Do you use any cookbooks?

[Glompbot]

Do you use a cookbook for recipies, etc?

Or do you usually just experiment and come up with something yourself?

[BlueBoy]

I've got a few books, but i rarely use them.

Mostly I just grab recipes from Epicure (http://www.theage.com.au/entertainment/epicure/) or RecipeFinder (http://recipefinder.ninemsn.com.au/) and play around with them.

[kleph]

i use cookbooks extensively. i read them like novels.

nothing is worse than a badly written cookbook. a lot of times it is not your fault the recipe never comes out right. lots of books are unclear, assume way too much and simply do not make sense. good ones, though, are a joy to explore. the cookbooks i like fall into two categories; those i read to understand a given recipe and those i read to find new ways of doing recipes.

among the basics needed in anyone's kitchen are any of the books by julia child (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/search-handle-url/index=books&field-author-exact=Julia%20Child&rank=-relevance%2C%2Bavailability%2C-daterank/104-0529665-7365507) on french cooking. the reason child became famous was because she made the rarified air of escoffer's french cusine available to the household kitchen. the real genius of child is that her recipes work. stick with it and you can make these wonderful dishes.

after you get some of those i reccomend having the joy of cooking (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0684818701/qid=1134860620/sr=2-1/ref=pd_bbs_b_2_1/104-0529665-7365507?s=books&v=glance&n=283155) and the fannie farmer cookbook (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0679450815/qid=1134860671/sr=2-1/ref=pd_bbs_b_2_1/104-0529665-7365507?s=books&v=glance&n=283155). while some of the recipes can be obtuse, they are great reference volumes for the casual chief. they explain a lot of details other cookbooks take for granted so you can refer to them to fill in a lot of blanks.

the beauty of all the above is that you can pretty much find them for almost nothing at any used book store. poke around, find one that has a broken spine and grease stains and then leave it auspiciously in the open when you cook to give folks the impression you know what the hell you are doing.

among the best cookbooks out there are the America's Test Kitchen volumes produced by the Cooks Illustrated (http://www.cooksillustrated.com/)folks. these books are derived from the quarterly magazine Cooks Illustrated and include stuff featured on the public television show America's Test Kitchen. they break down every recipe, find out what works and doesn't then explain it all in a clear straightforward manner. i've picked up more "secrets" from these guys than i care to admit.

one of my favorite cookbooks is Clifford Wright's A Mediterranean Feast (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0688153054/ref=ase_cliffordawright/104-0529665-7365507?s=books&v=glance&n=283155&tagActionCode=cliffordawright). this isn't simply a great cookbook, this is an incredible tome that integrates the history, culture and geograpy of the region and explains how it has all fitted together to produce the diverse and rich cusines it is famous for. it is also a dream to cook from.

wright has several other good books. his Grill Italian (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0028623991/qid=1134860032/sr=1-11/ref=sr_1_11/104-0529665-7365507?s=books&v=glance&n=283155) is an excellent guide for cooking on the grill and a summertime adventure for anyone with a good grill and a desire to cook outdoors. his Real Stew (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1558321993/qid=1134860017/sr=1-3/ref=sr_1_3/104-0529665-7365507?s=books&v=glance&n=283155) is a similar journey for winter with stick-to-your-ribs style comfort food that will make your whole home smell glorious. his website (http://www.cliffordawright.com/) is a good place to learn more about all of the above.

another cookbook author worth checking out is paula wolfort (http://www.paula-wolfert.com/). her writing is as exciting as her expertise in the kitchen. her cooking from the southwest of france (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/076457602X/qid=1134947712/sr=8-1/ref=pd_bbs_1/104-0529665-7365507?n=507846&s=books&v=glance) is a wonderful way to venture into formidible world french cooking. my favorite of hers is cooking of the eastern meditterannean (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0060166517/qid=1134947815/sr=1-4/ref=sr_1_4/104-0529665-7365507?s=books&v=glance&n=283155) which gives you a fascinating insight into the cultures of this region and provides more great recipes for cooking lentils than you thought possible.

a more advanced book that i simply love is james peterson's sauces (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0471292753/qid=1134860765/sr=2-1/ref=pd_bbs_b_2_1/104-0529665-7365507?s=books&v=glance&n=283155). he doesn't just stop at showing the recipes, he explains what is going on down to the molecular level. this book opened up a previously dark and forbidding field of cooking for me and i still use it regularly.

if you are ready to take the next step, i reccomend looking up some of the works of Jacques Pepin. his complete techniques (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1579121659/qid=1134861422/sr=2-2/ref=pd_bbs_b_2_2/104-0529665-7365507?s=books&v=glance&n=283155) incudes everything you would pay $50,000 to learn at a chef's school. it also is well illustrated and written so you have a chance to understand what the hell is going on. with that and any one of his regular cookbooks on french cooking, you can begin your march down the road to being a true culinary bad-ass.

but if you are more interested in a rough-and-ready style of cooking there are lots of great books focusing on regional american cusine. one that is a staple in every kitchen of my family is river road recipes (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0961302631/qid=1134860872/sr=2-1/ref=pd_bbs_b_2_1/104-0529665-7365507?s=books&v=glance&n=283155). this is not a detailed book or very explanatory but everything you need to know about southern-style cooking, particulary the manner it is practiced in louisiana.

as i mentioned in another thread, steven raichlen has a pretty good style for explaining barbeque. his how to grill (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0761120149/qid=1134861002/sr=2-1/ref=pd_bbs_b_2_1/104-0529665-7365507?s=books&v=glance&n=283155) is a wonderful book for the beginner an expert alike. for those looking for different approaches to their grilltime antics, his barbeque usa (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0761120157/qid=1134861002/sr=2-3/ref=pd_bbs_b_2_3/104-0529665-7365507?s=books&v=glance&n=283155) is a comprehensive and hands-on volume on this subject.

[Canalien]

I've got an old 1965 copy of Joy Of Cooking that I use a fair bit. There's even instructions on how skin and cook bears and stuff!

[kleph]

i love that. i have a new orleans creole cooking cookbood from the 1920s that has been edited for the volstead act. and my 50's vintage River Road Recipes has a recipe for "How to cook a coon" that is disturbingly vague.

[kleph]

also, for those bartenders out there, it is very much worth your while to scare up a copy of Stanley Clisby Arthur's now out-of-print classic "Famous New Orleans drinks and how to mix 'em"

it is a treasure trove of somewhat forgotten but serious knock-you-on-your-ass good drinks. none of this girly drink stuff with umbrella's either. we're talking about what you can do if you lay your hand on a bottle of good absinthe or the like.

[dwarfthrower]

Like Kleph I enjoy reading cookbooks. Although I'll rarely set out to work to a recipe... I just use them as inspiration, I enjoy experimenting with food, cookbooks serve as inspiration in the same way listening to records serves as inspiration when I play guitar.

[annie]

I have a tonne of cookbooks at home, and i use them regularly, or take a couple of recipes and mix them together. I have a set of about 12 huge cookbooks that are devoted to 'grandmothers recipes' from Holland. The problem is, they are all in dutch. I just need to get more enthusiasm to learn Dutch a bit more before I can properly peruse them.

One of my most used cook books is 'The Ultimate Chinese and Asian Cookbook', which has 500+ pages of delicious recipes.

I have to say i'm the same as kelph and dwarfthrower, in that i love to read them through, and picture it all in my head, and work out what I can use and what I can adapt to suit my budget and time.

[abelgold]

At the risk of sounding "women's-weekly set".. i really like the Naked Chef books - the recipes are refreshingly simple and have inspired me to try new flavours. The Marie Clair series seem good too, particularly "fresh". I'll try the first go following the recipe but then I'll modify it to suit my own tastes. I find I'm learning a lot about cooking this way.

I saw one today in the shops that I'm considering buying called "slow cooking" and features recipes from all around the world. I loooove a stew or a slow roast.... yummo.

[dwarfthrower]

Aye... the Marie Claire cookbooks are pretty good... and pretty too. Mmmmm food porn.

[munganah]

Like others here I use them for inspiration.
An excellent one is the Margaret Fulton encyclopedia of cooking.
Heaps of wicked recipes and definitions.
I've had it for ten years now and I havent needed to purchase any others.

[ms edeity]

Cook books are like old, favourite novels here too. For day to day cooking I generally like to play around with base ideas, but my favourite recipe has a kickarse dressing for salmon steaks.

[Glompbot]

Hm.

I think when I go book shopping this week, i'm going to try to find something more than just a new novel to read...

I don't know how to do so many basic things in the kitchen, I mean, some things I have an idea of because my mother used to make me help her cook... but.... well.... I have to ask people on IRC for help with too many things when I try cooking something different.

Thanks for the ideas.... I was kind of wondering if it was worth it, or do you find you look at it once, and then never look at it again... but you've all answered that one :D

[Canalien]

For modern australian cuisine, and easy to follow recipes, I'd have to recommend Donna Hay's Modern Classics 1 and 2. Volume 1 is all about your mains and starters and salads etc, and Volume 2 is where the desserts and sweets etc. come in. By no means is it any sort of comprehensive encyclopedic tome of culinary information (for that, I recommend Larousse Gastronomique, the MOTHER of all cook's handbooks... handbook being a vague term as you couldn't lift it with one hand), however it DOES have a very well done, well explained set of recipes from a broad range of styles incorporationg modern australian cooking (which is basically a mash of different cultural styles anyway). I recommend the lasagne recipe in Vol. 1 wholeheartedly.

[Lina]

I have a vedy vedy bad habit of going through cookbooks at other peoples houses. I just can't help myself. I too read them like they are novels.

My tried and true numbers consist of the Common Sense Cookbook, the huge Stephanie Alexander number and about 20 other books of various titles/cuisines.

Actually, my favourite is a little hardcover book I picked up at an op shop somewhere. It's about pasta and opera and it has a different pasta recipe for each opera listed in the book...such a cool book :D

[gunsella]

I don't know how to do so many basic things in the kitchen, I mean, some things I have an idea of because my mother used to make me help her cook...


i have an excellent book called 'essentials of cooking' by james peterson. it's really well written with great photos.

there are sections for all your basics, everything from making a chicken or fish broth, as well as vinaigrettes, mayonaise, make yr own pasta, millions of diffferent things you can do with veges, fish/seafood, meat, eggs. even how to scale, clean and bone a whole fish, how to cut up a rabbit. etc... it's pretty damned comprehensive.

[Glompbot]

Yeah, I think I need something like that gunsella.

:D

I'm all revved up to buy my first cook book this week :D
Thanks everyone

I think, for now, i'm going to avoid anything cultural specific, and just go for a basic cookbook

[abelgold]

Almost forgot: one of my little cooking bibles is a recipebook that my dear sister put together. It features a lot of recipes that my mum uses.. my sister's been documenting a lot of fantastic traditional chinese recipes that are only handed down by parents to children by spending cooking time together. Nice one Olivia!

[Glompbot]

Yeah, I've vowed before the year is out to get my grandmother to teach me how to make this traditional christmas log bread thing called a Beigli

One made of poppy seeds, and one made of walnut.

The lighter ones are walnut, the darker ones are poppyseed... and the top of the log is sprinkled with icing sugar :D
http://members.aol.com/phideltx/beigli.gif

I've asked my grandma to teach me, she was really happy when I told her I could make apricot dumplings, and knodel.

My mum has never learnt how to make this log thing... aparantly its not very easy because it uses yeast as a rising agent rather than self raising flower.

[beowulf437]

I only use cookbooks if I am making something unfamilar, or I ask my wife. Tonight I made an orange jello salad and an ambrosia salad for both I just asked my wife. The actual cooking that I do tomorrow is stuff that I have all done before so no recipes.

[excalibur]

Normally I'm one of the type that experiments when I cook.

The only cookbook I own I got for christmas. "Hot and spicy cookbook" I think found my food bible.

I did get the "common sense cookbook a few years ago. I don't know where that is anymore.

[Snowball]

My favourite Cook book is the Cooks Companion. It is the best Cook book i have ever owned.

http://www.stephaniealexander.com.au/mybooks.htm

[DCenT3]

Yeah, I've vowed before the year is out to get my grandmother to teach me how to make this traditional christmas log bread thing called a Beigli

One made of poppy seeds, and one made of walnut.

The lighter ones are walnut, the darker ones are poppyseed... and the top of the log is sprinkled with icing sugar :D
http://members.aol.com/phideltx/beigli.gif

I've asked my grandma to teach me, she was really happy when I told her I could make apricot dumplings, and knodel.

My mum has never learnt how to make this log thing... aparantly its not very easy because it uses yeast as a rising agent rather than self raising flower.


Where do your grandparents come from then? My whole family is croatian and my grandmar cookes the walnut one a fair bit.

I have to say that i have cooked about one dish from a cookbook. My grandma and my mum have cooked many dishes throughout the years that have been passed on through the family generations. I have picked up how to cook them aswell over the years. Most of my grandma's recipes are croatian/european style but my mum has a good mix of everything.

[FatherShark]

I've still got a little paperback cooking book (and now very dogeared) that was given to me when I first moved out of home back in 1995 - The Commonsense Cookery Book : Book 1 by the NSW Cookery Teaching Associated and published in 1978.

If you enjoy eating old fashioned cooking, I'd absolutely recommend it - none of that botique eatery crap to be found here.

[Davo_Dinkum]

The only cookbook I have and need is "The Anarchists cookbook" written by the Jolly Roger...AKA Eric Harris AKA One o the 2 shooters at columbine highschool....:D

[kleph]

that's wonderful. now.. this is the food forum. please get back on topic.

[Glompbot]

Where do your grandparents come from then? My whole family is croatian and my grandmar cookes the walnut one a fair bit.

Austria and Hungary and Czech... I'm never sure. I think grandma was chezh, grandpa was born in hungary, and they all lived in austria and adopted my dad there.


Supposedly its a traditional dutch christmas cake, but I've also seen reference to it as being a traditional austrian food. I guess they all just stole and borrowed until the lines became blurred.

[Lujan]

I have 2 cookbooks, well 1 cookbook, and a program on my pc. The cookbook is "Memories of Food at Gypsy House" by Roald Dahl. Full of lovely english recipes. The program on my pc has brazillions of recipies, and I sometimes use it. Mostly I buy stuff, fry it or boil it or steam it, add other stuff, feed it to the cat, assuming the cat doesn't die, I try it out on a housemate, if they survive, it goes on a plate and is called dinner.

[Davo_Dinkum]

Sorry for not knowing something. Jews.....You could have informed me instead of -repping, go and get AIDS

[DCenT3]

Austria and Hungary and Czech... I'm never sure. I think grandma was chezh, grandpa was born in hungary, and they all lived in austria and adopted my dad there.


Supposedly its a traditional dutch christmas cake, but I've also seen reference to it as being a traditional austrian food. I guess they all just stole and borrowed until the lines became blurred.

Ok, they are all very close to eachother geographically wise. I think another name for it is "stollen", ive seen it at oktoberfest and even aldi sells it sometimes. Enjoy it whenever you get a chance, i love homemade cakes and stuff more than bought.

[Marshall77]

I just got emailed The Naked Chef 2. (http://www.keepmyfile.com/download/cf9604494908)

http://www.keepmyfile.com/download/cf9604494908

:secret: :pclove:

[LisaJ]

I use those super foods ideas magazines...the recipes are pretty good and simple..We made a stuff roast lamb with vegies once...was nice..

[kleph]

i love those magazines. they almost always have a recipe or two i can use. i just hate the exorbant coverprices. since i don't think i am going to be needing their most recent reviews of the top end restaurants in philadelphia, back issues tend to do me just fine.

[Snapple]

I never use any cook-books, which explains why I never make the same dish twice.

[Scumbag]

I usually do a google search on the type of dish that I want to make, then go to the shop, buy the ingredients and make it!


The only annoying thing is that most of them are American which use the old fashioned imperial measuring system.

[Canalien]

google can convert those measurements quicksmart. i'm with you, usually get an idea and use a combination of research and inspiration to make something.
other dishes I get the cookbook out out every time until i can just make it.

[ShinymetalASS]

Sounds kinda lame, but I use the old CWA cookbook my grandma gave me. Makes a great basis for heaps of cooking if you are creative. As long as you know what to use instead of LARD.... :)

[kleph]

blasphemy! lard is awesome! make your pie crust with it ONCE and you will never make it any other way ever again.

[Buffy]

hehe Pirates mum gave him a copy of the 'nursing mothers cookbook', its great for those old fashioned recipes too. It has the best recipes for scones and pikelets and stuff, I just always giggle at him when he gets it out to make something :D

[Canalien]

holy crap, i'm with kleph, yeah it smells like a dead pig, but the shit is awesome in the kitchen. try making a yorkshire pudding in lard, the BEST. it's the best thing for seasoning cast iron and carbon steel too.

[SOC]

hehe Pirates mum gave him a copy of the 'nursing mothers cookbook', its great for those old fashioned recipes too. It has the best recipes for scones and pikelets and stuff, I just always giggle at him when he gets it out to make something :DI thought Pirate would have memorised the recipe for hash brownies by now?:weed: :D

[royale]

Some as mentioned before...
Cook Companion <- the bible
Spice Notes <- 2nd only to the bible if you grow stuff as well
The Margaret Fulton Cookbook <-Absolute classic
Australian Womens Weekly Chinese cookbook- many 'cheats' recipes to save time with similar results.

[Canalien]

I'm with you on the Women's Weekly Chinese one... there might be a few out there, i have a 1990 edition called 'Chinese Cooking Class Cookbook'. It's got some wicked time consuming recipes in it like Beggar's Chicken and Deep Fried Ice cream.

[haiironezumi]

I admit, I am guilty of reading Bill's and Donna Hay cookbooks, mainly because the only stuff we ate when I was a kid was steak + 3 veg or roast on sunday. Either that or Continental/Kan-tong etc food base things.

[Glompbot]

On the whole, what do people think of the womens weekly cookbooks?

I found a bunch of them for $4-10 each at a sale... but didn't have any cash on me at the time.

I should add i'm trying to buy healthy food cookbooks...

[King_Crud]

On the whole, what do people think of the womens weekly cookbooks?

I found a bunch of them for $4-10 each at a sale... but didn't have any cash on me at the time.

I should add i'm trying to buy healthy food cookbooks...
my dad is a really good cook and he swears by the Womens Day books. He also does some volunteer work at vinnies and they always get snapped up straight away

[dwarfthrower]

On the whole, what do people think of the womens weekly cookbooks?

Very good, no frills recipes for people who just want to cook good food reliably. I reckon my mum has the full set. Nothing in any of them would really set your world on fire, but you'll never really go wrong with them either.

[Spades]

best one ever is Margaret Fultons Cook book - ours is nearly wworn out - even the kids use it cause its simple, easy and the food is great

[Supreme_Cmdr]

Yeah, I've vowed before the year is out to get my grandmother to teach me how to make this traditional christmas log bread thing called a Beigli

One made of poppy seeds, and one made of walnut.

The lighter ones are walnut, the darker ones are poppyseed... and the top of the log is sprinkled with icing sugar :D
http://members.aol.com/phideltx/beigli.gif


Those things are awesome my gf's mum and grandmother make them.
Apparently they are a Hungarian specialty and they are very nice with a good strong black coffee.
The only other place I have seen them is in a little deli at Nth Ryde, Sydney.

[Glompbot]

I bought my first few cookbooks today from a discount book sale shop.

I've been eyeing off the books in this shop for a while now, but all I really wanted was a soup book... but since they're running out of stuff, they dropped the prices on everything even more

I have:
Womens Weekly "From the shelf" $1.95
Womens Weekly "Take 5 Ingredients" $1.95
Womens Weekly "Meals in Minutes: Low-fat" $5.95 (this one is pretty hefty sized)

And the one I originally went for
Simply Soups for summer and winter $7.95


WHEE, i'm all excited

[hijukal]

My g/f loves cookbooks, we have quite a few though we rarely seem to use them.

One book I can totally recommend though, is "Joy of Cooking" (but we call it "The Bible"); it was a gift from my g/f's aunty who used to cater.

For amateur and first-time chefs this book is amazing! It covers everything food-related; for instance there is a section which explains all the cuts of beef, where they're from, when/why to use them, how to cut it, the flavours and so on.

Then there are a good 10-20 beef-related recipes. It's more of a "how to learn" cookbook than a collection of recipes that you'll never reproduce anyway.

Any time we've decided to cook something, be it a main, dessert or something weird, there's always been a recipe in there. Can't recommend it highly enough. It is a bit expensive though (around 70 bucks).

[Canalien]

my copy of joy of cooking is about 40 years old... i've heard that the new revised version includes info on microwaves etc?

[kleph]

here is an interesting one to seek out if you wish to be a tad adventurous...

Delights from the Garden of Eden

The television news shows Iraq as a barren desert blasted by the heat of the sun and the wisps of smoke from deadly explosions. The country appears to be a hellscape that supports our polarized vision of the conflict that is unfolding there but, as one should suspect, there is a lot more to the place than that.

This was the cradle of civilization and it has one of the longest cultural histories on the planet to draw upon. This is where the world's first documented recipes were written and versions of those same dishes are still cooked there today. The constant churning mix of peoples on this relatively small piece of real estate has produced one of the most dynamic and profound cuisines in the world - and one of the most criminally overlooked.

Nawal Nasrallah's cookbook, Delights from the Garden of Eden is the impressive attempt to change that. Raised in Baghdad, Nasrallah escaped Saddam Hussein's reign during the 1990 war in the Gulf. She penned this book to keep Iraqi culinary tradition alive for other refugees.

Her book is not just a cookbook it is a reminiscence of her life in Iraq, it is a scholarly study on the gastronomic forces that have created the cuisine and it is a damn fun read too boot. Nasrallah is a cook, a scholar and a poet and her book is all the stronger for it.

via my cooking blog (http://www.kleph.com/cook/2006/05/cookbook-review-delights-from-garden.html)

[Glompbot]

I bought a Weight Watchers cookbook.

"Pantry Pull-Togethers"

Essentially fast meals, low fat, etc

There are 6 sections to it
Salads
Sides
Pasta & noodles
Stir-fries
Barbecues
Measurements (a lot of people use incorrect serving sizes or eat WAY too much meat)


Its also got really quick little sections for sauces, and dressings, quick light meals (ie ricotta & pear toast, asparagus & haloumi wrap), marinades....
Which is really handy because it means I can make sauces and etc from scratch :D

[ShinymetalASS]

I thought Pirate would have memorised the recipe for hash brownies by now?:weed: :D


English Tea Cake is the best bet :D

[kleph]

i was looking around this hear interweb looking for some background material on today's entry of my cooking blog (http://www.kleph.com/cook/) and i stumbled on a great resource - the fannie farmer cookbook (http://www.bartleby.com/87/).

not just any version of the fannie farmer cookbook, the 1918 edition of The Boston Cooking-School Cook Book which was the last edition authored by Farmer herself (she passed away in 1915).

as i wrote in today's entry (http://www.kleph.com/cook/2006/05/cookbook-review-fannie-farmer-cookbook.html) on my blog: This is one of the most honored staples in the American kitchen since its initial publication in 1896. My copy is a battered stained edition from the 1950s I inherited from my Grandmother Haynes. It got a lot of use when I first ventured into the kitchen and needed a guide to explain to me the basics that most recipes assume you know.

It has been a part of my kitchen so long it is sometimes hard to step back and recognize the tome for its greatness.

Fannie Merritt Farmer's "Boston Cooking-School Cook Book" was first released it was nothing less than a transformation in American cuisine. Because most cooking, until that time, was done in the home and by tradition. Recipes were rare, cooking was passed down from person to person. Written recipes were usually little more than guidelines and tended to be cryptically arcane.

Farmer's straight-forward pragmatic style changed all that. Her book is a joy to read because of its seemingly effortless clarity and exactness. Farmer published the book with the intention of creating a cooking school textbook but, instead, it found a rapt readership among the growing number of women who were treating hommaking as a profession. The encyclopedic and standardized approach of Farmer's cookbook was exactly what they were looking for.

Farmer died in 1915 and the last version of the book authored soley by her was published in 1918. (here is an online copy) The book continues to be issued in new editions every decade or so and it remains a key basic text for any domestic kitchen.

[that_guy]

One of the best cookbooks I have is 'Great Dishes of The World'. Printed in the 60's, it is one of the best resources I have, the only complaint is all the measurements are imperial. The asian cuisine section is a little lax, but that's where my Shri Owen books step in.
Women's Weekly cookbooks are absolute gold. Any time I'm at a garage sale or serching through a second hand store, that is one of the first things I look for. Not only are the recipies fantastic and easy to follow, they are usually quick to prepair.

[JumpinJez]

I generally freestyle my cooking, but I find the orange Nursing Mothers of Australia, the Golden Wattle and the CWA cookbooks are good for the basics like classic simple sauces, how long to cook what meat, that sort of thing.

[SilverSurfer]

I have bought this great Soup cook book, enough to make the Soup Nazi jealous
The recipes are great it just takes some time to prepare some of the more involved ones ... the results however are delicious

[SilverSurfer]

Ops ... forgot to add a link to it

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Soup-Nick-Sandler/dp/1856265064

[priji]

I am not interested and i have no use the cook books.my family member's are not like the cook book items. we are like only home made foods.

[Glompbot]

I got my hands on a copy of the cooks companion recently.
And once I got over the immense size of it...

Well... I love it. If I want to know how to prepare a vegetable I've never used before, I look in the book. If I want to know what flavours go well with say... cherries, I look in that.

I actually got used to it by reading the heading parts for most chapters in one day, and now I know where to look for stuff that I need.

Best cook book ever.

[Matt Rush]

Only if I can't think of anything to cook or am really stuck.

[MasterFarter]

Charmaine Solomon's Encyclopedia of Asian Food

Not so much these days, but for many years we regularly cooked from this one.

[annie]

I currently get a lot of recipes from the Good Taste or Super Food Ideas magazines that you get at Coles and Woolworths. There's a heap of really good recipes in there, and a lot that I can adapt or mix.

[and3w]

River Island Cook Book

And a old (1950's) American Good Housekeeping book (big thick fuck-off thing, but tells me how to do from the basics if I am stuck)

[Soahc]

I have one around here somewhere my mother gave me when I moved out of home. It's called The day to day cookery or something. It contains everything you need to know not to starve and not have take out.

Nothing fancy but helps me being a non cook type person to actually be able to make things :)

[Glompbot]

I'm using a lot of google and the cooks companion

I want maggies garden though, mostly because the cover is gorgeous.

My next book purchase is most likely to be the CSIRO well being diet book... and healthy cooking for one.

When I cook for other people I tend to have salads and veggies
but when I cook for myself lately I've been slacking off.

[cammobobbo]

Italian food? Silver spoon. Love that book to death.

[imp]

At the moment at the only one I cook from is the SureSlim Quickloss cookbook. :)