Favorite Cookbook?

I love my Settlement Cookbook.  The classic, red-and-white Better Homes and Gardens cookbook is good too.

Fannie Farmer, although I don't use it as much as I used to use it (TBH, even the updated ones are a bit dated, but it is a complete cookbook and will give you an idea on how to make the basics of practically everything).  I like the River Cottage series by Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall (probably not a huge surprise there).  

One of the best cookbooks I've used recently is "How to Cook Everything Vegetarian" by Mark Bittman.

I want to update my cookbooks and get rid of the ones I don't use, and I am considering getting some books on traditional French cooking.

Yeah, Nigel really isn't a celebrity as chary said, but a food writer.  Jamie Oliver has called Nigel "a bloody genius" though.  I agree! 

The Observer this week has been running the Top 50 Cookbooks of all time!  From among the top 50, we own The Greens Cookbook (vegetarian), Moro (Mediterranean), Jamie's Italy, and Nigel Slater's The Kitchen Diaries - the last making #4 on the top 10 list.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2010/aug/15/top-10-best-cookbooks

Not exactly a cookbook, but when I want to try something new I go to foodandwine.com.  I love the magazine. You can save your favorite recipes and make notes.

The Observer this week has been running the Top 50 Cookbooks of all time! 

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2010/aug/15/top-10-best-cookbooks

My favourite Italian cookbook, The Classic Italian Cookbook by Marcella Hazan is on that list!  It's something I really want to get a copy of, though my favourite recipes from it I have memorised. 

I like the River Cottage series by Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall (probably not a huge surprise there). 

Another Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall fan here.  We live quite close to River Cottage, and are going there next weekend for an open day.  We met him a few months ago when he did a special meal at the River Cottage Canteen in Axminster, and he was very nice and signed my copy of The River Cottage Cookbook.  We're having his courgette souffle for tea tonight.   

The Observer this week has been running the Top 50 Cookbooks of all time!  From among the top 50, we own The Greens Cookbook (vegetarian), Moro (Mediterranean), Jamie's Italy, and Nigel Slater's The Kitchen Diaries - the last making #4 on the top 10 list.

Oooh, nice!

I have:

#2   French Provincial Cooking by Elizabeth David
#4   Kitchen Diaries by Nigel Slater
#6    English Food by Sophie Grigson
#14  The Constance Spry Cookery Book by Constance Spry & Rosemary Hume****
#15  Jamie's Italy by Jamie Oliver
#18  An Invitation to Indian Cooking by Madhur Jaffrey
#20  Good Things in England by Florence White
#21  Mastering the Art of French Cooking by Julia Child
#22  The Four Seasons Cookery Book by Margaret Costa

If I were making a top 50 list, I'd definitely have included CookWise by Shirley Corriher.

***Constance Spry is my fave because it was published in '56 and I have my mother's old copy from '59 - complete with notes and menus from dinner parties she gave over 40 years.

My favourites are by far The Essentials of Baking by Wiliams-Sonoma and The Essentials of Slow-Cooking by Williams-Sonoma. They both are awesome and have measurements in cups and grams, so you can use either method. Every recipe I have ever made out of either book has been fantastic!

I also love Rachel Allen's Bake cookbook and have probably made the most recipes out of that one, as well as Jamie Oliver's Ministry of Food cookbook. That one is great because it teaches you how to make basic English stuff like roast dinners, Yorkshire puddings, and curries, etc, if you want to learn how to make that kind of thing. Other than that, I mainly just like having them so I can look through and get ideas (and I love food photography). I usually only actually follow a recipe when baking.

***Constance Spry is my fave because it was published in '56 and I have my mother's old copy from '59 - complete with notes and menus from dinner parties she gave over 40 years.

Old cookbooks are my favourite! While I was still living with my mother, anytime we got out her Betty Crocker cookbook from the '50s we had to read the "preparing for your day" (aka life advice) section. It contained classic advice like:

"Always be sure to add a spritz of cologne in the morning. It boosts your morale and your family's, too!"

"Have a hobby. Be interested and you'll be interesting."

And of course all of the pictures involved well-groomed women standing in their high heels, effortlessly mixing ingredients together. Because that's how we all look when we're cooking, right? 

And of course all of the pictures involved well-groomed women standing in their high heels, effortlessly mixing ingredients together. Because that's how we all look when we're cooking, right? 

It's what I aspire to! 

I have some lovely ANCIENT Mrs. Beeton cookbooks which are really entertaining to read. But, for me, for giggles you can't beat The American Hostess Cook Book (1949) which includes recipes by such luminaries as:

Mrs. W.D. Partlow - Many people in the state of Alabama say that Mrs. Partlow has no peer as a hostess. Because of her skill and the love the state has for her and her very great husband, she is frequently called upon to entertain the distinguished visitors that come to the state.

(It usually tells you what church and political party the ladies belong to, but Mrs. Partlow was let off the hook, by the sound of it.)

Then you get Mrs. Partlow's recipes, including Cucumber Ring with Cottage Cheese and Pineapple in Center. Um ... no peer as a hostess, eh? 

I second the vote for Jamie Oliver's Ministry of Food. It has some really quick easy recipes and some that, while easy, take hours and hours to make (let simmer...) and are completely worth it. It's the one we use the most.

The most interesting cookbooks I have are the Alton Brown ones. His regular cookbooks (I'm Just Here for the Food; I'm Just Here for the Food: Kitchen User's Manual; I'm Just Here for More Food) explain a lot about the science of cooking - how different cooking methods change the chemical composition of food, how to change your results by changing little things; the advantages of different cooking utensils (he believes very strongly that cooking gadgets should all be multi-functional).  The TV show cookbooks (Good Eats: The Early Years; Good Eats: The Middle Years) cover the highlights of each episode, informationally and a couple of recipes. If you haven't watched Good Eats, I recommend it. They're a lot of fun.

My favorite, however, is Nigella Lawson's How to be a Domestic Goddess. I love baking!

Also worth a mention is Epicurious. There's http://www.epicurious.com/ and an iphone app and years worth of recipes from back issues of cooking mags. You can search by ingredients, too.

My favourites are by far The Essentials of Baking by Wiliams-Sonoma and The Essentials of Slow-Cooking by Williams-Sonoma. They both are awesome and have measurements in cups and grams, so you can use either method. Every recipe I have ever made out of either book has been fantastic!

I was going to say those, did I recommend them to you?  I did to someone here.  :-)

The only time I had a problem with either of those is when I don't have the proper equipment. 

Allrecipes is great and I love Betty Crocker. 

You say you like simple, this is a good one:

In fact, I've found most of the recipes from BBC's Good Food range to be well, good.    Probably not dinner party fare, but fine for feeding the family in a reasonable about of time.  I have a few of their '101' cookbooks (the small ones you often see in grocery stores.)  I seem to be making a lot from the '101 Best Ever Chicken Recipes' book at the moment. 

Mark Bittman's How to Cook Everything is a great one, too.  I've seen it described as the Jok of Cooking for a new generation, and I think that's a decent review of it.  (I also have JoC, though I admit I don't use it often.)

I just remembered my current favourite cookbook is the one for India Knight and Neris Thomas' Idiot Proof Diet.  Yeah, it might not be one for you to buy if you're not a low carber, but I highly recommend people have at least a look at it (or get it from the library).  There are some excellent recipes in it, and many of them work for low GI diets as well.

I was going to say those, did I recommend them to you?  I did to someone here.  :-)

The only time I had a problem with either of those is when I don't have the proper equipment. 

Allrecipes is great and I love Betty Crocker. 

I bought them from the Book People, I think you did recommend them to me!  At any rate, we were messaging back and forth for a while about the recipes we tried from the slow cooker one. 

I second the vote for Jamie Oliver's Ministry of Food. It has some really quick easy recipes and some that, while easy, take hours and hours to make (let simmer...) and are completely worth it. It's the one we use the most.

The most interesting cookbooks I have are the Alton Brown ones. His regular cookbooks (I'm Just Here for the Food; I'm Just Here for the Food: Kitchen User's Manual; I'm Just Here for More Food) explain a lot about the science of cooking - how different cooking methods change the chemical composition of food, how to change your results by changing little things; the advantages of different cooking utensils (he believes very strongly that cooking gadgets should all be multi-functional).  The TV show cookbooks (Good Eats: The Early Years; Good Eats: The Middle Years) cover the highlights of each episode, informationally and a couple of recipes. If you haven't watched Good Eats, I recommend it. They're a lot of fun.

My favorite, however, is Nigella Lawson's How to be a Domestic Goddess. I love baking!

Also worth a mention is Epicurious. There's http://www.epicurious.com/ and an iphone app and years worth of recipes from back issues of cooking mags. You can search by ingredients, too.

I love love love love Alton Brown  Good Eats I found out is on Sunday night here, I DVR it!

Jamie Oliver's Ministry of Food will go on my list for sure as I need a good simple English cookbook but gosh I am a book lover even of cookbooks.  Just to have them is awesome but the problem is where do I put them all ;-)