With the latest cooking project around Maria’s household . . . The girl, thirteen, has expressed a desire to learn to cook. She can actually already turn out a classic vinaigrette, microwave a quesadilla, scramble an egg and produce a tomato salad with basil picked from the garden (and she knows how to identify the basil plant) which is probably a better arsenal than that with which many college students are armed. And she has started to learn her way around a knife and has naturally good hands with dough, perhaps because of several years of “Clay on the Wheel” at the Ann Arbor Art Factory. She has to be coached through the lighting of the gas burners, though, and has dropped a pan on the floor on occasion because the use of potholders does not occur to her and handles do, well, get hot. And we have been sadly deficient in some of the basics. She does not, for example, know how to cook up a pot of pasta, although, oddly she could probably get pretty far in making fresh pasta, having helped her father do so several times.
I’m of course naturally inclined to encourage this interest (the boy — four, next week! — knows he can con me out of almost anything by telling me he wants to be “a cooker” when he grows up). And having read Michael Pollan’s NY Times magazine article last week about the demise of home cooking (with which I’m not sure I entirely agree — see Michael Ruhlman for some kitchen-counter-thinking), I’m more determined than ever to get my kids into the kitchen. So, to the point, I want to get Naomi a good first cookbook and am struggling a bit with the choice. There are some nice looking teen starter cookbooks, a wealth of college survival cookbooks (and I remember my nineteen year old self poring over one such book in my first apartment — that and Laurel’s Kitchen ), and then there are the classics: The Joy of Cooking, The New York Times Cookbook, and, of course, the currently trendy Mastering The Art of French Cooking (which I myself have never cracked). I’m torn between the quick start that might be offered by inspirational glossy photos and simplified preparations and the last-a-lifetime value and basic education offered by the sturdy handbooks. My early 1970′s Joy of Cooking is in three pieces now and sits next to my husband’s inherited 1961 Craig Clairborne’s NYT Cookbook annotated by his mother with helpful comments such as “ugh — do not make again.” Both books gets pulled out at least once every couple of weeks.
So I ask you, what books got you going as a cook? If you were thirteen and starting to plan a dinner for and with a friend, what would be your menu planning resource? I want something that will both inspire and last. Thanks in advance for any suggestions. I hope the interest holds in the fickle adolescent mind, and we’ll have some early cooking adventures to report soon.
I’ve recently received both The Joy of Cooking and The Good Housekeeping Cookbook.
Good Housekeeping might be a nice compromise between something classic like the Joy of Cooking and something temporary like a “my first cookbook” for teens. It has lots of gorgeous pictures, recipes in a range of difficulties, and also nutrition information and other helpful tips like “how to spot a whole grain” and “how to whip up a flavored butter”
Also good for beginners: a cooking terms glossary, ingredients glossary, setting a “proper table,” a rundown on wines, info on the seasonal availability and storing/prepping tips for vegetables and fruits, etc.
I don’t have much experience cooking, and have had good luck with the recipes so far, and it’s a handy reference to have around.
http://bit.ly/6e9Ev
a word of warning, though: the binding’s not great for a book that’s to be used and loved. I’ve had mine just since Christmas and the cover’s already coming off.
I really love Jamie’s Dinners, especially because he starts the book off with some foundational recipes – pesto, tomato sauce, etc – and then gives you several ways to use that foundational recipe. So, for example, you might make tomato sauce, then use that with homemade pasta, grilled fish, etc. I think it would give a new cook a good vocabulary and several strong recipes to start with – then you can move on to other things, like the vegetable section, where he gives 2-4 ways of preparing things like spinach, peas, carrots, etc. Good stuff.
http://fossilfood.blogspot.com/2009/05/joy-of-cooking.html
Even when I am cooking the most gourmet of meals, hand-crafted recipes by Master Chefs, I still consult JOY to help me avoid the beginner pratfalls that could have so often ruined meals. It’s recipes have been perfected, it provides advice on techniques, and is almost encyclopedic in its content, from drinks to dinner.
For several years before my almost-five-year-old was born, we took cooking classes at night. Mostly for the fun & the wine; anything learned was just a bonus. I’d subscribed to Cook’s Illustrated for years but seldom had time to read it.
So after V was born, there I was for hours a day, breast-feeding – my first idle moments after two decades in the workforce and college before that. I sat there and read 4 years worth of Cooks Illustrated back issues – cover to cover. That was a foodie geekfest. I don’t know if they are colorful enough to appeal to a teenager, however.
I have found that Food & Wine has some gorgeous cookbooks – quite simple, big colorful photos, basic recipes. Here is one that I have – there are many others, some out of print but available used. http://www.amazon.com/Quick-Scratch-Italian-Cookbook-Magazine/dp/0916103927/.
Hope it goes well!
a couple suggestions:
Mark Bittman’s _How to Cook Everything_ seems to be replacing the Joy of Cooking for many people in their twenties and younger. it’s the one most of my friends picked up when they graduated from college, joined a CSA and needed to know what kohlrabi was and what to do with it and/or got married. it’s comprehensive, but simpler and more accessible than Joy and better suited to the kind of cooking I do than Joy or the Better Homes and Gardens and Betty Crocker my mom relied on.
alton brown’s _i’m just here for the food_ and _i’m just here for more food_ are great introductions to cooking and baking (respectively) organized by different techniques. he provides a few recipes that use each technique, and always explains why things work the way they do, which is super appealing. i know one guy who taught himself to cook by working his way through those two. and for many of the techniques and recipes you can go multimedia by looking up videos of his show on youtube.
I love the Silver Palate Cookbook. It’s a bit dated but has good humor and delicious recipes. Other people love The New Basics by the same people. We use How to Cook Everything weekly. I learned to start cooking asian food from Mahdur Jaffrey. I also love the Moosewood Cooks at Home (the original is a bit too creamy for todays tastes…). Fun topic!
Oh and when I was a teenager I loved reading Maida Heatter’s dessert cookbooks, which may be out of print. When I went to Paris at the age of 17 I went right away to Angelina to have a certain pastry she mentioned in a cookbook.
Thanks everyone for the great suggestions! Keep them coming. I think I like this topic as much for the stories it invokes (and memories it stirs for me) as I do for helping Naomi get a good cookbook. I did spend some time at Borders today with How To Cook Everything. It’s pretty tempting. But so big! Hard to browse.
Good Housekeeping. It’s the cookbook I had in home ec class, and it offers the basics easily. It’s a great first cookbook.
I third “How to Cook Everything.” I really, really wish I had had this book at thirteen. Or maybe I wish my mother had. Ahem.
Oh, my recommendation for a beginner is the Better Homes and Gardens cookbook. It is well organized, has tons of fairly foolproof recipes, easy to read, the ingredients lists are good, good index, lots of helpful hints, is in a ring binder so it easy to use, just a great all-arounder and one of my favorites from the time I was little until now. Still one of my go-to cookbooks even with the hundreds (literally—it is a bit of an obsession of mine
I have gotten since.
I’m sad to say that How to Cook Everything has been very disappointing for me—there are SO many recipes and I know some of them are good, but it never seems to have what I want for the ingredients I have. The last four or five times I have tried to find something in it, I haven’t found what I wanted. I so want to like it, but just don’t very much. I find Joy of Cooking requires a bit more finesse than some other cookbooks—a little bit harder for a beginning cook I think. You have to read each recipe very carefully. They aren’t all foolproof either and I’m a pretty veteran cook.
A great Michigan-focused cookbook which would also work for a young cook is Hollyhocks and Radishes. Many of my favorites come from this cookbook and it uses farm ingredients that we have and combinations that we can do, which makes it fun. Nothing bugs me more than farmhouse cookbooks that use ingredients that would never grow together here at the same time.
For the boy, Pretend Soup and Salad People by Mollie Katzen are fabulous for pre-school/very young cooks.
As an aside, my father (who was an amazing cook) always told me growing up that the only two things you need to know how to make are a good white sauce and a good pie crust. Everything else you can fake.
I have to second the vote for Better Homes & Gardens. This was the first cookbook given to me and, while Joy and How to Cook Everything are incredibly useful resources, the lack of pictures and sheer girth of them can be a little intimidating. Another tactic might be to get her a subscription to one of the food magazines, since they often have basics/”cooking classes” in them. My mom got me a subscription to Bon Appetit in college and while its recipes called for foodstuffs and tools I didn’t have, it was great inspiration (and it is always fun to get actual mail.)
Personally I like cookbooks that combine actual narrative/text with the recipes since I rarely follow recipes to the letter anyway. My favorite at the moment is Lynn Rossetto Kasper’s How to Eat Supper. The recipes are easy, quick, accessible and often include variations.
I started with the James Beard Cookbook and Sunset Magazine’s “Favorite Recipes” for cooking and the Betty Crocker cookbook for baking. (It took me years to figure out that Betty Crocker was a fictional character.) When my now-husband started to cook 25 years ago, I got him his own copy of the Beard. If you aren’t fat-intolerant, I think “The New James Beard” is still an excellent starter cookbook. Cook’s Illustrated “Best Recipes” is really reliable but kind of fussy. I’d avoid “How to Cook Everything” for a beginner. It’s much better as a reference than as a primer. Some of the recipes work better than others, and it’s hard for a beginner to judge which.
Sheer instinct almost impelled to buy a replacement for my very old, falling-apart Joy Of Cooking, but then I didn’t. I rarely refer to it any more. Perhaps that’s an argument *for* considering it a good beginner cookbook. I do refer often to The New Basics Cookbook by Julee Rosso and Sheila Lukins.
The first time I was on my own and cooking, my mom sent me 6 typed sheets with some of my favorite dishes from her repertoire. I still have those pages, 23 years later! And I referred to one of them for a cookie recipe just a few weeks ago. I also have her old Betty Crocker cookbook, and I do refer to it for a few things, but she never really annotated it.
I think that for a beginner, you want a cookbook that is going to be fun and easy to use. After she gets more experience and knows where her interests truly lie (is she more of a baker? an innovate-with-veggies chef? a soup maker? a generalist? does she like pictures, stories, or an explanation of the science?), then you can find a cookbook that will be more of a reference.
And a specific comment on “Best Recipes”: I like this now, but don’t think I would have liked it as a beginner. You typically have to read 2 pages of explanation of all the variations they tried and why to get to the recipe. Plus it’s big and heavy and doesn’t open flat (or at least mine doesn’t). If your daughter is one of those cooks who likes knowing that level of detail, it might make a good gift a few years down the road.
(enticed over here from the annarborchronicle)
I would also second the argument for BH&G (the spiral version). I’m on my second copy (first one NOT spiral – bad idea) and still use it. Not so much for the receipes, as for the fact that it will give you a way to start cooking pretty much everything. So when you want to remember how long to cook a medium rare roast, bingo.
Additional thought: if you buy her a Joy of Cooking or a NY Times cookbook, you lessen her joy in discovering her grandmother’s ‘oh ick’ comments, and your own check marks next to family favorites. Cooking is – or should be anyway – as much about heritage as about food.
Another vote for the Better Homes & Gardens red & white checked book. Though when your book is 30+ years old, you will have to invest in those little adhesive circles because the pages will be coming loose from the 3-ring binder.
Hey everyone — thanks for all the comments! So, nice to hear your voices and to follow your links back to learn a bit more about you (made for a very distracted evening — I think I had some work thing I was going to do tonight). For the results, check out http://gastronomical3.wordpress.com/2009/08/12/and-the-winner-is/
Easy to read – Tons of photos
La Technique & La Methode, by Jacques Pepin
Find the oversize paperback editions so you don’t have to worry about food spots.