Quick Bites: Paula Forbes

Paula Forbes has been a professional cookbook critic for over ten years and is the author of The Austin Cookbook. She is the publisher of Stained Page News, a newsletter where she shares news, recipes, exciting upcoming books, details on new releases and more.

Q: What first triggered your interest in cooking? Your first cooking memory?

I honestly can’t remember a time I wasn’t interested in cooking. I remember being extremely small and trying to figure out why cinnamon toast was so good (spoiler: because you can’t go wrong with bread, butter, cinnamon, and sugar). I got in trouble as a tiny girl for eating all of the sugar snap peas straight off the vine. I was making Buche de Noels for Christmas from middle school on. It’s always been my favorite thing to do.

Q: If you had to describe your cooking style, what would it be?

I am not sure anyone has ever asked me that! Let’s see. I’m always looking for new fun things to do with vegetables, so the cookbooks that live in my kitchen tend to be vegetable-focused. My favorite dinner party food is always going to be vaguely Alpine – something Northern Italian, French, or German, or a combination thereof. And I’m lucky enough to live in Texas, which in my opinion boasts America’s greatest regional cuisine, so I’m always playing with that. Not much of a baker, but I am constantly on a quest to perfect my chocolate chip cookie recipe.

Q: What is your to go for a quick dinner?

It depends on the time of year. It’s March, so it’s probably either a sheet pan dinner with chicken thighs, or a clear-out-the-fridge vegetable soup. The summers in Texas are brutal, so that’s often rice in the rice maker and a quick vegetable sauté, or a light and herby pasta.

Q: Are you a cookbook collector? If so, tell us about your collection – number of books, favorite genre, favorite author? What you look for in a cookbook?

I have about 1000 cookbooks. Most of these have been amassed over a decade of cookbook reviewing, but plenty are antiques/vintage/personal acquisitions. Genres I have focused on are Texas, obviously, and Midwestern (I’m originally from Wisconsin.) I try to make sure I have good classic cookbook coverage and am currently trying to fill gaps from the 70s and 80s. I am a sucker for a fancy chef book with personality. And some books I hold on to just because I love the design, or I think they’re funny, or they were a gift from a good friend.

Q: What is the best part of your job as an author, cookbook reviewer? Do you sometimes feel like working with food all day keeps you from wanting to get creative in the kitchen?

I am big on not wasting food, so I try to eat all of my recipe testing. Plus my boyfriend is a restaurant critic, so most meals we’re either dining out for his job or recipe testing for mine. But….the answer is no, haha. There is nothing I love more than to pull out a stack of cookbooks and plan a large holiday meal or a birthday dinner for a friend.

Q: I love your cookbook The Austin Cookbook: Recipes and Stories from Deep in the Heart of Texas. Austin is a great food city tell us a bit about the food scene and your recommendations for the best eats.

Where to even begin! So, for starters, everyone knows Austin for barbecue (love Mickelthwait) and tacos both breakfast (go to Veracruz) and lunch or dinner (digging Nixta and Cuanto’s tacos). But don’t sleep on Tex-Mex (Amaya’s or Joe’s Bakery) and kolaches (Batch) for traditional Texas. You also might consider branching out: Austin has remarkably good sushi for a land-locked city, thanks to Tyson Cole’s Uchi and all the chefs that passed through it and stuck around. Kemuri Tatsu-ya, a Texas barbecue/izakaya hybrid, is a great example of what fun, modern Austin food looks like. And go to Dai Due for the best farm-to-table—wild boar, anyone?