The Cake Bible is #1 in my kitchen, but I also like CookWise by Shirley O. Corriher, any of the Barefoot Contessa cookbooks by Ina Garten, and I’m a big Nick Malgieri fan as well.

Where to begin?

I like Rose’s cookbooks because they’re so dependable.

Lisa Yockelson’s Baking by Flavor must be my ‘most used’ book other than RLB’s collection. Not only are the recipes dependable, the techniques have helped me give some old family favorites a flavor boost without changing their essential character. 

I like Cook’s Illustrated and Cook’s Country magazines, generally speaking, but somehow I’m not that wowed by the cookbooks I have. The results are dependable, but I guess I like my food spicier than they do, LOL!

I like reading cookbooks, and have read quite a good many just for the fun of it.

I also like memoirs with recipes, most lately, The Lost Ravioli Recipes of Hoboken: A Search for Food and Family by Laura Schenone,  My Grandmother’s Chinese Kitchen : 100 Family Recipes and Life Lessons by Eileen Yin Fei Lo.

I’ve also enjoyed Chinese Village Cookbook  and Dim Sum (two titles) by Rhoda Yee.

My next cooking project involves ravioli, inspired by the Schenone book, and I’m going to try making some filled cookies, ravioli style for my Holiday cookie plates. Not sure on actual recipes yet.

My collection of cookbooks is growing and my kitchen is getting smaller.  I have over 250 cookbooks now and can’t stop buying new ones.  My favorite cookbooks are about baking.  I love Nick Malgieri too!  I went to a demonstration class in Tampa and he did a few very Italian Easter desserts.  He is a fabulous baker and is wonderful with his audience too.  He made a simple biscotti without a mixer that baked light, crisp and very tasty.  I also love Beth Hensperger’s muffins and quickbread cookbooks.  Lorraine

For baking cakes and sweets I rely on four other workhorse cookbooks (besides RLV’s), in no particular order:

a) Baking from My Home to Yours by Dorie Greenspan

b) The Baking Handbook by Martha Stewart

c) The Simple Art of Perfect Baking by Flo Braker

d) Baking 911 by Sarah Phillips

I collect cookbooks as well and have well over 100, and I collect recipes off of the internet as well.  The RLB books are a recent acquisition, and already a permanent fixture on my counters, but my most well-used cookbook is probably The Joy of Cooking (the 1972 edition).  Epicurious.com is the recipe website I visit the most.

I don’t have any books from Dorie Greenspan or Lisa Yockelson yet - I should do something about that .

I have a couple of Cook’s Illustrated books too, but there is just something about their magazine format that I prefer.  Speaking of magazines, I really like Taste of Home and Southern Living too.

For baking, I pretty much use Rose’s books exclusively.

The only other dessert book I’ve used a lot is:

Perfect Scoop by David Lebovitz

For cooking, I make a lot of Indian and Thai food, and these are my favorites:

Dakshin by Chandra Padmanabhan
Vegetarian Nirvana by Santosh Jain
An Invitation to Indian Cooking by Madhur Jaffrey
Real Vegetarian Thai by Nancie McDermott
Buddha’s Table by Chat Mingkwan

I also like these two for Mexican and Tex-Mex:

From my Mexican Kitchen by Diana Kennedy
The Tex-Mex Cookbook by Robb Walsh

When it comes to cookbooks, Claudia Roden is my guru. I love her books and I use them a lot (especially The New Book of Middle Eastern Food).

I also turn to Rick Bayless’s cookbooks for authentic Mexican fair

When it comes to baking, I mostly bake breads, tarts, pies, and brownies, so I use the Bread Bible and the Pie and Pastry Bible a lot.
I also like the King Arthur Flour baking books; the KAF Cookie Companion rocks.

I’ve been on the look out for a decent Persian cookbook, but so far—nada. The books that do address Persian cooking, do it a short 3 pages or less, not really what I’m looking for.

Patrincia - 20 November 2007 08:52 AM

I don’t have any books from Dorie Greenspan or Lisa Yockelson yet - I should do something about that .
I have a couple of Cook’s Illustrated books too, but there is just something about their magazine format that I prefer.  Speaking of magazines, I really like Taste of Home and Southern Living too.

Ms Greenspan’s latest book (Baking from My Home to Yours) is a great addition.  It is a heavy tome (literally).  It’s packed with gorgeous photographs and wonderful, homey recipes.

She is also a darling of the blogosphere:

Click here for a list of bloggers who tried her recipes and posted their reviews.

Click here for my rendition of a recipe from this book.

I like David Lebovit, too, Matthew.  I came upon his blog once while looking for a German Chocolate Recipe. 

Yes, like many others, I use Rose’s recipes almost exclusively now.  I can always count on excellence with her.

However, Sweet Celebrations by Sylvia Weinstock, is the book that hooked me into cakes & decorating.  Incredible cakes!  I learned about making sugar dough flowers from her book.

Does anyone know if Wildflowers by Lori (in NJ) has any book out?  Her work is fabulous!

Cathy in SoCal - 20 November 2007 12:30 PM

Sweet Celebrations by Sylvia Weinstock, is the book that hooked me into cakes & decorating.  Incredible cakes!  I learned about making sugar dough flowers from her book.

I agree, Sylvia’s book is very nice.  I like DeDe Wilson’s Wedding Cake Book a great deal as well.

HELLO TO EVERYONE,
  Many of the titles you-all mentioned I have. I revert to them from time to time for reference purposes.
I truly enjoy browsing thru for learning purposes the Cake & Bread bible editions like many of you do.
I enjoy Dorrie Greenspan’s “Baking from my home to yours”. Flo Braker’s “The simple art of perfect baking”.
Shirley Corrihers “Cookwise” So much to learn there. Last but not least “Understanding baking” by Joseph Amendola.
It is not so much the recipes inside, although many are worthwhile….but the baking science knowledge that is available in those pages that I value.

  ~FRESHKID.

Being in the UK, many of the books you all mention I have not heard of.  But since finding Rose’s website earlier this year I have purchased the Cake Bible and today I received my much awaited copy of Rose’s Christmas Cookies!  I also have Dorie Greenspan’s book which I love and have made several recipes from with no problems concerning differences in our flours.  I have also bought SarahPhillips’  Baking 911.  Cheers for Amazon!!  Of my UK books , Delia Smith is my favourite for all cooking with Mary Berry being my most used baking book.

omg this thread is a danger to me.. I have this sickness that i will call cookbookitis.. I absolutely LOVE cookbooks (hey I got it from my grandma) noe the cake bible is marked up stained up wrinkled up   (I have only baked like 2 recipes out of it (soon to be 3).. but I have the weights marked.. the buttercake formula page marked.. i also love paula deen.. and I will usually get one of her recipes and compare and modify it with another..

Roxanne - 20 November 2007 11:28 AM

I’ve been on the look out for a decent Persian cookbook, but so far—nada. The books that do address Persian cooking, do it a short 3 pages or less, not really what I’m looking for.

How about Larousse’s Gastronomique and La cuisine de France?

Roxanne - 20 November 2007 11:28 AM

... I’ve been on the look out for a decent Persian cookbook, but so far—nada. The books that do address Persian cooking, do it a short 3 pages or less, not really what I’m looking for.

Have you seen this one? The title sounds good: New Food of Life: Ancient Persian and Modern Iranian Cooking and Ceremonies. The same author seems to have written a number of books on similar lines. HTH!