The story of how Amanda Hesser decided to write this cookbook, and then went about amassing the recipes that the newspaper has published over it's 150+ year history and that make up this new volume is almost as good as the cookbook itself. No, that is not true. But it is a good story and I have linked to it in the title. She tells it better than I could so please check it out. it will give you a taste for how the cookbook will read, and what to look forward to.
When I was in college I learned to cook. There were four cookbooks that walked me through those early years--Craig Claiborne's 1961 edition of The New York Times Cookbook, The Tassajara Bread Book by Edward Brown, The Vegetarian Epicure by Anna Thomas, and later came The Moosewood Cookbook by Mollie Katzen. All of these hold a special place in my heart because they taught me things I didn't learn at home, and gradually I gained a real feel for the art of cooking.
I was so disappointed by the 'updated' version of the New York Times Cookbook that came out a couple of decades ago that I was not eager to look at this one. I feel the same way about "the Joy of Cooking". The 1975 edition that I bought as that unformed cook in my late teens is still my favorite version.
My husband, however, is unencumbered by such romanticism, and he boldly checked it out of the library. Our usual early evening positions are to be standing in the kitchen, having just concocted something that our only remaining child at home will deign to eat, and while we keep him company polishing it off, we lean against the counter and talk or we peruse cookbooks, or more often, I talk and he peruses. When he looked up from this new volume, he said, "We want to buy this cookbook. And you know why? Because her stories about the recipes make me want to cook each and every one of them." And so we went about making a few, and they were easy and delicious.
Here is a classic one for plum torte:
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/21/dining/216frex.html
No comments:
Post a Comment