My Favorite Kitchen Novels

I am a messy cook. I don’t know why . . . it’s just the whole timing of things. I’m always behind in what I am doing and I have butter wrappers and cutting boards and pieces of food here and there as I work feverishly against the clock while cooking. Kind of like that commercial for Rice Krispy treats a few years ago, with the lady in the kitchen who throws flour on her face to look like the recipe was harder than it really was. Although, I always look like that when cooking – and sometimes flour isn't even called for IN the recipe (figure that one out!)

But, I love cooking. And I love cookbooks. I can read a cookbook like a novel, page by page, carefully looking through the ingredients list and reading the directions. I often wonder how the creator came up with those particular concoctions and how they knew it would work together. I love that part about cooking. It is like a symphony, isn’t it?

At first glance, you can easily tell where my favorite recipes are . . . it’s ALWAYS the pages of the cookbook that have be splattered with oil or dotted with spices, where the color of the pages are no longer white but now have little spots of brown or yellow. The paper itself is wavy, as if it survived and finally dried after a big rain storm (only, it was me, not rain, who got them wet.) I can take a cookbook and simply fan the pages to find those that are my very favorite recipes. I love that. I’ve tried those plastic shield stands that hold the cook book up straight to protect it from the elements. But for me, those spots and stains represent a good time in the kitchen, and I think they need to stay.

I have two cookbooks that I refer to most regularly when cooking. You might expect them to be written by Julia Child or even Paula Deen. But, they are not. The first is a small Betty Crocker cookbook that I bought through one of those mail order book clubs some 15 years ago – even before I was married. It’s Betty Crocker “Everything you need to know how to cook”, and it is my staple cookbook. Everything from cooking a pot roast to steaming carrots is discussed and it is usually the first place I go to when I want to cook something new to me, but standard for others. I love this book! (This is also where I get my pie recipes from, and you know how good PG’s recent Cherry Pie looked!)

The second cookbook that I can’t live without, is a cookbook that my own mother organized and put together with a committee at the hospital we both worked at. THIS COOKBOOK is INCREDIBLE! Not only does it have MANY of my own Mom’s recipes, but it has recipes from some amazing southside Chicago cooks. I was 15 when mom worked on this cookbook, and I did the cover drawing along with each chapter insert. While the art work leaves MUCH to be desired, the recipes inside are fantastic!

You can find so many (millions) of recipes for the at-home cook online now. And while I love looking around at yummy food blogs or recipe sites, I still can’t get rid of my good ol’fashioned cookbooks. They are a part of my kitchen that will never go away. Stains and all.

What about you? Do you have a favorite cookbook that you refer to? Let me know … I might want to check it out, and it could become one of MY favorites, too.