Modern Cookbooks?

Being a newbie to cooking at home, I’ve been keeping my eyes open for some good cookbooks. Heading out to bookstores, I’m overwhelmed by the number of cookbooks there are out there and now, the number that are in my kitchen. I have a double cabinet above my stove that is now chock-a-block full of cookbooks. This lead me to wonder… does anyone use electronic cookbooks? Would a cookbook on my iPad be usable? Reasonable? Functional?

With the iPad, I have quite a few options between apps, iBooks, and the Kindle reader. Amazon lists over 1800 cookbooks, the iBook store has quite a few less at about 400 and about 18 iPad apps as well. And surprisingly enough, there were quite a few cookbooks for the Nintendo DS. I figured I’d take a look at some of these apps, cookbooks and games over the next month or so. If you have any suggestions for apps or books you want me to take a look at, leave it in the comments and I’ll see what I can do about it!

Book review: Food Rules, by Michael Pollan

It’s no secret that I’m a major proponent of all things Michael Pollan.  If I were to wake up one day and hear on the news that he had taken over the planet, I would smile and turn over, and go back to sleep, comforted in the knowledge that the bad guys lost, and that everything will be ok.

The trouble with food information is that we have had ideas crammed down our throats and those ideas were all terrible.  We have been taught what not to eat, what foods to avoid, and to throw our hands up in defense to where we indirectly fear food.  There are those who don’t have this fear, but to listen to them requires time, which none of us have, and a willingness to undergo some discomfort, which none of us want to do, as well as a shunning of one’s culture, which is awful.  Michael Pollan manages to strip away all of that, and deliver his message in such a way that you can feel like you will be successful.
This book isn’t about weight loss.  It isn’t a diet.  You needn’t avoid particular items nor ascribe points to the foods you do eat.  But as you read it, you kind of begin to remember that you did actually eat this way once, and it was good.

The best part? There’re only 64 rules.  Things like, #11 Avoid foods you see advertised on television. That makes complete and total sense.  Because if advertising is involved, you can assume that the cost of this food is inflated, and if it isn’t, farmers aren’t getting paid what they should be to produce it.

#19 If it came from a plant, eat it; if it was made in a plant, don’t. Another bit of brilliance.  Do not eat manufactured foods.  You don’t know what is in them, and probably the people who made them don’t really know either.

Nothing in this book is preachy.

Nothing in this book is new, either.  If you’ve read his other books, you already know this stuff.  This book is for the absolute novice who has decided that they want something better for themselves, for their family.
I got it on amazon.com for $5.00  I think that might be cheaper than a McDonalds value meal in downtown Chicago, and this book will change your life.

Lobel’s Meat Bible—via Uncrate

It’s one thing to love eating meat, and quite another to love learning about it. If you fall into the latter category, consider picking up Lobel’s Meat Bible($27). Written by the Lobel family of master butchers, this 320-page epicurean excursion includes extensive information on beef, pork, lamb, rabbit, poultry, veal, and more, explanations of texture, flavor, and contents, and more than 150 recipes from various cuisines and origins.