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Post by BrewDaddy on Nov 10, 2018 23:25:13 GMT
Maybe I'm just weird, but every now and then I like to just sit down and read a cook book just like any other book... Start on page one and just keep going, rather than going straight to the one recipe I might be thinking about doing.
I just picked up a copy of Victory Cooking for my collection and it's all sorts of frugal recipes, techniques and bits of history from 1940-1957. Should be a good read...
Since they are usually in chapters dealing with one thing at a time, like soups, breads, etc. it can be interesting to campare and contrast the recipes one after another... see what spices are used, root veggies for this, other things for that, and just see how it all comes together...
Honestly, other than a recipe for chicken noodle soup the first time I made it, and one for I think beer cheese, I haven't consulted a recipe ever since and make all sorts of soups all the time, but still it's interesting to know how a lot of the details work.
Rubs for different types of meats and styles of cooking... low and slow here, fast sear there, roasting temperatures for this other thing....
Okay, maybe I'm just weird....
brew
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Post by feather on Nov 10, 2018 23:34:14 GMT
I like recipes and then there are days I just throw a bunch of things in the pot for some soup. Honestly, my throw together soups aren't as good as when I follow a recipe. It reminds me which herbs and spices to use, the amounts, and I forget some items and the recipe reminds me of it.
I especially like the recipe books that tell stories with the recipes, to bring me back to another time and place.
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Post by susannah on Nov 11, 2018 15:09:31 GMT
I use recipes as general outlines, but I've often said I think I'm genetically incapable of following a recipe to the letter - including the first time I try one. I come by it honestly - my mom and grandmothers were excellent cooks but one grandmother especially - I swear I never saw her use a recipe. Of course, this "fly by the seat of your pants" cooking method probably does not work for baking. Which could explain why I pretty much hate baking. It frustrated my husband, this "no recipe" way of cooking my family does, but after 35 years he's learned to accept it and go with the flow. The results are usually excellent, or at least edible. I love reading cookbooks, too! I don't think either thing is weird BrewDaddy . Not the love of reading cookbooks as BOOKS, not the lack of following recipes. feather , have you ever read Wisconsin Country Cookbook and Journal by Edward Harris Heth? It was first written in the 1950's (I think) and each chapter has so many wonderful stories and details of his life in the southeastern Wisconsin countryside and those of his friends and neighbors. I've had that book since I was in college 40 years ago and it's pretty much worn out, but I keep bringing it out for a read at least once a year. I'll probably pick up another used copy in the near future when this one totally hits the dust. I've made a few of the recipes (or my adaptations of the recipes)but for me it's more of an enjoyable story book than a cookbook - although I store it with my cookbooks so go figure.
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Post by freelove on Nov 12, 2018 14:05:10 GMT
I love to read cookbooks, too. Susannah, I have one titled "The Country Kitchen Cook Book" by Edward Harris Heth that I have had since the 1970s. It is like the one you have with the dust jacket torn, taped and hanging off, but as you said it has wonderful stories. I bring it out every couple months and read it seasonally as it is written. Two newer ones that I have and read monthly are "The Cook and The Gardener" by Amanda Hesser and "Cooking With the Seasons" by Monique Jamet Hooker. They are written by the month with stories to go with each month. I have hundreds of cookbooks and enjoy reading them.
I am not a recipe follower either, but I get lots of ideas from reading the recipes then I put together something made out of my experience, preferences, what is available and what I have read. Usually it is very good. I have been cooking for at least 60 years (my Mom was a good cook and taught me when I was young) so I have some experience to draw on.
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Post by susannah on Nov 12, 2018 14:19:06 GMT
freelove , the spine of my book is held together with duct tape - and even that isn't keeping it together anymore. If I recall correctly, The Country Kitchen Cookbook and Wisconsin Country Cookbook and Journal are the same book with different titles. The book is so descriptive that I feel as if I know all his friends and neighbors. I'm going to check out the two books you mentioned. Thank you!
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Post by dustawaits on Nov 12, 2018 14:54:00 GMT
Many years ago I got a cookbook from the library. Seems like it was called Salt Bread. I wanted to learn how it was made... I do not recall seeing a recipe but it certainly told a story about the bread and those that liked it and those that did not.
It was an older book at the time and if it was discarded it went to the junk pile. The county did not allow books to be sold. Stupid idea!!! Not they sell all they discard including magazines.
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Post by grannyg on Nov 12, 2018 16:35:24 GMT
Love them...wrote this a long time ago--
Old Cookbooks I have a love affair with old cookbooks. I can find myself lost in the recipes. I read the old ads, remembering what it is like to buy everything at one store, not the malls of today, but little country stores, where you could buy coffee, tea, sugar, flour, spices, and a pair of overalls to cover your rear. I remember the two and three story ones from my childhood. I went to the flea market yesterday and found a treasure, an old cookbook, 1931, Dungannon Community Cook Book from VA. I have really enjoyed looking over the old recipes, love it when it reads to "use some lard the size of a hen's egg".
I read the recipes, remembering as the hog was butchered, how we scraped the hair off after it was immersed in a drum of boiling water, how the head was saved to make head cheese, and the rendering of the lard,and the love of fresh cracklins and cornbread. Pages of memories open to me as I read them.
"Scald one-half pint of sweet milk", and I remember the old cow, Bessie. She loved to switch my face with her tail, and a time or two, I got kicked in the ear. I remember grandpa squirting a stream of milk towards the cats, as they meowed loudly, each wanting a lick of milk.
"Cream butter till fluffy" and I can picture grandma sitting on a stool, the old butter churn beside, up and down with the paddles, until the tiny golden dots began to appear, and soon, there was sweet, churned butter, and buttermilk to drink. The butter was put into wood butter molds so it would look pretty. Memories, down memory lane I go.
"Stone the dates".....or break a tooth, reminds me of cleaning the beans, and when we would string almost dry beans for leather britches, I can remember the little spiders that would pop out and run across grandma's floor, giving me shivers, and her laughing at me. Where has time gone? How many years has grandma been gone now? Memories, still alive, remind me of her, and if I close my eyes and breathe deep, I can smell her lilac perfume. She is always close, as close as I breathe. Her love always remains around me.
"Everything is level measure"....."For measuring, use a cup larger than ordinary size such as a glass goblet". There aren't many of them around these days, but I still have about a dozen ice tea goblets found at garage sales, their big bowls and frosted grapes on the outsides. Old timey tea glasses. I remember the homemade sun tea with fresh mint or fresh lemon slices. I remember grandma standing on top of the hill, we lived at the bottom of the hill, and she would wave the teapot back and forth, time to climb up to the top of the hill and have tea and biscuits with grandma.
"Do not stop folding the egg whites in until the cake is at the oven door" Priceless advice, "Get the cake in the oven at once and do not open the oven door for 20 minutes, and do not jar the stove". Sage advice from the years past speak to me. I delight in the writings, knowing the love special ladies have passed down from years ago. How precious they seem to me, caring, loving , great cooks, teaching, helping, measuring, and baking.
"Line pie tins with pastry"...how many of us still love the old cooking utensils and pans of the past. Some of my old pie tins have names of by-gone products embossed on them. I love the old things. Cooking from "scratch" used to be a way of life. You had to grow your own food, have your own gardens, grow your own livestock, or have a hunter in the family.
There is a recipe in the book from THE WHITE HOUSE, WASHINGTON,DC. It is for Spaghetti Croquettes.....the recipe from Mrs. Herbert Hoover. I laugh to myself, as I have saved recipes myself from Mrs. Jimmy Carter, Hillary Clinton,(and even Ann Landers). They have to be good, look at the prestige from these recipes, they were used in THE WHITE HOUSE !
"These pickles will never wither or become white or pithy". I read the recipes for cucumbers with a smile. "Wash carefully without removing the prickles". I definitely want a pickle with a prickle, and I remember trying to grow gherkins, and what a disaster that was !
Who knew, a cook book could bring such a flood of memories. We cook on our stoves, gas, butane, electric,wood, we are all kinswomen with heart, cooking and sharing our recipes to the next generation, wanting the best only for our friends and family. And I end this little story with my favorite quote.....'You can sprinkle it with sugar and bake it in the oven with love, but a cow pie is still manure". My deceased Uncle Arthur Leo actually covered a cow pie with icing, and sent it to the neighbor's daughter, Annie Papcun, on her birthday. Talk about a feud ! My poor grandmother never could understand why Mrs. Papcun threw it over the fence back at her. My mother still laughs about it.
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Post by Woodpecker on Nov 13, 2018 2:15:29 GMT
That was truly wonderful to read So many memories that I remember, too. That’s is one inspiring cookbook!
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