I have been interested and food, cooking, and cookbooks for over 30 years. The windy road that led me to where I am today was somewhat convoluted. Even though I write primarily about Asian food and cooking, there have been many works and people who have influenced how I think and communicate what I do.
Of course, my parents had something to do with my culinary interests. They made sure that I was well-fed and I responded by being chubby. The fact that our family came to the United States as refugees in the 1975 also affected how I perceive the importance of food and identity. Those personal situations undoubtedly shaped my food pursuits.
Andrew Gray of Cookbooker.com asked me 5 questions last week that got me to set those personal factors aside. His questions focused my thinking on the process of making a good cookbook and how you become a good cookbook writer. I work constantly hone my cookbook writing skills. Multimedia publishing (social networking, blogging, and print) adds yet another dimension to food writing.
Writing, like cooking, is a never ending craft. It's something I practice and get great pleasure from. I'm very fortunate.
Read my responses to Cookbooker.com's 5 Questions, then let us all know your thoughts on:
1) What was your first cookbook?
2) What cookbook(s) influence(d) you most?
3) How do you judge a good cookbook?
4) What kinds of cookbooks would you like to see published?
External links of interest:
- See 101Cookbooks and Cooking with Amy for my favorite cookbooks and why I cook.
- On Cookbooker.com, also check out Omnivore
Books owner Celia Sack's comments on
What makes a good cookbook.
TikiPundit says
1) Today's Gourmet, by Jacques Pepin. It was an easy introduction to cooking, focused on easily producing a meal. Ingredients were easily available (well, maybe not rabbit). The ease of recipes and the ability for a novice to quickly produce something quite tasty are why I've kept this book. That, and it was a present from my wife when we were still newly-married! She hasn't remembered the book in 20 years but if I were to give it away then in five minutes she'd ask what I did with it.
2) That Pepin book, of course, and my second, The Yan Can Cookbook, by Martin Yan. Both Pepin and Yan were fixtures on Bay Area public TV, and both have deep cooking skill chops behind their TV personalities. They opened up a world of discovery into selection, prep and technique. Living overseas, it was fun to get foreign-language cookbooks and decipher their recipes, but that's even more of a challenge than deciphering whether an English-language recipe will come out well.
3) Not too much food porn, but complicated recipes or plates that are specially arranged should have color photos; more details on preparation; no recipes that include one obscure ingredient only available from Upper Remoteland; and, only a few writers (Grace Young's who wrote Wisdom of the Chinese Kitchen) can get away with personal narrative included), so leave it out for the most part.
4) Technique has been done to death, so cookbooks should focus on recipes. More information is needed on ingredients. It's hard to pin down any type of cuisine, so round-robin tours of a region or country usually disappoint (I've seen more useless Italian cookbooks than I can count). Maybe an intense focus on a more constrained region would be good -- that can attract interested visitors to that area.
Schlake says
1) What was your first cookbook? My first was probably The Joy Of Cooking that mother had received as a wedding present. I know I was cooking by age seven (I have a picture) but I don't know when I started to use cookbooks. I made mostly candy and cookies as a child and young adult; sometimes spaghetti. I feel like it was actually Yan Can Cook that was my first recipe source for anything of substance.
2) What cookbook(s) influence(d) you most? The Joy Of Cooking was always there, plus another from the 60s that was more the remains of some kind of encyopediac cookbook kept in a pile (too many pages for its binding to contain). I still have both. For now, when I reccommend books I reccomend the Tassajara Bread Book, The Complete Tassajara Cookbook: Recipes, Techniques, and Reflections from the Famed Zen Kitchen, Alton Brown's I'm Just Here For The Food, Mark Bittman's How To Cook Everything and How To Cook Everything Vegetarian. Plus more if needed.
3) How do you judge a good cookbook? A good cookbook should be about cooking and not a picture book of things the cook has cooked. The illustrations in those old Joy Of Cooking editions are about perfect. Simple line drawings only when needed. A good cookbook should explain how to cook, not just give recipes. Espe's most recent Tassaraja book (mentioned above) is an ideal example. He tries to explain how to know when the food is ready instead of giving a range of times that it might be ready in. A good cookbook should provide authentic recipes. I hate buying a cookbook that changes all the recipes to fit the modern crazy cooking fad of the week. Anthropologists make the best cookbook authors by far. They take good notes and don't change things.
4) What kinds of cookbooks would you like to see published? I like to buy variety. I live in a small town in Southwest part of the United States. We're just a stop on the Interstate in a 100+ mile stretch with no other stops, so we have a huge line of fast food places. For restaurants, we have primarily Mexican food (which is really Texan and New Mexican with almost nothing offered that is actually from Mexico). So I like to buy cookbooks that are things other than what I can get here. African, Asian, and Indian cuisine have been my favorites for quite a while. US and European food doesn't quite seem exotic to me.
amy says
1) What was your first cookbook? Fannie Farmer
2) What cookbook(s) influence(d) you most? The Flavor Bible...ok it's not quite a "cookbook" but it fits the bill right?
3) How do you judge a good cookbook? The information, the way the recipe is laid out, etc
4) What kinds of cookbooks would you like to see published? A Taiwanese Cookbook in English/American print
David Levy says
Wow! What a great bunch of questions.
1)I read "The Joy of Cooking" and did enjoy it. however my mom kept a copy of Adele Davis' first cookbook around. Also Fannie Farmer was there too.
2)Even though I was exposed to all of the usual suspects around the 1960's and '70's, I think that the one book that really changed it for me was "The Tassajara Bread Book". Also I remember being fascinated and loving the Time Life series on foreign cooking. Later I picked up a copy of "A Thousand Recipe Chinese Cooking at Home" (I'm not sure if this is the title but it was a classic}. Paula Wolfert's book on Moroccan food became one of my favorites. Also anything by Anne Willans on French cuisine. My Dad gave me a copy of "Larousse's Gastronomique" when he realized my strong interest in French basics. Don't forget Julia Childs.
3)The criteria for a good cookbook have changed over the years. I like a cookbook that begins with a simple premise or idea, such as "this is a book about noodles". I do enjoy good food photography that makes it look tasty. layout is very important as well. I enjoy it when the author writes in a familiar way and allows you some leeway in your choice of ingredients. My favorite right now is Dorrie Greenspan's "From My Kitchen to Yours'.
4)I enjoy all types of cookbooks and try to keep up. I would like to see more written that explain processes and procedures yet allow you to insert the fresh ingredients available at that time of year. I do like ones that are colorful and gaudy and are over the top as well.
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Alicia Van-Weed says
this is wonderful....it was my mom's cookbook that influenced me...she also got it from my grandma
Andrea Nguyen says
It's totally cool that the classic works hold true over time. I too love the line drawings in the Joy of Cooking.
I sometimes wonder if we'll ever be able to write and use recipes written in that kind of short hand again? For example, "try the bacon, then add the onion" meant fry the bacon to render its fat before adding the onion.
Diane says
1) What was your first cookbook?
I remember reading all my Mom's cookbooks like they were novels. I would sit & read them for hours planning meals and daydreaming. There was "The Vegetarian Gourmet," Julia Child of course, and "The Moosewood Cookbook" as well as several on Jewish cooking that were all my favorites.
The first one I actually paid good money for myself was "Laurel's Kitchen" when I was about 12. I think I only used it to cook a few things (bread, some dips, beans, etc), but I read it until it was dog-eared. I loved its stories of those capable, food-loving women in Berkeley - and hey maybe reading is destiny, as now I am a capable, food-loving Berkeley woman!
2) What cookbook(s) influence(d) you most?
"Lord Krishna's Cuisine" and "An Invitation to Indian Cooking" by Madhur Jaffrey. Both of which I read in the 1980's. The former was too daunting and specialized for me, but I loved reading it. Madhur Jaffrey's book sent me down a path of serious exploration of Indian cuisine and exploration of the culture that has lasted to this day. For a non-desi gal, I am a great Indian cook!
On the Western side I would have to say that the biggest influence on me was reading Nigel Slater's books in the mid-1990's (an on to this day). It was an eye opener to see that simple food can be celebrated in its own right.
3) How do you judge a good cookbook?
Recipes from the heart, from someone's home and background. Things I think they eat when they are alone, not trying to impress anyone, that maybe their grandmas made in their day.
Oh, and lots of clear talk on technique and ingredients. I don't want to see ethnic food dumbed down for me with substitutes - I want it real, and I want to learn how to do it right.
4) What kinds of cookbooks would you like to see published?
More egional cuisine from South and SE Asia. Every time I go to India, I snap up whatever books I can find. Many are oddly writtens and hastily assembled. Often rather baffling in their instructions, leaving much out and assuming a lot. But it's the only way I can find cookbooks on, say, vegetarian Maharashtrian cuisine, or Bengali food, etc etc.
OK, is that enough of a tome on cookbooks? God, I love them.
🙂
Diane says
Sorry for all the typos above. I clearly shouldn't post after 11:30 at night.
And I realized point #2 was poorly written. Only "An Invitation to Indian Cooking is by Madhur Jaffrey. "Krishna" is by Yamuna Devi.
Chef Jay says
the two cook books that influenced me the most were Dionne Lucas' "Cooking at Home" and her cookbook compiled for her original school in England.. Both I had to use for some of my classes at the several culinary schools I attended ,, and each time I woudl go thru the books I would learn something I missed in prior readings. she not only gave recipes but more important she taught techniques and explained the reqsons for those techniques. Also her description of procedures were wonderful ,. each procediure not only outlined but the reason for it was well explained .. I used those many procedures all my professional life..
travesti says
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James says
Those are good tips on how to judge a cook book. Will use them next time.
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