New Blogs Indexed

We have added seven great new blogs this month - add the entire blog or individual recipes to your Bookshelf.    A blog completely devoted to chocolate - what a great theme for a blog to help satisfy the cravings of us chocoholics. Choclette from Chocolate Log Blog thought so and all 269 recipes on her blog use some form of chocolate. Her… read more

Dorie Greenspan expands her cookie reach

Famed baker Dorie Greenspan, author of the wonderful book Baking: From My Home to Yours and the blog In the Kitchen and on the Road with Dorie (recipes indexed on EYB), had a pop-up cookie store in NYC for a while.  It would appear around celebrations such as Christmas and Valentine's Days.  Now she has teamed up with her son and a business… read more

A gastronome’s puzzle

Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall has a new book just out Hugh's Three Good Things.  Hugh's premise is that there are combinations of three ingredients that create culinary magic.  And we will be indexing the book shortly so we will find out how well that works. The Guardian newspaper has revealed a puzzle that academics have been pondering for at least three decades.… read more

Top food writers on Twitter

There are thousands of food writers on Twitter, many of them amateurs, so Mashable has selected what they consider the top 10 professionals on Twitter.  Included are some friends of Eat Your Books:   Amanda Hesser @amandahesser of Food52 Monica Bhide @mbhide Kenji Alt @TheFoodLab (of Serious Eats) Check out the list and let us know who else you think should be included… read more

If an oyster cannot feel pain, is it OK for a “vegan” to eat it?

  Christopher Cox considers himself a vegan as he eats no meat, dairy or eggs.  But he does love a plate of cold oysters.  He puts up a fairly convincing argument on Slate.com that both in terms of its environmental impact and its own physiology, an oyster is as ethical a food item as a vegetable.  As you would expect… read more

A day in the life of Fany Gerson

  Fany Gerson, author of the delectable cookbooks Paletas and My Sweet Mexico shared a day in her life on Food52.   It sounds completely exhausting between getting up at 6am, making and selling ices all day and retrieving her car late at night from the pound. read more

James Beard Award winners announced

  At a star-studded event last night in New York, the winners of the prestigious James Beard Book, Broadcast & Journalism Awards were announced - see the list of cookbook nominees and winners.  Cookbook of the Year went to the epic book Modernist Cuisine by Nathan Myhrvold and crew.  And the wonderful books by Laurie Colwin, Home Cooking and More… read more

Anne Willan looks at banquets of old

  Anne Willan. founder of La Varenne cooking school in France, has a new book out - The Cookbook Library which reviews the history of recipes and cookbooks over the last several centuries.  She has an interesting article in Zester Daily about how food became spectacle and entertainment.  Fascinating to read what was considered normal a few hundred years ago.  We… read more

How much celebrity chef news can you take?

As reported in the New York Times, a new website, The Braiser will go live in a couple of weeks with constant coverage of "chefs who have cultivated a worldwide reputation".  It will be interesting to see if they can come up with enough news and features on a daily basis to fill an entire site. Or will they end… read more

The ghostwriter debate heats up again

  You may remember a month or so ago there was a controversial article in the New York Times by Julia Moskin regarding the ghostwriting of cookbooks.  Indignant responses were fired from Gwyneth Paltrow, Rachael Ray and others.  The story seemed to be petering out but now Michael Ruhlman, the ghostwriter to top chefs such as Thomas Keller, Eric Ripert and… read more

A feast for reluctant risers

As a night owl myself (as anyone who gets emails from me after midnight EST knows), I could really relate to Susie's article on NPR Kitchen Window.  For those people who have more energy and brain-power at night than in the morning there are a host of ways (and she includes recipes for three of them) in which you can… read more

Where are cookbooks headed?

  Cookbook author Denise Vivaldo is the owner of more than 1,000 cookbooks and the author of several herself.  In her article today in the Huffington Post she explains why holding a cookbook in her hands is so important to her. read more

Summer cookbook preview

  Paula Forbes at Eater produces a major round up of all the new cookbooks being published in the next few months.  Can't say I spotted any major trends but as usual in the summer there are books on grilling, ice pops, and of course pie.  But there are a lot of others so you are bound to find something… read more

Economist sticks in the throat of the food world

  The food world is abuzz with negative reactions to the theories on food and eating out, put forward by Tyler Cowen in his new book 'An Economist Gets Lunch' and in an article in The Atlantic.  In addition to the buzz on discussion boards there have been two negative reviews of the book in the New York Times "Reading Mr.… read more

A peek into America’s Test Kitchen

  Dianne Jacob of the Will Write for Food blog interviews Doc Willoughby, Executive Editor of the Cook's Illustrated and Cook's Country magazines.  He explains how they test recipes (over and over and over) and shares his thoughts on free recipes.  And you can calculate how much they earn from their websites - it's stunning! read more

The favorite cookbooks of Jeremiah Tower

  Jeremiah Tower, the founding chef at Chez Panisse and the founder of the legendary Stars restaurant in San Francisco, has now retired from professional cooking.  But he is still writing and reading and he shares in Eater's column The Cookbook Shelf, which are the most important books he owns. read more

How cooking for a 5 yo can drive you to distraction

Debbie Koenig has a new cookbook out Parents Need to Eat Too.  In the Huffington Post today she explains why she is quitting her job (well almost) as chef to her fussy 5 year-old son. read more

Andrew Carmellini comes clean on ghostwriters

I just saw a funny tweet where chef Andrew Carmellini owns up to the important role his co-writer played in the writing of his two cookbooks.  If only all cookbook "authors" were this honest.  Though in full disclosure, his co-writer is also his wife! read more

Now Gwyneth too denies using ghostwriters

Gwyneth Paltrow has added her voice to the chorus of cookbook authors denying they use ghostwriters.  It is interesting though that her book My Father's Daughter was used to illustrate the article in the New York Times that stirred up this hornet's nest.  What exactly did her co-writer Julia Turshen do if Gwyneth wrote every word herself, as she now claims? read more

Heston Blumenthal on the Olympics

Heston ruminates in the Financial Times on what the Olympics will mean for London.  He also explains how he and Simon Hulstone, a young chef he mentored, have developed a new menu for British Airways, an Olympics sponsor, to be served July to September. Four of the recipes are included in the article. read more

Would you pay $225 for a cookbook with just one recipe?

Susie reviews in the Boston Globe a new book Notes from a Kitchen which documents the obsessions of 10 different chefs.  There is just one recipe, for a cocktail, with 14 pages of instructions. The book costs $225 on Amazon - is this a book you could ever see yourself buying? read more

Who writes the cookbooks you buy?

A couple of interesting articles today on cookbooks: The Boston Globe has a feature on whether cookbooks are moving from books to cook from to books to look at. Not at EYB we think! The New York Times has a fascinating article by Julia Moskin about her experiences ghost-writing cookbooks for celebrity chefs.  I just wish there were some names attached! read more

Hear Susie talk about how her job as a cookbook reviewer impacts her kids

Fascinating radio piece by Susie on New England Public Radio on how her constant testing of cookbooks for her reviewing jobs at NPR Radio, The Boston Globe and of course EYB, mean that her children very rarely get repeat dinners.  And how their palates have had to adjust to the exotic and (sometimes) downright bad. read more

T. Susan Chang

We've hijacked Susie's blog and we're interviewing her.  Susie (T. Susan Chang) has been reviewing cookbooks for years for NPR and the Boston Globe - there aren't many people around who know as much about cookbooks as Susie. Now she's become an author with the release this month of her own beautiful collection of stories, A Spoonful of Promises, about food and love, with 49 recipes. … read more

Cookbooks or apps what will it be?

There seems to be a lot of online debate in the last few days on what the future holds for cookbooks.  The most exciting article for us, because EYB was the focus and it was carried around the globe, was the Associated Press article by Michele Kayal.  One of our most enthusiastic members, Mary-Claire van Leunen does a great job promoting the benefits… read more
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