Cookery Books

[Sue]

Hi
I'd love to know which cookery book you use more than any other? There are some cookery books which seem to provide endless inspiration and others I hardly use. Which of your cook books has the dirtiest, stuck together pages?
Sue

[Alison]

Depends what I want, one of my current favourites is the Able & Cole cookbook Cooking Outside the Box and I have various others I use for special occaisions. However I mostly use an old scrap book of cuttings and hand written notes which is my own cookery bible! Also not to forget my ancient old copy of Delia's complete cookery course which is always a handy reference guide.

[scarey55]

Mr Scarey and I Larousse Gastronomique ISBN 0-600-60235-4 very expensive but worth it's weight in gold. It has everything about everything in it and I use it about once a week. On a cheaper note we also use Margeurite Pattern's 300 recipe cookbook - the best IMHO for preserving, jam making etc. www.deliaonline.co.uk is also a great reference point.

[Nicos]

" books....
BeRo
and'The only cookbook you'll ever need' by Zoe Camrass

[moggssue]

Sorry to say, but my most used is probably a very old Indian Curry Club recipe book! We love spicy food in our house and its a good way to get veg into otherwise non-veg eaters haha!

[Flummery]

My really falling to bits one is the Mrs Beeton I got when we got married - nearly 37 years ago. It has some excruciating bits about hiring staff and 'turning out' all your rooms once a week etc. However, for basics it's ok

[shirlthegirl43]

The Good Housekeeping Cookery Book. Always my first place to look for stuff. Also use an online recipe finder

[Birdie Wife]

Ditto Good Housekeeping book for me! Mum gave it to me for Christmas a few years and I've not looked back since. Though I do have a chocolate recipe book that is well worn and always falls open at the Chocolate Brownie recipe! Best one I've ever found.

[Headfry]

Aga cook book that came with it!!!!! sunk without it. Even had to look up jacket potato when first had the stove!

[Seahorse]

'How To Be A Domestic Goddess' by Nigella Lawson. Absolutely scrummy bakes. I also have quite a few of the WI 'Best Kept Secrets' series that get used a lot.

Claire

[HeyWayne]

Most Jamie Oliver books - he, like me deals in handfuls, widgets and jobbies, rather than grams, ounces and pounds.

My cooking is a bit taste it as you go...

[valmarg]

I bought the weekly magazine Carrier's Kitchen back in the 80's. I also bought the binders to put them in. They are so well used that the binders are falling to bits.

I also have several of his cookbooks. He is my first port of call.

Also use Delia's books.

Some of the Australian Women's Weekly books are well used, particularly the 1st Chinese cookbook.

Oh, and the Dairy series of cookbooks that you get/got from the milkman.

For all the ones that are well used, there is an even larger number gathering dust on the shelves!!

valmarg

[muckdiva]

I am a cookbook addict, I confess, but the ones I actually use...
Delia's Vegetarian Collection
Real Fast Vegetarian Food, Ursula Ferrigno (I'm not a vegetarian, but they both have veggie recipes to die for)
Cookery in Colour, Marguerite Pattern (think I must have borrowed this from school and forgot to return it, but it's great for advice on the basics, espec dealing with different cuts of meat)
More with Less Cookbook by Doris Janzen Longacre, great read as well as good recipes
Naked Chef
Domestic Goddess (truly fab - all the recipes seem to work!)

[wellie]

Funny You Should Say That!....

I am forever thinking of new ways to update our blog, and two weeks ago, I announced to Trousers that I was going to take a photo of my Cookery Book Shelf in the Kitchen, and he thought I'd 'finally flipped'....

Not So! Complete 'method in my madness' - every decent law-abiding vegetable grower is dead keen on cooking, or, they soon will be! One has a hand inside of the other hand as far as I'm concerned, and NO mistake!

We all have our normal 'stand-by-reliables' and I thought it would be an interesting moment for viewing, so thank you for bringing the subject up so beautifully.

Personally, I'm a Denis Cotter (Irish Chef of Cafe Paradiso fame) fan. His Restaurant and CookBook Recipes are all vegetarian, but I make them to accompany my own home-cooked dishes, or adapt them to include meat, poultry or fish, and he has completely ingenious ways of using veg that you'd never dream of, and I think that's dead clever.

I'll actually take that photo then this week?

[Hazel at the Hill]

And just because that is a truely INSPIRED idea, Wellie, I have take a piccy of my cook book shelf in the kitchen.

I have:
-Couple of Delia's - 'baking' is OK, but on it's way to Oxfam
-notebook stuffed with cut out recipes etc & Bero book (first cookbook, now an updated version)
-Family Circle 'Cooking' - good for basics
-Good Housekeeping 'one pot' cookbook
-1000 classic recipes & WI classic cookbook (no pics, but good recipes)
-Fresh Bread in the Morning - use it all the time & juicing book in same series
-Home Freezing handbook
-A couple of partworks which I use most weekends - 1001 recipes for pan or wok - and Simply Delicious cookery cards

Not on display - Sarah Ravens cookbook which is being perused in the lounge

I love a new cookbook, but am pretty strict that it has to fit on the shelf - or something has to be hoofed out to make way for it!