Desert Island Books

[Sakkarin Profile]

Prompted by Gill's Book Recommendation thread.

What would your choice of book be if you were marooned on a desert island and allowed to bring just one of the foodie books from your bookshelves?

If you can't tie it down to just one, feel free to make it a top 3 or 5 or whatever, after all Desert Island Discs is a top 8.

[Sakkarin Profile]

My number one is "On Food and Cooking" by Harold McGee. I've dipped into it, but I would love the time and space to really read it in depth, cover to cover. All 884 pages.



Second choice would be my complete set of Lonely Planet World Food books. They are foodie guides, not recipe books. Took ages to collect and cost me a fortune. Again I'd love to read them all cover to cover. The Thai and Vietnamese are my favourites.



My favourite actual recipe book is Fuchsia Dunlop's Sichuan Cookery, but I don't think I'd want it with me unless the Island had a convenient lifetime supply of Szechwan ingredients too

Gill wouldn't like it though as it features lots of celery...

[Joanbunting Profile]

There is absolutely only one. Elizabeth David's french Provincial Cooking. I'm on my third paper back copy but have a rare edition in hardback which I teasure.

With it I can go to the country and the food i love and really the one where I learned to cook.

[Alexandria Profile]

Sakkarin,

Fantastic Interview Question !


This is a very difficult question since I have close to 1.000 cookbooks in hard cover, cook books in soft cover if they did not come in hard cover which is always my 1st choice, restaurant menus, magazines, hand sketched & hand written notes and recipes in addition to supplier brochures, books & catalogs, Dvds and Pdfs.

I believe I would have to say: The Culinaria Series ( By Country ) and Published by: H.F. Ullman .. (Each have 500 Pages chockfilled with amazing authentic, traditional regional cuisine and valuable product information and historical facts on each recipe and seasonal product ..

www.ulmann-publishing.com

[Stokey Sue Profile]

Ha! I have one Culinaria Book - Caribbean - which could be useful on a tropical desert island. OH bought it for me as a decoy one Christmas, the real present was jewellery but he wanted to put a big heavy parcel under the tree. He spent 10 or 15 pounds at one of those shops that sell off out of print books. Currently I could sell it for a lot more

I was going to go for Mrs David though. Although French Provicincial Cooking is perhaps my most used recipe book, for my desert island read I’d go for something more of a reading book, so one of Jill Normsn’s excellent anthologies, probably aAn omelette and a glass of wine, or perhaps Is there a nutmeg in the house?

[Gillthepainter Profile Website]

celery would be so easy to sub. I'd add more chilli.

The book that taught me most about baking, and my favourite book is the Handmade Loaf, by of course Dan Lepard. That would come.

If I actually had to cook, and the reason for taking it would be cooking. I'd take my Mrs Beeton.
With no internet, I'd be able to cook most things.

My first ever cookbook bought for me was the feast of floyd. And I still pick it up today.

Michael van Straten's super books are aptly named. I love them.
And he's an absolute hero. On my husband's money sites, a 40yr old chap was saying his goodbyes.
An extreme eating condition meant he lived only on broccoli, Rachael's yoghurt, rice. His organs were shutting down, as Rachael's yoghurt had changed their culture, and didn't have the original, which he could not tolerate.
Michael van Straten flew out to his home in America, and has given him a new very limited diet that he can continue to eat.
The chap still posts, which is phenomenal news.


All my other books, I wouldn't particularly miss.

[Alexandria Profile]

Sue,

You should buy the Middle Eastern " Culinaria Book " ..

Extraordinarily amazing and if you are a history buff as I am, you shall find it to be a never put down read ..

There is also a British Isles one, which includes: Scotland, England, Wales, Northern Ireland and also Ireland ..


Have a lovely day.

[Suffs Profile]

Mine are Darina Allen's Forgotten Skills of Cooking, followed closely by Elizabeth Luard's European Peasant Cookery ... both eminently readable as well as being full of fascinating and useful information and recipes.

As a matter of fact, my book choice for the real DID* (as opposed to the Foodie Feedback one) is The Diary of a Country Parson ... an edited version of the diaries of 18C Parson James Woodforde a Norfolk vicar (who also had connections with Oxford and the West Country) ... a wonderful insight into the social (and political) rural life of the time, as well as lots of information about food and how it was prepared, cooked and eaten.

*I'm still waiting for Radio 4 to invite me to take part ... it must be my turn soon

[Binky Profile]

mine would be 'The Moosewood Cookbook' by Mollie Katzen. I really got to grips with vegetarian cookery using that book.

For nostalgia, and not as a recipe book, Dorothy Hartley's 'Food in England'.

[Suffs Profile]

For nostalgia, and not as a recipe book, Dorothy Hartley's 'Food in England'.

That's another of my favourites too ... but as you say, not for actual recipes