Joy of cookbooks

“Sacrebleu! What’s going on here?”

Henri had just returned from a walk around the block with Miss Marilyn to find Colette dumping armfuls of books into the trunk of Pierre. Cookbooks! Henri’s cookbooks!

“Spring cleaning, Little Brother. Goodwill. Salvation Army. Do you have preference?” (She’s known the answer to that since I was 14.)

“But … but … but …”

“Oh, chill out,” she said. “Just getting rid of stuff we don’t need. Like 300 cookbooks.”

A bit of an exaggeration.

“Don’t need? Cookbooks?”

She scowled. “Oh, come on. You’re getting your recipes online these days as much as I am.”

“But … my cookbooks?” I peered into the trunk. Alice Waters, Craig Claiborne, Anna Thomas, Rachael Ray, Christopher Kimball. Mes amis!

“Tell you what,” she said, “you can keep one shelf of books.”

Probably best I didn’t say what I was thinking: And you can keep one pair of shoes!

Actually, she had a point. The Internet has dramatically changed how we find recipes. Whether it’s looking up ways to cook a specific dish or possible dishes to make with specific ingredients, we’ve found ourselves going online more and more. Besides, there were cookbooks I hadn’t opened in years.

So I ended up agreeing to thin them out. Problem: which ones to keep.

Thankfully she agreed to wait until the next day, so I had some time to go through them and think about which books I absolutely couldn’t let go of.

At the top of the list:

Joy of Cooking, Irma S. Rombauer Continually in print since 1936 (subsequent editions revised by co-authors), Joy of Cooking is a virtual reflection of 20th century American cooking, a book that will never disappoint, whether you’re looking for recipes for hors d’oeuvres, soups, sauces, or game (including opossum and raccoon in earlier editions).

The Way to Cook, Julia Child Another classic, by one of the most influential cooks of the last 50 years, The Way to Cook is actually more useful than her better-known Mastering the Art of French Cooking, emphasizing fresh, natural and easy-to-find ingredients in her down-to-earth conversational voice. Child walks beginners through the basics—of soups, breads, fish, meat and desserts—but allows room for improvising for more experienced cooks.

The New Basics Cookbook, Julee Rosso and Sheila Lukins This 800-plus-page book (over 900 recipes) is a continuing source of new discoveries, two of my favorites being chilled avocado soup and peanut pesto (a dip, perfect for sliced red bell peppers!). An expanded version of the authors’ The Silver Palate Cookbook, The New Basics includes simple suggestions for preparation, presentation, entertaining and wine pairing—with wonderful hand-drawn, often silly illustrations (we love the smiling fish).

How to Cook Everything, Mark Bittman Two thousand recipes, often with many variations/alternatives, such as the eight ways to make skillet pork chop (including with soy sauce, with pears, and with prunes and cream). This is an excellent book for finding dishes for ingredients you have, with overviews of the product first (“About Eggplant”) and then pages on what to do with it. Bittman begins with a section on essential kitchenware, from mandolins to muffin tins.

Culinary Classics and Improvisations, Michael Field This is our go-to book for what to do with leftovers. For each “classic” (pot-au-feu, roast chicken, leg of lamb), Field also offers up to eight improvisations—what to do with what ends up in Tupperware. Got some leftover corned beef? How about making a pâté? Or some red flannel hash?

Non-cookbooks: There are also several books about food and cooking that I absolutely refuse to let go of. Among them: The Art of Eating, by M.F.K. Fisher (the grand dame of American food writing); The Physiology of Taste, by Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin (published in France in 1825, translated by Fisher in 1929); Choice Cuts: A Savory Selection of Food Writing from Around the World and Throughout History, edited by Mark Kurlansky.

Note to readers: What cookbooks and books about food are essential to your collections? Send me a note to the email address above explaining your selections. I’ll discuss as many as I can in a subsequent column.