Tag: cookbooks

On the No-Recipe Recipes cookbook from the New York Times

I want to recommend the cookbook above, one of my favorites.  The blurb for it says:

You don’t need a recipe. Really, you don’t. Sam Sifton, founding editor of New York Times Cooking, makes improvisational cooking easier than you think. In this compact, handy book of ideas, Sifton delivers 100 no-recipe recipes — each gloriously photographed — to make with the ingredients you have on hand or could pick up on a quick trip to the store. You’ll see how to make these meals as big or as small as you like, substituting ingredients as you go.

For experienced cooks, it’s a great book. For most others, I think you kinda need more detailed recipes, unless you are adventurous. If nothing else, it’s a fun book to read: Sam Sifton is a great food writer and every time I read him, I am inspired to cook.

Before you rush out and get it, take a look at this: You Don’t Need a Recipe – The New York Times. It’s a beautiful representation of the book. You can also get many of the recipes list here. I am a big fan of the pasta amatriciana on the fly and the pasta with chickpeas and a negroni! And you can’t go wrong with Italian subs with sausage and peppers.

If making a few recipes gets you wanting more, you can buy the book here: Cooking No-Recipe Recipes – The New York Times Store

 

 

So you want to publish a cookbook? If so, read this.

If you are thinking of publishing a cook book, then you owe it to yourself to read this piece in Eater. Eater interviewed three cookbook authors on how they got their first book deal and touches on all aspects of the process they followed. It even talks about how much money you might make. (Emphasis on the word, might.)

Obviously this isn’t the last word on how to get published, but you will come away from it with a better sense of what those authors did to become successful. In one case, author Priya Krishna went on to become very successful with a prominent position at the New York Times. Who knows where you and your stack of recipes — or Instagram posts — will end up?

 

On the Silver Palate Cookbook

I started thinking about the Silver Palate cookbook again after reading this piece in Bon Appetit: How the Silver Palate Cookbook Changed Our Cooking

It’s funny to read the staff of Bon Appetit talk about this as their parent’s cookbook. To me the tone is nostalgic. Perhaps they believe it is dated. Like any decades old cookbook, it is dated in a way. There’s lots of things in there that was novel and daring at the time but now are passe, and ingredients which are now commonplace were once hard to find.

But there is much about the book that is still great. The layout and design, for one thing. And some recipes stand the test of time and became classics. It’s so much more than a collection of recipes.

In some ways, publications like Bon Appetit are the same. Many of the things I’ve said about that cookbook will apply to Bon Appetit over time.  And like the Silver Palate cookbook, I believe people will look back on Bon Appetit in this era the way the folks at BA look back at this kitchen classic.

If you haven’t read the Silver Palate cookbook in some time (or ever), you can read (at least some of) it online.

P.S. I came across another article on the Silver Palate in the New York Times, and similar to Bon Appetit, the author was condescending towards it and the owners of the place. Odd. Especially since the Cooking section recently did two versions of the Palate’s classic dish, Chicken Marbella. Here’s a weeknight version of the recipe, and here’s the standard version. Go and make either one whenever you get a chance. You’ll be glad you did.

For the curious: top chefs and their fridges.

You might be surprised (or you might not) to see that much of what top chefs have in their fridges is not all that different than you. If you are skeptical, you should check out this book: Inside Chefs’ Fridges, Europe. Top chefs open their home refrigerators. from TASCHEN Books. If anything, your North American fridge may have alot more in it than the typical smaller European icebox.

The book is worth a look: besides the peek inside, their is also recipes and other things of interest.