My Favorite Cookbook

[fullygoldy]

I have many cookbooks.  Not as many as bzdchris, to be sure, but really, I do have more than most people.  I really enjoy reading cookbooks, looking at the glorious pictures and imagining the final product.  In fact, my first "collectible" cookbook is called Glorious Food.  It's an oversized "coffee table" book from a caterer, and features recipes and photos of several themed dinners.  It was a college graduation gift, and I still love it, even though I've rarely ever cooked from it.

The cookbook I've cooked from the most is The New Good Housekeeping Cookbook, published in 1986.  I grew up with an earlier edition (1963), learning to cook from it and my mom.  When it was time to move out, I knew I needed my own copy.  I looked everywhere, and couldn't find it, but it turned out that was only because I didn't recognize it, LOL.  The new edition was a similar size and heft, but the paper cover threw me - it looked nothing like the beat up blue and gray hard cover I was used to.  Plus, I had it in my head that it was "Betty Crocker" but Betty's red-and-white-checked, binder style cookbook was definitely NOT what I was looking for (turns out Mom owned that one too, but we never used it that I recall.  When I peeled the bookcover back, the hardcover was red with gold lettering!  So we now refer to it at our house as "The Red Cookbook."

Whenever we're looking to try a new technique, or find a traditional recipe, we always turn to "The Red Cookbook."  The funny thing is, even though the recipes aren't terribly creative, and there are no inspiring pictures of the food, this book almost never fails us.  It's pretty funny when we've spent an inordinate amount of time trying to hunt down a recipe we remember reading in a magazine, and we're frustrated and grumpy, and finally one of us will say, "did you look in the Red Cookbook?"
"No." the unspoken text is "why would I look there when I know I saw this in a magazine?"
"Well, give it a shot."
"Fine."  Retrieve the beloved book.  "Huh."
??
"Well, here's something we could try.  It's pretty close."

See? Works like a charm!

Over the years, I've made a lot of things from this cookbook - what springs to mind immediately:
Baking Powder Biscuits
Split Pea Soup
Hoppin' John
Quiche
Coffee Cakes
Muffins
Breads
Polenta with Cheese
Tabbouleh
Oyster Stuffing
Chestnut Stuffing
Rice Pudding
Bread Pudding
Frostings
Pies
Ice Creams
Baked Apples/Apple Dumplings
Apple Crisp
Stuffed Cabbage
Stuffed Peppers
Beef Burgundy
Sauerbraten
Bourbon Balls! yum :)
Alfredo Sauce
Meatloaf
Baked Mac & Cheese
Pancakes & Waffles

Plus, there are great references for temperature and time for roasting meat and poultry.  The vegetable chapter lists individual vegetables alphabetically and discusses selection, storage, and preparation of each, plus 1-3 different recipes for each.  There's even Broccoli Rabe!  From 1986, people! I'd never heard of this until 2000+! The fruits are handled the same way.  There is info on safe freezing, canning and pickling.

There are all kinds of things in it that I've been making for a long time, so didn't realize they were in there.  B surmises that it is because I learned to cook them from my mom, and she learned to cook them from the earlier edition! 

I use this book as a reference book.  When I pick it up, I immediately turn to the index.  Except when it falls open to the page I want because it's been opened there so many times.  The book is littered with scraps of paper as bookmarks too.  We're careful not to lose each other's markers, because they're in our most used spots.  I've also given this book as a wedding gift a few times.  Whenever I do gift it, I always run through the index with my highlighter, and mark up all my favorite recipes - the tried-and-true so the new cook can be assured of at least a few successes.  It's actually time to run through my own index again, and highlight all the new things I've tried since last time.  This is the only cookbook I do that in.  I know I'll have to do it for Mavis and Rupert when they move on too.  If I can get my hands on it.  Because I was looking on Amazon, and alas, this book seems to be out of print.  The earlier edition seems to be available from used booksellers, but not mine (with the chapter on microwaving).  Other than The Joy of Cooking, I don't know if there is another cookbook available that is as comprehensive AND comprehendible as my good old Red Cookbook.