been cooked.
I do love discovering new recipes from food blogs, but I haven't wanted to lose the feel of a recipe in my hand vs. on the phone screen. To resolve this, I now keep plenty of extra note cards in my recipe box and when I've looked up something multiple times online because it's becoming such a favorite, I don't print it- I put in on the note card, with my own adaptations added of course. Along that note, when friends ask me to share a recipe, I don't text links anymore. I write it down on a note card and hand it to them if we're sitting down together, or send it snail-mail if they're further away. Yes, it takes longer, but its so much more personal.
I experienced the down side of internet cooking when the recipe for perfect raspberry syrup that I loved but never wrote down disappeared completely. Apparently whoever owned the web location stopped supporting it. I had foolishly trusted that the internet is forever.
Cookbooks are the best. I love Simply in Season, except for the lack of spice in the recipes. But that can easily be fixed. My copy is full of stains and comments. I love that a guaranteed go to gift for me has become a cookbook.
Three months after we moved into our house, I found an old recipe box in the back of a drawer. It was from the woman who lived here before us, and died in the house in 2011 at 93. It is an absolute treasure of regional (South Philadelphia) dishes, including four different recipes for apple cake. It is the number one thing I would save if our house was on fire.
My cookbook collection is one of my great joys! I usually ask for a new cookbook every Christmas and one of my favorite traditions is grabbing a few off the shelves in those quiet weeks of late December and early January and re-immersing myself in recipes (and the stories behind them) to invigorate a new year in the kitchen!
I also enjoy actually reading my cookbooks, Delia Smith is a favourite although I don't make a whole lot of her recipes - I did really like her cooking show years ago. And I know I am not the only one who dislikes getting a recipe off a website because you have to read through a novel about the ingredients and the prep and the tools needed etc etc while pop up videos auto play and banner ads appear at regular intervals!
There is nothing more fascinating to me than the food we cook; why do we make it, who gave us the recipe/idea? I love that the recipes (both in my cookbooks as well as my binder with my own collected recipes) I make often come via specific people I love. There is the sugar cookie recipe from my dear friend Lindsey (which actually came from her mother!), the corn chowder I first ate 15 years ago made by my friend Carrie, my grandmother's whole wheat buns (written in her handwriting!), and my grandfather's recipe for homemade root beer. And I am adding to the collection over the years, changing and adapting and tweaking recipes (often doubling or tripling them!) to fit our family.
Thank you for writing this. I'm not cooking right now because I just had a baby (my 7th!). But now I feel like spreading out all my cookbooks on my bed. There's really nothing like sitting down with a good cookbook and the comfort that comes with long before any food has been cooked.
I do love discovering new recipes from food blogs, but I haven't wanted to lose the feel of a recipe in my hand vs. on the phone screen. To resolve this, I now keep plenty of extra note cards in my recipe box and when I've looked up something multiple times online because it's becoming such a favorite, I don't print it- I put in on the note card, with my own adaptations added of course. Along that note, when friends ask me to share a recipe, I don't text links anymore. I write it down on a note card and hand it to them if we're sitting down together, or send it snail-mail if they're further away. Yes, it takes longer, but its so much more personal.
I experienced the down side of internet cooking when the recipe for perfect raspberry syrup that I loved but never wrote down disappeared completely. Apparently whoever owned the web location stopped supporting it. I had foolishly trusted that the internet is forever.
Cookbooks are the best. I love Simply in Season, except for the lack of spice in the recipes. But that can easily be fixed. My copy is full of stains and comments. I love that a guaranteed go to gift for me has become a cookbook.
Three months after we moved into our house, I found an old recipe box in the back of a drawer. It was from the woman who lived here before us, and died in the house in 2011 at 93. It is an absolute treasure of regional (South Philadelphia) dishes, including four different recipes for apple cake. It is the number one thing I would save if our house was on fire.