A new way to test cookbooks
November 12, 2024 by DarcieCookbook clubs (along with our EYBD Previews) offer an opportunity to “test drive” cookbooks. Making recipes that you find online or in a library copy of the cookbook, along with hearing how others fared with specific recipes, allows you to get to know the book without committing to a purchase right away. There’s another way to vet a cookbook, and it involves less work but more money – check out an author’s collaboration with a restaurant.
This growing trend features cookbook authors teaming up with chefs in one or more restaurants to make tasting events based on recipes in a new cookbook. It’s especially poplar with chef-written books, as the collaboration is a natural extension of the ways chefs share ideas with one another. The menus can feature dishes from a cookbook paired with ones offered by the hosting chef, or be strictly derived from the book.
Restaurant collaborations are quickly becoming a standard part of author book tours. For both parties, “the cookbook dinner is a strategic play toward networking and cross-promotion,” and the benefits for diners are also a win-win – getting to eat dinner and evaluate a cookbook at the same time. However, there can be drawbacks. Sometimes chefs can’t resist putting their own twists on a dish, so you can’t be sure it’s going to turn out the same way in your own kitchen. For some authors, this is actually a feature, not a bug. Author Renee Erickson says that for her, “writing a cookbook isn’t to say, you do it this way…It’s to give an idea to the world and hope people can be inspired to adapt it into their life.”
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