The 5 Cookbooks In My Kitchen

So I had someone ask me how I learned to cook...

I have had no formal training at all.  Sure, I'd love to spend a few months at the Culinary Institute, but I don't have thousands of dollars.

All of my training was done in whatever kitchen I had access to.  My mom taught me a great deal when I was young (see the Coconut Cream Pie post for the story).  There's a lot I learned from practicing, and from burning, overcooking, over-spicing, and generally destroying a number of meals.

But I also learned a WHOLE lot by reading some cookbooks.  Yes, reading a cookbook.  I know that when you're looking for a new recipe, you'll go to the index, find the meal you want to make and just get the details.  But if you have a few free minutes, it's beneficial to thumb through it and see the variety of food out there.  Most good cookbooks will go beyond just the details of the recipe.  They'll explain the steps in more detail, explain the techniques used to create the look and taste of the food, etc.  So not only do you get a good recipe, but it may inspire you to create something new.

A number of years ago, I signed up for a Cookbook Club.  It's a lot like the old CD clubs: get a bunch for free to start and then agree to buy a few more in the future.  I ended up with WAY too many, so now the majority of them sit on a shelf in the basement.  Partially because I don't have room in the kitchen, but partially because they have one or two good recipes and that's it.   Moral: Don't judge a cookbook by its cover.

There are thousands of different cookbooks out there and it's impossible to know which ones are the best.  Now to prevent you from spending $30 on a cookbook that will eventually become a doorstop, let me recommend my top 5 cookbooks.  These are always nearby as reference materials.  They not only have great recipes, but the extras inside, such as conversion tables, technique demonstrations and explanations of the processes will definitely improve your culinary skills.

The 5 Cookbooks in My Kitchen

Better Homes and Gardens Cook Book - "The Old Standby"

This was the first cookbook I was given.  I received it as a wedding present back when I was way too young to get married.  It's a great collection of classic recipes.  But it's not only that.  It's the best basic cooking reference for the amateur cook.  A number of the recipes have variations to show their versatility.  And by showing you how you can mix up a recipe, it can inspire you to be creative as well.  If you know a young couple getting married, this really does make an excellent gift.  Oh, and make sure that when you buy it, you go with the Ring-bound version.  It'll hold up to the wear and tear you'll inflict upon it.

The Best Recipe - "One of the Best Learning Tools"

This comes directly from the Cooks Illustrated Magazine, the people behind America's Test Kitchen on PBS.  This cookbook has a great selection of basic recipes they have developed through trial and error.  And they detail the steps they took to reach their conclusions along with the recipe.  So you can learn a great deal about cooking by just reading the prefaces.  There's a whole series of these books, some focus on desserts, some focus on certain strains, such as Italian or Chinese.  All are good, but if you're going to get only one, start with this one.

I'm Just Here For The Food - Alton Brown - "The Ultimate Teaching Tool"

OK, for some food snobs, what I say next may be sacrilegious.  But I truly believe that Alton Brown has helped out the home chef in the past 15 years as much as Julia Child did for the home chef 30-40 years ago. His show, Good Eats, not only presents some great food, but he explains the science behind it all in a very entertaining way.  Yes, some of rigs and cooking apparati he uses on the show are a little extreme, but for a science geek like me, this kind of complexity is exactly what I need.  I can pull what I want from the show and ignore some of the extraneous items.  This cookbook has great recipes, but it also describes how and why a technique works.  Wanna learn how to fry something?  He'll give you multiple ways to do it and a few recipes along the way.  His entire series of Good Eats books are great.  But if you have a geek in the household that wants to learn how to cook, buy him this.

The Professional Chef - "Learning the Restaurant Tips and Tricks"

OK, now we're to the upper level courses.  This is serious stuff.  We're talking about how to prepare large amounts of food.  We're learning specific, extremely skilled preparation techniques.  We're talking expert level creations. We're talking extremely fancy food.  Yes, I've learned a lot from this book, but I use this one more for inspiration than anything else.  If I get a wild hare from trying something in a restaurant or from seeing something on a cooking show, I'll use this book as my reference guide.  This is also the only cookbook I recommend getting secondhand or from a DEEP discount bookseller.  The cover price is very steep (over $50) so look for is used on Amazon, eBay or any other recycled book seller.

The Best Local Cookbook You Can Find - "Because you gotta go local"

Wherever you live, you should learn to cook like the locals.  Because if you learn about the local food, you'll learn more about the local area.  When I lived in Seattle, I had a great seafood cookbook that unfortunately was lost in the move.  By reading that one cover to cover, I learned what was available in the area, but I also learned why some people prepared what they did.  The cookbook mentioned the Underground, which led me to the discovering about the city's seedy beginning.  Since I'm back in Utah, it's the Lion House Cookbook.  Why, because it's got some local cuisine and it's the Lion House, one of the early homes of Brigham Young and his multitude of wives.  It's now a restaurant run by the Mormon Church and the book has some of the best baked goods you will find.  Basically, no matter where you live, search out some local cuisine and learn more about your area.

So those are my Top 5 for now.  Feel free to get any or all of them.  But go out and find a few of your own. Take a minute in a Barnes and Noble to thumb through a book.  Or better yet, if you see one you like, check it out from your library and give it a trial run. Then go buy it on the cheap online.  Either way, buy one or two and use them to inspire your own cooking.