Cookbook Giveaway – Fresh from the Farm: A Year of Recipes and Stories

We're delighted to be able to offer five copies of Susie Middleton's new cookbook, Fresh from the Farm: A Year of Recipes and Stories. Not only does this book include 99 great farm-inspired recipes, it also relates the story of Susie's move from her job as editor of Fine Cooking magazine to her new life on a small farm in… read more

Susie Middleton’s life on the farm inspires a new cookbook

Susie Middleton is likely familiar to many of our subscribers. She is the former chief Editor for Fine Cooking magazine, and has previously published two cookbooks dedicated to vegetables, Fast, Fresh & Green: More than 90 Delicious Recipes for Veggie Lovers, and The Fresh & Green Table: Delicious Ideas for Bringing Vegetables into Every Meal. These cookbooks have earned Susie… read more

Mystery food for thought

Like many cooks, I enjoy curling up with a new cookbook and reading it like a novel. Snuggled up on the sofa, I pore through each recipe as though it were a spellbinding mystery. I enjoy reading mystery novels too, and recently learned about a genre of culinary-themed mysteries that not only offer intriguing plot twists but also include recipes!… read more

Valentine’s Day: In or Out?

What's a food lover to do on Valentine's Day - especially when it falls on a Friday? On the one hand, you know it would be nice to go out to dinner, particularly if you're a couple and date night doesn't come around as frequently as you'd like.  On the other hand, as an informed eater, you know that Valentine's… read more

Romantic recipes

Friday is Valentine's Day, so if you haven't yet planned the romantic dinner to sweep your significant other off his or her feet, you better start straight away. My romantic dinner will include a fried bologna sandwich (that's what he wants) and red velvet cheesecake (that's what I want). So many Valentine's Day recipes revolve around standbys like steak and… read more

Share and share alike

Most cooks have at least one special recipe, where an unusual ingredient or technique helps set the dish apart from similar recipes. A few cooks are more possessive about these secrets than others. Some family recipes now exist only in the mists of memory, because Grandma or Aunt Betty would never relinquish the cherished mystery ingredient. Professional chefs and cooks… read more

Perfect brown sugar, every time

I've seen a lot of kitchen tips on how to soften brown sugar. The advice varies from using damp paper towels, using the microwave, putting an apple or piece of bread in the container, and using adorable terra cotta bears. But even if my brown sugar is soft, it always has small, hard lumps that never seem to go away,… read more

How long will it take?

This post appeared at my blog this week.  I'm sure Eat Your Books members have a wealth of recipe-testing shortcuts and tools too - feel free to borrow my tips and share your own!  --Susie. Like anyone who regularly uses cookbooks,  I've often found a vast disconnect between how long I think a recipe will take and how long it… read more

Competitive appetites

Today the Olympics begin in Sochi, Russia. While there has been controversy about dilapidated hotels, strange toilet configurations, and cameras in the showers, food hadn't been part of the hullabaloo. But now that, too, has become an issue. It seems that a trade dispute involving dairy foods will keep U.S. Olympians from enjoying their Chobani Yogurt (Chobani is a sponsor of… read more

Featured Cookbooks & Recipes

Today we're sharing our latest compilation of recipes and cookbooks we've featured on Facebook, Twitter, & Google+. Many of the recipes are samples from recently indexed cookbooks, so even if you don't have the book (yet!), they can give you an idea of what each one has to offer. There are also recipes from indexed blogs and online recipes indexed by EYB members,… read more

A rose by any other name

When looking for German chocolate cake recipes on Eat Your Books, I found a recipe that, along with the usual directions and ingredients, explained the origins of the cake. I was surprised to learn that German chocolate cake is not German at all. The cake is an all-American creation originally called German's Chocolate Cake after the sweet baking chocolate used… read more

Use your noodle

  Perhaps weather extremes have triggered comfort food cravings, or maybe it's just because pasta is delicious, but something has prompted a flood of pasta posts on news feeds everywhere. Food52, in collaboration with Mario Batali's How To Tuesdays, recently demonstrated how to make garganelli pasta. Garganelli is rustic pasta that resembles a cross between penne and tagliatelle, and appears… read more

Second chance cookbooks

There are some cookbooks that become your favorites right away. They seem to spring into your hands shouting " Use me!", and within a couple of months they get so beat up it looks like they've been in the family for generations. But then there are the other cookbooks - the ones you put aside for no very good reason,… read more

A cover story

Nigella Lawson recently announced the publication of "covetable new editions" of nine of her bestselling cookbooks. (You may have to scroll down the page a bit to view the announcement.) The first two books, Nigella Express and How To Be a Domestic Goddess, pictured above, have covers described on Nigella's website as "striking" and "witty." An April, 2014 release date is… read more

Making time for food

From salt to sausage, ice to ice cream, this fascinating food timeline traces the origins of many different foods and recipes. Some entries are surprising - the timeline states that popcorn predates olive oil by about 1,000 years. The left side of the timeline lists the approximate date of introduction or discovery of various foods, while the right side indicates the… read more

Bowled over? Here are game day alternatives

  In the United States, many people are busy preparing for their Super Bowl parties, making dips, chili, snacks and even entire stadiums made out of food in anticipation of today's championship football game. Meanwhile, across either ocean, people are scratching their heads wondering why Americans (and Canadians) call this sport, which mainly uses hands and a "ball" that is… read more

A simple gift

Lindsay's eloquent farewell post reminded me of how the gift of two cookbooks greatly influenced my cooking journey. The first gift was for my wedding. My grandmother bestowed upon me a small plastic cookbook filled with handwritten cards containing cherished family recipes. Her love was evident in the time she took to carefully transcribe each recipe and add helpful hints… read more
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