Summing it up

January 7, 2014 by
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2013 seems to have been an anthropological moment in American food: two ambitious tomes devoted to the subject came out, and each attempted to sum up a dauntingly diverse population of eaters in a slightly different way.   Colman Andrews takes a defiantly idiosyncratic path in  The Taste of America (Phaidon, $29.95), which features 250 US-produced goods ranging from the local… read more

2013-2014 slow cooker books

January 2, 2014 by
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I've written about slow cookers before here, but they are so popular and published in such volume that I think it might be worth doing an annual review of the genre each January. Personally, I love my slow cooker, especially at this time of year.  Although it sits unused for months on end, it comes out with the snow about… read more

Christmas! Christmas! Christmas!

December 24, 2013 by
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Of course, it's only Christmas for some of us. And it's not even the cooking-est holiday - that would be Thanksgiving.  Yet publishers barely lift a finger for Thanksgiving, and Hannukah and Kwanzaa and Ramadan hardly get a second glance.  Christmas, at least in the English-speaking world, gets a special place on the cookbook shelf.   Many cookbooks focus on… read more

2013 was the year for…

December 10, 2013 by
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It's cookbook roundup season, and over the next couple of weeks we'll see plenty of lists of the best cookbooks of 2013 (my own among them).  In some ways, it was such an odd year that I'm betting there won't be as much overlap as usual between the lists, never mind a white-hot winner like last year's Jerusalem.  Though I could… read more

Two great non-cookbooks of 2013

December 3, 2013 by
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For the last week, I have been consuming a steady diet of leftover turkey and 2013 cookbooks.  The turkey is great, and so are the books (you can see my top 10 picks on CookShelf, my cookbook-rating app). But for a change of pace, I wanted to showcase two really wonderful books published this year, neither of which has even… read more

What’s on your Thanksgiving menu?

November 26, 2013 by
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This Thanksgiving is a special one for our household - the first time we've ever really hosted (and by "hosted," I mean "invited people who don't usually see the house in its usual pigsty state").  We've got 3 serious cooks to prepare the meal for 13 or 14 guests - a good ratio - and the menu has gotten to… read more

November 2013 Cookbook Roundup

November 23, 2013 by
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Every month Susie Chang reviews new cookbook releases and notes trends in the United States. And she may also occasionally throw in a review of a "not-quite cookbook."  And for our non-U.S. members, Jane and Fiona provide similar reviews for new U.K., Australia, and New Zealand releases. __________________________________________________________________________ United States: In October, publishers pushed forth a brash brigade of talkworthy… read more

CookApp giveaway – CookShelf

November 21, 2013 by
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For our latest cookbook giveaway, we're not exactly offering a cookbook. Rather we're offering 20 licenses for Susie Chang's cookbook app, CookShelf (the title has now changed to Cookbook Finder). We're sure you're familiar with Susie as she writes a weekly blog for EYB, but you may not know her as a highly regarded cookbook reviewer for NPR, The Boston… read more

The new simple.

November 13, 2013 by
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It's not like "simple" is new.  Cookbook authors have been touting the ease and speed of their authors presumably for as long as there have been cookbooks.  But these days, I get the sense that ease and speed are a means, more than an end. By that, I mean that "simple" has become an aesthetic. Maybe it all started with… read more

Make way for chocolate!

November 5, 2013 by
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It's been a while since we saw much in the way of serious chocolate books. For a while, the same chocolate book seemed to be published over and over: an introduction featuring the history of cacao's discovery and complicated processing and manufacturing, followed by well-photographed recipes of more-or-less average quality. But this year's books are, without question, distinct from both… read more

October 2013 Cookbook Roundup

October 30, 2013 by
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Every month Susie Chang reviews new cookbook releases and notes trends in the United States. And she may also occasionally throw in a review of a "not-quite cookbook."    And for our non-U.S. members, Jane and Fiona provide similar reviews for new U.K., Australia, and New Zealand releases. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- United States: The fall onslaught continues, with publishers releasing one would-be hit… read more

What’s a winter cookbook?

October 28, 2013 by
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The summer cookbook has always been a pretty identifiable creature: cocktails, grilling, entertaining, the odd picnic or camping book.  But although you could argue that people enjoy cooking more in cold weather, I've never been specifically sure what a winter cookbook should look like.  There are, of course, dozens of slow cooker cookbooks, but a lot of them seem -… read more

Jewish cookbooks on the rise

October 21, 2013 by
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The Jewish new year is well underway, and the calendar is heading into the frantic stretch before Thanksgiving and an early Hannukah.  And it happens that cookbooks paying tribute to one of this country's most beloved inherited cuisines are appearing in abundance this year.  I lay no personal claim to this legacy, despite having grown up with good access to… read more

Pastry! pastry! pastry!

October 15, 2013 by
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It started a couple of weeks ago, when the third book on French pastry in two weeks arrived in the mail.  What's up with that?  I wondered.  Was it a conspiracy?  Some kind of vast plot by the butter export lobby?  There was Pastry by legendary Richard Bertinet, and The Art of French Pastry by Jacquy Pfeiffer and baking veteran… read more

Don’t judge a book by its cover…except just for a second, right now.

October 7, 2013 by
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Lucky me - I just received a copy of The Photography of Modernist Cuisine - the art-book sibling of last year's Modernist Cuisine at Home and the previous year's Modernist Cuisine.  It's impressive in every way, especially its cover - 14" x 18" and featuring the top of a tomato, blown up to something like 50 times life-size.  It's a… read more

To the ovens! with, or without a mixer.

October 1, 2013 by
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The fall baking books are trickling in, and a curious phenomenon seems to be cropping up:  baking without a mixer.   Yvonne Ruperti's One Bowl Baking is an example.  Its promise of simplicity is somewhat disingenuous- one bowl, yes, but the equipment glossary (p. 14 - 17) calls out everything from pastry blender to a cake wheel.  Still, Ruperti pulls off an impressive… read more

You Complete Me

September 24, 2013 by
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Maybe because my life so often seems like a messy accumulation of loose ends, I'm a sucker for completion in cookbooks.  When a cookbook claims to be "complete," I sigh with satisfaction and think "Ahhh...I will never need another cookbook on this subject again."  Of course, that has not even once proven to be true.  For example, there was the… read more

September 2013 cookbook roundup

September 23, 2013 by
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Every month Susie Chang reviews new cookbook releases and notes trends in the United States. And she may also occasionally throw in a review of a "not-quite cookbook."    And for our non-U.S. members, Jane and Fiona provide similar reviews for new U.K., Australia, and New Zealand releases. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- It must be September, because after a quiet summer the publishers are… read more

Interview with Mollie Katzen

September 20, 2013 by
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Author of the iconic Moosewood Cookbook, Mollie Katzen has been publishing almost continuously since the debut of that culture-changing first book.  But her most recent title, The Heart of the Plate, stands as a testimony to the way eating culture itself has changed both for the author herself and for ourselves as a country over more than 35 years.  And… read more

We Are Family

September 17, 2013 by
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Just as we saw with the words "table" and "kitchen" a while back, there's a battle going on for the soul of "family" in cookbook titles.  What is a family cookbook, exactly?  What, or who, counts as family, and what does a family cookbook need to accomplish? The what, or who, used to be easy. Family was family, by blood… read more

Line cooks

September 10, 2013 by
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When it comes to cookbook design, it's the Wild West out there! Maybe its because cookbooks, stalwart sellers in a digital age, have the luxury of experimentation as buyers hunt down increasingly charming and quirky gifts.  Maybe it has to do with our increasingly visual culture.   In any case, I've posted about some of these graphic innovations on earlier… read more

Rainy day cookbooks

September 3, 2013 by
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I've got them.  You've got them.  Pretty much anybody with over 100 cookbooks has a couple.  That's right - those books that we set aside for a rainy day, or a day when the kids have a field trip, or when we've already finished all the knitting projects. This year seems to have brought a whole bunch of them, with… read more

Pick a region, pick a diet, pick a subject…

August 27, 2013 by
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While attending to the (never-ending) task of culling and organizing the cookbook library today, it struck me that publishing output in a number of categories is shifting. There seem to be fewer big-ticket restaurant books this year (think Noma, Faviken, El Bulli). And for me at least, many trade reference single-subjects (the kind of book that's a glossary of 200… read more

August 2013 cookbook roundup

August 27, 2013 by
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Every month Susie Chang reviews new cookbook releases and notes trends in the United States. And she may also occasionally throw in a review of a "not-quite cookbook."   And for our non-U.S. members, Jane and Fiona provide similar reviews for new U.K., Australia, and New Zealand releases. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Believe it or not, summer's over! as far as cookbook publishers are… read more

What’s hot in Manhattan

August 20, 2013 by
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Actually, everything's hot in New York this week. It's in the upper 80's, and as usual the steaming sidewalks, midtown traffic, and ever-present faint smell of garbage makes it feel even hotter. Nevertheless, business is hopping at the Union Square Barnes & Noble, helped along by the farmer's market. I stop by the Cookbooks section to find out what's selling… read more
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