favorite cookbook

sweet tea · October 2006

stealing this topic from the shrimp scampi discussion....

who do you love? for special occasions? for all the time?

my favorite is "Mama Dip's Kitchen" by Mildred Council, who owned a restaurant called Mama Dip's Country Kitchen in my hometown.

http://www.powells.com/biblio/61-0807825085-0

not only is her biscuit recipe the basis of mine, but i love that she takes the time to explain how to do basic things like cook various styles of eggs, rather than only having regular recipes.

i have a lot of cookbooks, fancy and not, but when i take it into my head to make something and begin poking around for recipes, this book is almost always where i get the recipe or at least ideas of how to make my own.

stacey · October 2006

Subject: Re: favorite cookbook

sweet tea wrote: stealing this topic from the shrimp scampi discussion....

who do you love? for special occasions? for all the time?

my favorite is "Mama Dip's Kitchen" by Mildred Council, who owned a restaurant called Mama Dip's Country Kitchen in my hometown.

http://www.powells.com/biblio/61-0807825085-0

not only is her biscuit recipe the basis of mine, but i love that she takes the time to explain how to do basic things like cook various styles of eggs, rather than only having regular recipes.

i have a lot of cookbooks, fancy and not, but when i take it into my head to make something and begin poking around for recipes, this book is almost always where i get the recipe or at least ideas of how to make my own.

Its funny because most of my recipies I get on the internet nowadays

But I still refer to my Joy of Cooking! I have another cookbook that I like to use when cooking Spanish food its called Puerto Rican Cuisine in America by (I forget his first name) Rivera.

pitu · October 2006

I love cookbooks. Don't ask me to choose!

for total basics like cooking times, Mark Bittman's "How To Cook Everything". It does for me what Fannie Farmer and Meta Given did for my mom.

for The South, Edna Lewis and Scott Peacock "The Gift of Southern Cooking"

for the Italians...I mostly just cook what I know without books, but I love Biba Caggiano "Biba's Taste of Italy" and I'm getting into the Batali books since I started DVRing reruns of his Food Network show.
I have Marcella Hazan, but she's soooooo bossy!

for Vietnamese, and for great party food, Mai Pham's "Pleasures of the Vietnamese Table" (or is it Kitchen)

I also LOVE the Zuni book by Judy Rodgers - what is that, "New American"? The mock porchetta kills.....

Also Chez Panisse Vegetables is a great reference.

And Room For Dessert by David Lebovitz, for dessert of course. Slammin' ginger cake recipe from there widely available on the Internets...
http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/recipe_views/views/103238

with all that, I hardly ever follow a recipe :roll:
but I love a reference, and I'm trying to make myself do what they say, esp in books like Zuni

sweet tea · October 2006

pitu wrote: I love cookbooks. Don't ask me to choose!

for The South, Edna Lewis and Scott Peacock "The Gift of Southern Cooking"

i was so excited to get that one, and i do love the lamb shanks with green tomatoes recipe (although, since it's basically a tagine, i ended up tweaking the cooking stages a bit based on my experiences with another great favorite, paula wolfert's "Couscous and Other Good Foods from Morocco"). but some of the recipes in there are a bit fussy for my taste -- using bottled water and the like.

i just found a copy of edna lewis's "taste of country cooking", and i am SOOO eager to try it out.

i tend to make up my food as i go along, but i like to have good teachers. (it's hard to argue with edna lewis as a teacher of the highest order.) my latest triumph was a (i thought) quite respectable gumbo made without a recipe. i did put some beausoleil on the stereo and turn up the volume a bit -- think how good it might have been had i whyfi's speakers....

and stacey, i definitely grew up on "the joy". i hold a little grudge against the rombauers because of how TERRIBLE the biscuits i made in high school from there recipe were, but i do always use their apple pie recipe. they are a bit obsessed with the double-boiler, though....

pitu · October 2006

sweet tea wrote: [quote=pitu]I love cookbooks. Don't ask me to choose!

for The South, Edna Lewis and Scott Peacock "The Gift of Southern Cooking"

i was so excited to get that one, and i do love the lamb shanks with green tomatoes recipe

Oooooo I gotta try that. I made their fried chicken a couple nights ago -- it really is stellar. You brine it overnight before the buttermilk soak, lots of plan ahead. I put dry sage along with pepper in the flour, which is the only thing I think they left out...and I left out the salt in the flour, because with the brine that stuff is perfectly salty.

They tell you to use bottled water? I would skip over that unless I lived in a bad water place. I've had to restrain myself from getting more of Ms Lewis, cause someday I'll stumble across a used copy and I don't cook *that* much South.
But let me know how that one is, or invite me over

New books I order from Jessica's Biscuit. www.ecookbooks.com
great prices, easy to deal with, AND they send you 1/2 lb of coffee with your order.
Powells for everything else that isn't at the Strand or some other local bookstore.

rose · October 2006

Mark Bittman's How to Cook Everything. Just what it says. Simple recipes for tasty food. This book has never let me down. His fish cookbook is great too.

Peter Berley's Fresh Food Fast. Vegetarian. Everything I've cooked from this has been really, really good. Despite the title, the recipes are a little fussier than what I'm used to, and some of the ingredients are pretty obscure, but when I have time for this, it's always worth it.

Moosewood Cooks at Home. This is my most-used cookbook ever. Easy, healthy, tasty vegetarian food.

favorite cookbook

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