Good Cookbooks?

[Eden]

Oh - and its not exactly a cook book, but the book Timing is Everything by Jack Piccolo is a terrific cooking reference book.

[Crankin]

I use the fast recipes from Cooking Light almost exclusively. At the end of the month I cut them out and save them. I also use a couple of the Cooking Light cookbooks (15 minute meals). I also get Food and Wine and use stuff from that. For the basics I use a Good Housekeeping cookbook I bought for my son when he was in high school, and a couple of Jewish cook books handed down from my mom.
I have a lot of other cookbooks, but most of them are full of recipes that are too fattening, especially the vegetarian ones.

[shootingstar]

Hmmm. Have about 10 cookbooks gathering dust abit. Have one of the Moosewood books while some are a blend of fusion cooking with real cheffy twists, and other books are traditional Asian recipes with photos or illustrations on technique. There are 3, I value because the books are no longer in print but have real value because....China has changed so much in the past decade that some of these photos are probably not quite relevant /scenery has been radically altered.

For past 5 years, I get recipes from magazine websites for:
Cooking Light -healthy recipes (though Eating Well, is even healthier. Cooking Light still tends to use too much sugar.)
Eating Well - healthy recipes
Epicurious.com (which covers Bon Appetite & now-defunct Gourmet magazine)
Saveur

Either he or I, only consult a recipe..um about once per month or less. Rest is memory or we throw ingredients together for culinary magic.

[hoffsquared]

Thanks for all these. Next time I'm at the bookstore, I'll try to find the ones mentioned here.

I use the internet too but I really like to browse through my books at the kitchen table when planning (or at least making an attempt at) out meals for the week.

[Atlas]

Someone already mentioned Mark Bittman's "How to Cook Everything Vegetarian" and its wonderful. I keep getting it from the library but I really need my own copy.

My other go-to's are "Vegan With a Vengeance" and "Veganomicon" but I understand that most people aren't vegan. Still, they are great cookbooks that have lots of recipes for healthy, good food and many of them don't call for weird ingredients.

[azfiddle]

I rely on Joy of Cooking for lots of basics- got mine as a gift over 25 years ago!

A source of a lot of interesting recipes from all over the world- Jewish Holiday Cooking. It's over 20 years old and I don't know how easy it is to find, but I everything I've tried from it was great, and there are quite a few vegetarian options (mostly w/ dairy products).

Another cookbook that might be completely out of print, that I got a really long time ago - The Vegetarian Epicure. Though my copy is falling apart, I still get great reviews on the Cauliflower Curry recipes, and I wowed a college dinner party with Asparagus Pastry.

[malkin]

Yesterday as I was culling the excess from the cookbook shelves, we had a great laugh about the Joy of Cooking, which I will keep, because you never know when you will need to clean a moose or prepare a squirrel at a time when the internet will be down.

I like the old Tassajara Cookbook and Bread Book (and they have an ex-boyfriend's possessive mark in them ha!).

I just got the King Arthur Flour 200th Anniversary book from the library and we couldn't live without Cookwise which isn't really a recipe book, so much as an explanation about everything having to do with cooking.

Pie in the Sky is the best resource for baking at every altitude.

[bmccasland]

Because I think I might be moving away from this place, I bought the Times-Picayune's Cooking up a Storm - a collection of recipes the local paper put together from requests for lost recipies after Hurricane Katrina. Each recipe has a bit of history about it, and in true New Orleans fashion, has good drink recipies, fish & game, and desserts.

For basic reference I have my Better Homes and Gardens Cook Book a notebook type binder that looks like it's covered with a red check table cloth.

I have to admit, I have a weakness for cookbooks, and have a bookcase full of them. Don't ask me to cull the stacks. Can't do it, just can't.