What (non-cook)books do you consult most?

We've all got cookbooks. They reflect our tastes, both literally and figuratively, and our interests. But although the subject of cookbooks is fascinating in and of itself, I've become curious to know what other books you have in your kitchen. I suspect we've all got a great variety. What I'm particularly curious about is, what are the non-cookbooks that you consult/use regularly?

Having posed the question, I'll be happy to volunteer three volumes that I find myself consulting on a regular basis. Far and away the most fascinating to read and a superb source of useful information is Harold McGee's On Food and Cooking: The Science and Lore of the Kitchen. So informative, so well-written, so...gol durn essential do I find it now, that it boggles my mind that I could have done without it, ever. Who'd have thought that anyone could make the physics and biochemistry of food exciting? But not only does he make it fun to read, I can't even begin to count the number of times that his explanations have rescued me.

Tied for second are David Joachim's The Food Substitutions Bible and Christine Ingram's Cooking Ingredients.

Ingram's book is primarily a photographic reference to help you identify and distinguish ingredients. It has an English flavor and slant but is remarkably comprehensive. The photographs, on heavy, glossy paper, are little short of food porn; and although the storage and choosing information is somewhat abbreviated, I find myself consulting it far more than I ever expected.

Joachim offers thousands upon thousands of useful (and occasionally silly) substitutions and his book is chock full of bite-size identifications, exceptionally helpful weights and volumes of most ingredients, and dozens of pages of useful basic information, such as the table of over two dozen different kinds of apples or the pages of listings of different kinds of beans, flours, Asian noodles, rice. An exceptionally handy compendium.

(For Chanukah, the Lovely Dining Companion gave me the Larousse Gastronomique. I've spent hours reading it--and, to my horror, finding more than the expected number of errors--and enjoying its vast reaches. It's a little heavily French for my taste but I suspect that, over time, it may become a regular reference as well. A very roughly equivalent Italian book that I found in a used bookstore the other day, Anna del Conte's Gastronomy of Italy, is proving fascinating and instructive as well.)

So: what are your kitchen references?

Gypsy Boy wrote:(For Chanukah, the Lovely Dining Companion gave me the Larousse Gastronomique. I've spent hours reading it--and, to my horror, finding more than the expected number of errors--and enjoying its vast reaches. It's a little heavily French for my taste but I suspect that, over time, it may become a regular reference as well. A very roughly equivalent Italian book that I found in a used bookstore the other day, Anna del Conte's Gastronomy of Italy, is proving fascinating and instructive as well.)

Just curious, what type of errors did you find? I've been meaning to pick this up, but am less enthusiastic if it isn't as reliable as I thought it would be.

Bios/auto-bios, mostly - Jeremiah Tower's "Dish" (fabulously catty!), Martha Stewart (pre-Big House, and a fabulous read), two on/by Julia Child, James Beard (what an odd duck he was!), Gordon Ramsay...also, books on various farmers markets, Zingerman's Deli, tomes by Waverly Root and MFK Fisher, and various gardening books specifically related to edibles, including the wonderful "$64 Tomato," by William Alexander, which I highly recommend, and "The Gardener's Year," by the late Karel Capek, which I bought nearly 40 years ago (!) at the Library of Congress bookstore, of all unlikely places, and treasure greatly. The culinary collection takes up a five-shelf six-foot-something case in the kitchen, and has declared a combo of manifest destiny/eminent domain over both the dining room and bedroom.

I need a card catalog.

The inclusion of McGee's On Food and Cooking makes me wonder if we need to limit this to the kitchen -- because my copy of McGee is in the 2nd bedroom, which is my office, as I work from home. The entire bookcase in the kitchen is just cookbooks, but there are a few additional shelves with a few addiitonal cookbooks, plus the the Food Lover's Companion and A Cook's Guide to Chicago.

After that, all the rest of my non-cookbook foodie books are, as is the McGee, in the office. Mostly, I have lots of histories (current favorite is Near a Thousand Tables), food literature (all the usual suspects -- Reichl, Ruhlman, Trillin, and so on), food as relates to culture and travel (love the "Eat Smart" series), and The Fearless International Foodie Conquers Pan-Asian Cuisine.

Just a quick note to say that I modified the title of this thread because the original was misleading. Although I am interested in what books everyone has in their kitchen (or second bedrooms ) beyond cookbooks, my greatest interest is in learning which two or three books you rely on most (either before or after your cookbooks). Sorry for any confusion.

In addition to McGee, I'd add Shirley Corriher's Cookwise as a text I frequently go back as a technical reference.

Best,
Michael

Michael,
I'm embarrassed to admit I don't know the name, either of the author or the book. Can you tell me a bit about it?

It's kind of a cookbook, kind of not, but I go back to Jigger Beaker Flask/Glass quite a bit. I also go back to Ruth Reichel's books a lot to remind me a lot of what food and dining is supposed to be about. I've got a huge bookshelf of non cook book food books if anyone is looking for anything to read.

Gypsy Boy wrote:Michael,
I'm embarrassed to admit I don't know the name, either of the author or the book. Can you tell me a bit about it?

Corriher, a biochemist, has a similar approach to cooking as McGee. Her book does have a number of recipes, but it is first an foremost a reference on the scientific "hows" and "whys" (and "why-nots") behind the recipes. There are a number of quick references that are very useful, and I have my copy indexed with a number of little tabs to help me find my favorite spots quickly.

Cookwise at Amazon.com

Best,
Michael

Corriher is really neat. I'm embarassed to say the first time I saw her was on Alton Brown's "Good Eats". I thought she was really interesting on the show and then googled her and picked up Cookwise. I enjoy it and think it's a wonderful reference tool and very interesting.

Erzsi wrote:I'm embarassed to say the first time I saw her was on Alton Brown's "Good Eats".

Ack! Of course! I KNEW that the name rang a vague distant bell. Now I know who she is, I'll have to follow Michael's link to the book. Thank you all.

If the question is reference books or back stories, so to speak, like McGee's, then I don't have anything special to add. I do have several books that I've read in recent years that have both inspired my decision to eat local and informed and reinforced my choice.

Omnivore's Dilemma and In Defense of Food by Michael Pollan - The former's more entertaining, but the latter contains one of my new found favorite sayings: "There's no high fructose corn syrup in your CSA box."

Plenty by Alisa Smith and J.B. Mackinnon and Animal, Vegetable, Mineral by Barbara Kingsolver. I'll admit that both books are a bit of a slough to read, and neither book is essentially practical for the (sub)urban localvore; still these comprise the basic cannon of eating local and should be read.

Real Food by Nina Plank and What to Eat by Marion Nestle. Neither woman writes exclusively on eating local, but the types of foods they most extol are readily available if you eat local.

Nose to Tail Eating by Fegus Henderson. OK, am I cheating? Yet, for me, the recipes are besides the point, its more the philosophy from one of the original localvores.

Nourishing Traditions: The Cookbook That Challenges Politically Correct Nutrition and the Diet Dictocrats by Sally Fallon; Mary Enig. This is an odd book extolling the virtues of raw meat and pickles. I mean Ms. Fallon really likes pickles, and I like anyone who likes pickles, but I am not going to go anywhere close to endorsing all of her beliefs. Still, a very, very interesting read.

How to Pick a Peach: The Search for Flavor from Farm to Table by Russ Parsons. Perhaps more of the reference that Gypsy Boy is seeking. I know Parsons is a California man, but my one issue with his book is the over reliance on California based produce.

We have a host of produce guides and produce oriented cook books, I could not possible name them all, but two that we open a lot are The San Francisco Ferry Plaza Farmer's Market Cookbook by Peggy Knickerbocker and Christopher Hirsheimer and Farmer John's Cookbook: The Real Dirt on Vegetables by John Peterson.

I could do this all day. Our food books are in more than the kitchen or the second bedroom. They line 2 dining room walls, take up 1/4th of the den, scatter around our bedroom, get piled in my office and shoved into the sun room for some latter sorting.

McGee, Fisher, Root are probably our mainstays. I also dip into Hugh Johnson's Atlas of Wine constantly, as well as his annual pocket buying guides just to ruminate on his various (very Brit. inflected) slant on food/wine matchings.

One book I used to refer to often - and is a great reference to have is

Keeping Food Fresh: How to Choose and Store Everything You Eat
by Janet Bailey
ISBN: 978-0062725035
(amazon link)

Okay. If we're talking most commonly referred to, then Waverly Root's Food, Oxford Companion to Food, The Fearless International Foodie Conquers Pan-Asian Cuisine, Barnes and Noble's The Essentials of Cooking, and, of course, McGee -- both On Cooking and Curious Cook.

I had to bring the laptop down here to the kitchen to see what I had, but in addition to McGee, I have The Visual Food Encyclopedia and the Oxford Guide to Food (the former is especially recommended - it was the first time I found out about crosnes). I'm not sure if these others count, since they do have recipes, but I also have The Professional Chef, from the CIA (more about technique than recipes) and Le Cordon Bleu Complete Cooking Techniques. I think I've posted before about how much I like Steingarten's books, as well as Beard on Food, but those are upstairs for reading, not here in the kitchen for actual reference.

nr706 wrote:I had to bring the laptop down here to the kitchen to see what I had, but in addition to McGee, I have The Visual Food Encyclopedia and the Oxford Guide to Food (the former is especially recommended - it was the first time I found out about crosnes)

Interesting! Because I also have The Visual Food Encyclopedia and, though I consult it regularly, I chose the Ingram book over it--seduced no doubt by the glossy stock and exquisite illustrations. Indeed, my one complaint about the Encyclopedia is that the illustrations are all drawings. Otherwise, I find it an impeccable reference.

Vital Information wrote:How to Pick a Peach: The Search for Flavor from Farm to Table by Russ Parsons. Perhaps more of the reference that Gypsy Boy is seeking. I know Parsons is a California man, but my one issue with his book is the over reliance on California based produce.

Thanks for the tidbit of info. I almost bought that book from Amazon but now I'll save my money if it's too California-focused.