The Books Briefing: What’s Wrong With Following a Recipe?

Eric Wolfinger

Writing an Iranian cookbook in an age of anxiety

“As the world thundered, I paved a new, diplomatic relationship with my measuring cups and timer, finding solace in their certainty. Whereas only months before I’d felt restricted by the written recipe, I now relied on it.”

📚 Bottom of the Pot, by Naz Deravian

Katie Martin

When did following recipes become a personal failure?

“Well-meaning but uninspired cooks—and believe me, we have been legion since the dawn of time—long for specifics.”

📚 The New York Times Cooking No-Recipe Recipes, by Sam Sifton

📚 The Boston Cooking-School Cook Book, by Fannie Farmer

📚 The Joy of Cooking, by Irma Rombauer

📚 Betty Crocker’s Picture Cook Book

📚 That Man in the Kitchen, by Malcolm LaPrade

📚 A Man’s Cookbook, by Raymond Oliver

📚 The I Hate to Cook Book, by Peg Bracken

Wendy MacNaughton

The why of cooking

“[R]ecipes, for all their precision and completeness, are poor teachers. They tell you what to do, but they rarely tell you why to do it.”

📚 Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat, by Samin Nosrat

📚 How to Cook Everything, by Mark Bittman

📚 On Food and Cooking, by Harold McGee

📚 The Science of Good Cooking

📚 Cooking for Geeks, by Jeff Potter

📚 The Food Lab, by J. Kenji López-Alt

📚 How to Read a French Fry, by Russ Parsons

📚 The Improvisational Cook, by Sally Schneider

📚 Ruhlman’s Twenty, by Michael Ruhlman

Lebrecht / Corbis / Zak Bickel / The Atlantic

The myth of ‘easy’ cooking

“The decision to cook from scratch may have many virtues, but ease is not one of them. Despite what we’re told, cooking the way so many Americans aspire to do it today is never fast, and rarely easy compared to all the other options available for feeding ourselves.”

📚 The New Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day, by Jeff Hertzberg and Zoë François

📚 How to Cook Everything Fast, by Mark Bittman

📚 Lucky Peach Presents 101 Easy Asian Recipes, by Peter Meehan

📚 The Glamour Magazine After 5 Cookbook, by Beverly Pepper

📚 In & Out of the Kitchen In 15 Minutes or Less, by Anne Willan

Netflix

Michael Pollan and the luxury of time

“Americans are transfixed with the culture of food, but not with the actual cooking of food.”

📚 Cooked, by Michael Pollan

About us: This week’s newsletter is written by Kate Cray. The book she’s reading next is An Ordinary Age, by Rainesford Stauffer.

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