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When Do You Give Up On A Cookbook?

Chris Amirault
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JPW

JPW

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"Add 1 can Cream of Mushroom/Celery/Chicken Soup"

If someone writes a book about restaurants and nobody reads it, will it produce a 10 page thread?

Joe W

srhcb

srhcb

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There are some cookbooks authors who I just can't relate to. I know they're good cooks and writers, but something about their recipes just doesn't work for me.

Although I'm a fairly adept baker, some recipes from James Beard's Beard on Bread just don't turn out right even after repeated attempts. Other selections from the same book have become staples in my repertoire though, so I keep the book with the offending recipes crossed out.

On the other hand, I found Chris Kimball's The Yellow Farm House Cookbook to be near totally unuseable. And I bought it because I'd always had good luck with recipes from Cooks Illustrated? I gave the book away, with a warning, but the person I gave it to likes it.

I suppose there's a parallel to other types of literature, or even face to face communication. There are plenty of people who I'm sure are interesting and intelligent that I just can't communicate with.

SB :unsure:

FabulousFoodBabe

FabulousFoodBabe

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You? What makes you bail on a book?

Pan sizes that don't exist, for baking. Recipes that start with "Conchetta and I love to serve this to our sorority sisters after a naked pillow fight. Passs a steaming bowl of barbecue sauce separately." Anything with a Food TV Star on the cover (sad but true: I've been given more of those than I care to remember.) While I don't bail on them, I also never use restaurant cookbooks (I've been given Brennan's, The Mansion on Turtle Creek, K-Paul's, etc. etc. etc.). I like to read them but don't cook from them.

I have kept every cookbook I've ever gotten -- The Jif Choosy Mothers' Cookbook(circa 1978), the Better Homes and Gardens looseleaf notebook that someone started for me (egad!), about 40,000 Junior League, church and "team Mom" cookbooks that everyone just knows I'll love. Not all of them remain on my shelves, though. Nathalie Dupree's book is propping up one side of the foosball table. :wink:

"Oh, tuna. Tuna, tuna, tuna." -Andy Bernard, The Office
Chris Amirault

Chris Amirault

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Recipes that start with "Conchetta and I love to serve this to our sorority sisters after a naked pillow fight.  Passs a steaming bowl of barbecue sauce separately." 

I can think of a few guys around here who would volunteer to give that cookbook a happy home.

Chris Amirault

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Sir Luscious got gator belts and patty melts

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