Do you use cookbooks?

Discussion in Food & Drink started by Gelsemium • Nov 3, 2014.

  1. Gelsemium

    GelsemiumWell-Known Member

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    I have never cooked using cookbooks. Sure, I have a few recipes that someone passes to me or that I get online, but I don't have a cookbook. Or I didn't. My wife just bought one last week, it's still unused haha, so let's see what will happen to it. Do you use cookbooks?
     
  2. pennylane

    pennylaneActive Member

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    I have several cookbooks. I find them more reliable than searching online for recipes. Online has way too many options. I also have ones for certain restaurants/chefs. Sometimes I'll search for a recipe online if I have no idea what I want to make but if I'm making something I'm familiar with and just want a reference I'll use the cookbook.
     
  3. Dora M

    Dora MWell-Known Member

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    I have a big collection of cookbooks, as I am always looking for new ideas for my dishes. All my cookbooks are vegetarian or vegan. Several of them are back from the 1970's and have beautiful art work and pictures in them. On rainy days I often sit in my kitchen and like to flicker through my favorite books. They feel like old friends to me.
     
  4. Sugarhill

    SugarhillActive Member

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    I have a few old school cookbooks that my mother owned and I prefer them to a lot of the online cooking sites. For me, they are more classic recipes that I can make any variances to versus the back and forth of 50 different spins on one common thing as everyone tries to become THE recipe maker to follow.
     
  5. prettycolors

    prettycolorsActive Member

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    You can say I do, but not the paper kind. What I do instead is browse my favorite recipe website and study there how to cook the meal I want. Plus, reading the comment section of a certain dish helps since you learn tips/variations. Cookbooks or online resources are really handy for a beginner I'd say, we all have to start someplace and cooking is not one of those things that you can simply do on instinct.
     
  6. Allison2021

    Allison2021Active Member

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    I use the old fashioned hand held "Fanny Farmer Cook Book" because that was what my mom used. My mom was one of the best cooks, and bakers. Sure all of those recipes are full of fat. However, I love those recipes. For example, the recipe for the best pancake batter is written in that book. You can create the batter from scratch. YOU can use the batter for waffles or pancakes. There are very few preservatives in that batter.
     
  7. insertkittyface

    insertkittyfaceActive Member

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    Sometimes. A lot of my cookbooks are pretty old because they came from my grandmother that had them for years before me. I use them from time to time when I want to try something new, but still homemade.
     
  8. Theo

    TheoWell-Known Member

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    I've had cookbooks since I was a child and I also buy cookery magazines. They are great for inspiration and new ideas and methods of cooking. I'm always looking for new ingredient combinations and so I look through books for what can work.

    The internet is a good resource too, but with a book I can browse and decide and it's easier to follow a recipe from a book and see the picture. I don't like having a laptop in the kitchen and I could print it out, but that's not very green!
     
  9. Denis Hard

    Denis HardWell-Known Member

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    My attempts to cook anything using instructions given by someone else have always ended badly. Either I made something entirely different or the food would have such a horrible taste that I'd have to throw it all out. For that reason, I wouldn't buy a cookbook so it could gather dust on a shelf somewhere in the house.
     
  10. TheViper

    TheViperActive Member

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    We have several old cookbooks from back in my grandma's days. There are pretty interesting to read through to get a idea of how cooking was portrayed back in the day. Though, I like work on the notion of feeling and not measurements. Therefore, I enjoy a good cookbook but I rarely use a cookbook.
     
  11. DrRipley

    DrRipleyExpert

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    I never had much patience for it and mostly only browsed them for ideas and for the pictures. I may one or two recipes if they were simple enough but for the most part I'd much rather just stick to cooking shows since it's a lot more visual and therefore much easier to understand and follow. Now that we have online resources I use cookbooks way less than I ever did which wasn't even that much to begin with.
     
  12. xTinx

    xTinxWell-Known Member

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    For regular frying pan dishes, I tend to ignore cookbooks and just figure it out based on instinct and prior instructions or advice from my dad. I only use a cookbook when I attempt to bake. Unlike viands and side dishes, you can't estimate the ingredients you use for batters and the like because they're always measured meticulously.
     
  13. Winnie

    WinnieActive Member

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    I love cookbooks. Absolutely adore them. I have probably about 30 cookbooks in my kitchen right now, I also have some older issues of cooking magazines. I really like good food, and I like to be able to cook it myself. Going out to restaurants used to appeal to me, and I use to frequent a lot of different eateries, but I have grown apart from that.
    These days I like to cook my own food with my own hands so that I can have control over the contents and the cleanliness of things, to the best of my ability, especially after watching episodes of "Caught on Tape" and seeing what people sometimes do to food they are serving to the public.:eek:
     
  14. Squigly

    SquiglyActive Member

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    Definitely, I tend to use cookbooks and online recipes a lot. Cooking is one of those things where while improvisation is good, it remains something you shouldn't always use, particularly if you are cooking for other people. Recipes exist because cooks found out how to make great tasting food through trial-and-error, to ignore their recipes would be disrespectful, and there is a risk of your food coming out unpalatable.
     
  15. happyshopper

    happyshopperActive Member

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    Sometimes I use cookbooks but not all the time. I know someone who looks at a cookbook while making meatloaf and candied chicken which are two delicious dinners that I really like. The meatloaf recipe is my favorite but I enjoy all of them. I also like looking online at recipes and watching some cooking shows on youtube for fun. A cookbook is great to have if your baking a dessert for the first time for a celebration.
     
  16. DesignerMum

    DesignerMumActive Member

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    Cookbooks are quite handy. We use them a lot in the kitchen, but not for family recipes. Those we had to memorize. Other than cookbooks, we have clippings of recipes from magazines, newspapers, and other sources like the back side of food product packagings, social media posts, and online reviews. Cookbooks don't usually turn obsolete even after a decade or so, so we rarely buy new cookbooks. To get the most recent cooking recipes, we have our clippings.
     
  17. thepieeatingjay

    thepieeatingjayMember

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    I use cookbooks once in awhile. Normally, I either know how to cook something already or get all "experimental" and go for broke. I only use cookbooks or written instructions on things that look interesting. Oddly enough, I only seem to use them for things like Chinese style foods
     
  18. calebmelvern

    calebmelvernActive Member

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    My grandmother has so many cookbooks. I don't cook a lot but when I do, I like trying out the different recipes listed in those books. It doesn't matter to me much if I'm following a recipe via a cookbook or somewhere online.
     
  19. ACSAPA

    ACSAPAWell-Known Member

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    I used cookbooks until I found Pinterest. Now I just pin recipes because it takes up less space to save the recipes online. I love Pinterest. It's digital hoarding.
     
  20. eppie

    eppieActive Member

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    We have a few cookbooks in the house but I seldom use them though. I usually just search the internet for recipes, cooking instructions and of course for images of food that I intended to cook. Also, I mostly prefer the video cooking guides over just written instructions because I'm really not good at cooking and following cooking instructions. :D