I would recommend against Joy as a first cookbook. It’s a great book. I love it. However, it’s not for people who “can’t smeg won’t smeg”.
Better Homes & Gardens has a new cook book - Anyone Can Cook . We gave that to my Brother-in-Law’s new wife for Christmas. She loves it. She’s one of those who cannot boil water without setting off the smoke alarms.
[QUOTE=Lightray]
(unfortunately, ATK recipies will end up dirtying every dish you own. but it’s a good read.)
[/QUOTE]
Ha! At least it’s not just me…
That said, I can also highly recommend America’s Test Kitchen 's Family Cookbook. Don’t let the size blow you away. (Over 1200 recipes) They certainly have a ton of more challenging recipes in there, but there are also a ton of quick and easy ones.
[QUOTE=Ronald C. Semone]
.
I can not recommend too highly a book that is probably out of print for years, but is well-worth searching down and buying in old book stores: Jo Coudert’s The I Never Cooked Before Cook Book.
[/QUOTE]
I came in here to mention this book. It truly is helpful to the person who doesn’t want to be a gourmet cook, just be well-fed without relying on prepackaged or frozen foods.
The Better Homes and Gardens Cookbook is my cooking bible. I know you said no cookbooks, but this one is wonderful. Many of the recipes are very basic. Nothing tricky, no exotic ingredients. And the beginning of each section has explanations of what all the cooking terms mean. So, if you are baking cookies and it says “cream the butter and sugar” and you have no idea what that means, you flip to the front of the chapter and it tells you exactly what it means and how to do it. The meat chapters tell you all about the different cuts and the best ways to cook them and the time you need to cook per pound. I think it’s an absolute essential in every kitchen.
I also second the Alton Brown book. If only because he is a god. Well, that and it is a great reference.
The Food Lover’s Companion is essentially a glossary of terms. It will tell you what a roux is. It will not tell you how to make a roux.
Get the previous edition of Joy of Cooking (the Rombauer/Becker version). It has illustrations and descriptions of how to skin a squirrel and remove its scent glands, among other amusements.
Look up something like What Einstein Told His Cook on Amazon, then look at the related books for more of a physics/chemistry approach to cooking.
[QUOTE=friedo]
Thanks for all the suggestions so far. These look like exactly the kind of things I want, especially The Art of Simple Food and Just Here for the Food.
I am putting down my potato peeler…now.
But I’m still holding a spatula. Muahahahah.
[/QUOTE]
AB’s book includes a page of meat magnets, sorta like this except much cooler. Never again will you ponder the difference between cuts of steak or chops.
Seriously, what carnivorian fridge doesn’t need meat magnets?
[QUOTE=Shoshana]
Get the previous edition of Joy of Cooking (the Rombauer/Becker version). It has illustrations and descriptions of how to skin a squirrel and remove its scent glands, among other amusements.
[/QUOTE]
That’s two editions ago. The newest one isn’t bad. The one before that, OTOH…
But As I said above: for the novice cook, Joy isn’t a good fit. It’s like suggesting a shop guide to someone who wants to put some air in their tires.
[QUOTE=Bosstone]
Sorry bubbeh, but recipes are part and parcel of learning how to cook. You can’t escape them, but you can ignore them.
That said, Alton Brown’s I’m Just Here For The Food is excellent for beginners (at least, this beginner thinks so). It takes cooking step by step and explains a lot of the common things one does in the kitchen regardless of the food involved. Yes, there are recipes, but they’re more like homework problems than the actual content, taking what was taught in the section before it and applying it to an actual dish.
[/QUOTE]
Got it in two.
This book is precisely what you are after. The art and science of cooking explained, step by step and most importantly…why!
[QUOTE=Queen Tonya]
AB’s book includes a page of meat magnets, sorta like this except much cooler. Never again will you ponder the difference between cuts of steak or chops.
Seriously, what carnivorian fridge doesn’t need meat magnets?
[/QUOTE]
::: Looks at link:::
OK,
Upper left Lamb
Upper right pig
Lower left beef
Lower right Dog? :eek:
[QUOTE=Omniscient]
The art and science of cooking explained, step by step and most importantly…why!
[/QUOTE]
I could tell you why, but then I’d have to charge you. 
[QUOTE=Rick]
::: Looks at link:::
OK,
Upper left Lamb
Upper right pig
Lower left beef
Lower right Dog? :eek:
[/QUOTE]
Nope, it’s a poorly illustrated chicken.
Pig, cow, sheep…next one has to be chicken, so that’s what I’m going with.
Alton’s meat magnets have a chicken, and certainly not a dog, so chicken, chicken, dammit, chicken!
Good to know. I stopped with the 1995 (?) edition because we’ve got around 125 cookbooks and have never really used that 3rd Joy.
Friedo, my advice is to look for cookbooks aimed at college students. The authors of these books assume their readers are beginning cooks who have minimal cookware and ingredients in their kitchen.
[QUOTE=Rick]
::: Looks at link:::
OK,
Upper left Lamb
Upper right pig
Lower left beef
Lower right Dog? :eek:
[/QUOTE]
Stole my post. :mad:
Any of Peg Bracken’s “I Hate to Cook” cookbooks. Long out of print, but easy to find on eBay or in second hand shops. “The Compleat I Hate To Cookbook” is great.
Trivia time: Peg Bracken once worked on a newspaper, writing a column with Homer Groening. Homer’s son Mark went on to greater things.
[QUOTE=Annie-Xmas]
Trivia time: Peg Bracken once worked on a newspaper, writing a column with Homer Groening. Homer’s son Mark went on to greater things.
[/QUOTE]
Mark Groening?
Three generations of my family have relied with some success on The Boston Cooking-School Cookbook , but we all call it “Fannie Farmer”.
It is mostly recipes, but also includes quite a bit of basic information such as identifying cuts of meat, and various techniques.
A quick look at Amazon reveals that there’s an all new revised and updated edition and I can’t vouch for that. I have my grandmother’s second or third one and one purchased in the 80s. There aren’t many changes between them…fewer aspic recipes in the later one, but there are a few.
[QUOTE=Labrador Deceiver]
Mark Groening?
[/QUOTE]
MATT Groening. Mark is his twin brother. His mother Marge had a lifelong friendship with Braken.
Speaking of cooking, I need coffee…
Don’t Sweat The Aubergine a cookbook written by a non-chef who is happy to point out the BS in most cookbooks.
[QUOTE=Queen Tonya]
AB’s book includes a page of meat magnets, sorta like this except much cooler. Never again will you ponder the difference between cuts of steak or chops.
[/QUOTE]
Cooler than meat cut plates? That include dog cuts? Bah.
I’m pondering whether I should track those down for my our-dogs-are-like-our-kids friends. It would be a wonderfully Evil gift… but I suspect that would be wrong of me to do. sigh
