They’re here already! My mail-order kitchen items are here!
That’s not a huge surprise. One small advantage of living in Lawrence, Kansas, is the city’s proximity to an Amazon.com warehouse. That means when I redeemed a Christmas gift certificate on Sunday, my items had a short distance to travel, and they arrived today. In fairness, though, one item came via Amazon from a seller in Seattle, and it arrived today too. Two of the four items are kitchen-related, and I can’t wait to put them to use.
Exhibit A is a new cookbook, How to Cook Everything (Completely Revised 10th Anniversary Edition): 2,000 Simple Recipes for Great Food by Mark Bittman. Based on innumerable recommendations from others, I’ve recommended this book many times, but I haven’t owned it myself until now. It’s like a couple of my other favorites (Joy of Cooking and Mastering The Art of French Cooking) in that it provides tons of useful and educational information along with many, many recipes.
How to cook everything, of course, is hyperbole. When I first opened the book, I landed on pages 626 and 627, which feature recipes for squid and octopus, recipes I’m not likely to have a use for. Did I mention I live in Kansas? Yea. Meanwhile, he doesn’t have recipes for bison or venison, which are considerably more available in these parts than tentacled creatures. That’s OK. We in the midlands are accustomed to this sort of slight, and dear late Mrs. Rombauer of Joy fame, a St. Louisan, provides instructions (at least in the edition I own) on cooking far more critters than I’d care to try. Muskrat, anyone? Opossum?
In any case, you’re likely to see some of my adventures in cooking from this big ol’ book. If you have it and recommend any recipes in particular, let me know what they are.
My other kitchen purchase is the highly recommended but not particularly attractive Unicorn Magnum Peppermill (at left). I’ll let you know if it lives up to its reputation. I suppose even if it doesn’t grind as well as expected, it’s at least easy to fill and has a nice little tray to catch the pepper “crumbs.”
(And, of course, you can see what else I think is worth ordering from Amazon at Foodperson’s unabashed exchange division.
Susan G. // Jan 15, 2009 at 12:17 pm
Janet: we got Todd (our son, as you know) a copy of the new edition of the Bittman book that you had recommended for Christmas. Don’t know if he’ll use it, but he was enjoying looking at it. It had one of his requirements…Asian noodle recipes (go figure). I’ll encourage him to give something a try and have him let you know how it turns out. Since he worked in a restaurant kitchen, he’s not afraid to do things, he’s just rarely used a cookbook! Will keep you posted.
Janet Majure // Jan 15, 2009 at 6:52 pm
Oh, cool! Thanks for letting me know, Susan. I hope he likes it as much as I think I’m going to. I’ll be interested to hear the updates.
Barb Shelly // Jan 16, 2009 at 4:20 pm
Hi Janet. Really like your blog, especially that tip about peeling butternut squash. Good luck with this venture. Barb
Janet Majure // Jan 16, 2009 at 7:28 pm
Hey, Barb! Thanks for stopping by, and thanks for the compliment and good wishes. Enjoy your butternut squash. :) Just so you know…I regularly enjoy reading your pearls. Keep up the good work.