Cookery books, why do we buy them?

[JanieB]

One of the wall-cupboards in the kitchen is devoted to cookery books. (goes out and counts them). 33, and these are the ones chosen for their "most used/useful". There are about the same again in different places around the house, not counting homebrew/winemaking, cocktail recipes and other specialist stuff.

The most used one is "The Cookery Year" from Reader's Digest. Given to me in 1975. There are two Mrs Beetons, one pre WWI, the other 1960's. Purnell's Complete Cookery, New Larousse Gastronomique, Elizabeth David's Yeast Cookery, books on Greek, French, Spanish, Indian and Chinese cooking. Delia's there but she's the most recent.

I would like a Jamie Oliver, but will hope someone buys me one, birthday coming up, heavy hint time again .

I would love to find a copy of the one we had for Domestic Science at school. I had to buy it from the school and was made to share it with my sister. As she's younger than me she used it 'til a year later than me and then gave it to someone else . It had the best tomato soup recipe I've ever tasted .

[Sue]

JanieB
That doesn't sound like the book we had for Domestic Science, I kept it as it was so awful, first printed around 1900! And what school child is going to cook sheep's heads or little delicacies for invalids.... It must have put loads of people off of cooking.
Sue

[JanieB]

JanieB
That doesn't sound like the book we had for Domestic Science, I kept it as it was so awful, first printed around 1900! And what school child is going to cook sheep's heads or little delicacies for invalids.... It must have put loads of people off of cooking.
Sue

Ooooh no. Nothing like that in ours. If I remember rightly (44 years ago) it was a fairly slim, A5ish, blue linen-backed book. Can't Google as I don't remember its name.

[Alison]

Have two shelves worth of cook books plus a scrap book and an ever increasing electronic cookbook which is where I put most of my new recipes these days. Don't use recipe books on a day to day but find it very useful to have a couple of "technique" books plus some specialist culinary ones, eg Indian, Mexcan, Chineese etc as well as a few for baking and posh desserts which I don't do very often. Love reading them but find a lot of the celebrety ones are overpriced and many of the recipes can be downloaded from the internet anyway. Tend to only buy ones these days when I need advice on a specific type of dish or they're bargains!!!!

[veg4681]

Now I buy French ones and I must say, just as a book to look at, they can be wonderful.
I dont think she has ever made a recipe out of one, although I can say that she has looked at many piccys and recipe's and taken ideas from them.

I think most of us tend to derive immense pleasure just from looking at them even if we don't get round to using the recipes.

I now tend to buy only 'specialised' cookbooks, so recipes that are authentic(ish) such as the Indian/Asian ones. Or French vegetarian cooking!

Also got a box full of cuttings from magazines and stuff printed off the Net.

I agree with the specialised cookery books, imagine you wouldn't buy Indian cookery cook by Jamie Oliver, would you? And BTW, I copy and paste recipes from the Net, printing means I have to physically store them...call me paranoid!

My fave cook is Keith Floyd, who's not been too well lately.

I've always loved his programmes as he really takes you on a cooks tour of each area he visits - bit of geography and bit of good nosh and PLENTY of his slurps!

I've several of his books and whilst I may not get round to cooking every recipe - I do like to browse them and like I say - you also get a look into the country/people which is/are the subject of the cuisine.

He's my fave too (from the cooking-tour TV programs) unlike the other celebrity cooks. He has this amazing ability to absorb the cooking concept/style of any geographical region of the world then vary or even enhance a little within the limits/rules of that national cuisine. Imagine Delia Smith trying to demonstrate how to cook a Thai dish just because it's becoming trendy (or that her agent had advised her it was a wise move), well Floyd's been there, ages ago. I trust him to know what he's talking about, he really does knows his stuffs.

Just been to count mine and I have 84!

I think they're all useful though! I have a few basic ones that I find handy for things like knowing how long to cook a particular cut of meat and stuff, others that I use often for 'favourite' things, some classics (Mrs Beeton, Elizabeth David, Jane Grigson etc) and quite a lot of specialist ones. My most recent aquisition is a book on North African cooking, as I'm going to try and grow some beans from that region this year.

wot 84! Same on you!

I agree that we do need a basic one from time to time and mine tend to be the M&S cookery book with all the standard recipes so much so that I find all the other basic cookery a duplicate purchase. I can really dig the North African cookery book although I have tried getting Lebanese, Turkish, Moroccan recipes from the Net.