Cookbooks

I have lots of them. Not as many as I could have. I like to think that all of the books that we see in the background of a Nigella series are all cookbooks. So that at least doesn't make me feel like I've gone over board.

When I first started catering for myself full time in the bay area, I turned to a series of cook books put out by Family Circle. My Mother, in typical fashion, had determined that I needed something of a guide. So while packing for my return trip to California presented these to me. They are all the size of an A5 page, around 100 pages. I'm sure there is some professional publishing term for the format. They covered a specific topic. Included pictures to entice the cook to be.

I found them great. I'd throw one in my laptop bag in the morning. Whenever I left work. Which could be late. I'd just call by the local Safeway which was open 24 hours. Pick something out of the book. Buy what I need take it home and cook it. I'm still partial to the Beef and Bok Choy out of the Stir Fry titled book. I've pretty much listed the ingredients in the recipe title. A bit of garlic, soy sauce, dry sherry and sesame oil. Sesame oil! I should probably have a crack one time at favorite or essential ingredients in my cupboard. Sesame oil will be in either list.

These books were my staples while in California. Then continued back in Australia. I don't recall when I started acquiring cookbooks proper. Celebrity chefs and the like. But also the magazines. ABC Delicious (a total doddle since my favorite mother-in-law keeps buying my a subscription for my birthday) and Australian Table, now morphed into Good Food.

A few years back I found where having so many sources for recipes has its downside.

Each morning before the weekly shop. I'd spend hours trying to locate the meals that we'd have for the week. Pouring through the different sources. I'd try to be seasonal by sticking to the magazines that had been published for the current month. Tying this all together with a consolidated shopping list. I've even written up the specifications for a web based software application that would automate most of that process. While successful it ended up with a lot of time spent working on a menu. A somewhat restricted shopping regime. Especially going to farmers markets. If I hadn't put a plan together. Plus a refrigerator and cupboard full of spices, sauces and pastes that I'd only ever used once.

Listening to some of the debates from slow food, and 100 mile diet. The challenges that contestants in cooking competitions are put through. The discussions on what makes a French cuisine great. These activities all have one thing in common. In their original form everyone is just cooking with what they have to hand. The lauded French cuisine, we are always reminded, has come about because some poor peasant had to make a handful of intestines (or other equally appetizing protein) edible or starve. Only a hungry person would look at snails and ask how can I make this edible. A really hungry person would probably scoff them down. Someone who isn't hungry, but eats them anyway. Implies that the hungry person did an excellent job at making snails edible.

I still love my books. There is still information I can learn from them. To be inspired. One day I may clean my hands really well and finally unseal my copy of A Day at elBulli. But for now I'm trying to let what I see at the market lead me in the direction I'll go for the weekly menu. I look for what is on special. For what looks good.

This week. I'm planning on slow roasting a leg of lamb. With the traditional selection of roasted vegetables. Follow up on Monday with some braised pork chops. Tuesday Lamb with a chickpea salad. A firm family favorite. Plus I get some extra Turkish Bread. Wed isn't my concern. Thursday I've got the theater. So a couple of steaks on the BBQ are the order. But I'm still thinking of something interesting with the sides. Broccoli and Zuchinni are both in season at the moment. I've got time. I've also got a lot of cookbooks.