Yesterday’s NY Times contains a piece entitled “The Math of Publishing Meets the E-Book,” a fascinating study of where the money goes in paper vs. digital publishing.
For nearly a year in our temporary move, I’ve been looking up hints of recipes on various sites, just so I know the correct proportions to continue a recipe. With a couple hundred cookbooks, I didn’t bring one with us on the 1,500 mile trek, and have only bought 4-5 since last January. Plus a few magazines, though sadly not the final edition of Gourmet marking the end of an era.
Years ago, when planning a dinner party I’d go to the bookshelves and choose 5-6 titles with which to curl up and cobble together a menu, set the heat in my zoned bedroom from 55 to 65 degrees and crawl under the arctic weight down comforter to spend a few hours figuring out how best to satisfy an eclectic group of guests.
Some of the books would open automatically to favorite pages, such as Julia Child’s French Onion Soup, the Silver Palate’s smoked salmon mousse or Beef Carbonnade. Then there are pages with the slightest bit of grease spatter, or mustard from a special vinaigrette. Like Simca Beck’s Cassoulet or James Beard’s blue cheese spread.
Sitting in bed with a clipboard, pulling together a menu from favorite books, is one of my favorite things to do. I just don’t see that happening with an E-book reader. If you look to the right I’ve a selection of favorite cookbooks that is exhaustively researched and presented with links to Amazon (yes, I might make a nickel on this blog after 18 months) and most are already out of print.
What do I buy newlyweds and new homeowners? James Beard’s Theory and Practice of Good Cooking, which has been out of print for over 20 years but I find priceless editions on Amazon and even treated myself to one, finally. Len Deighton (yes, the spy thriller author) wrote a book in the 70’s called Ou Est le Garlique, translated into English into a paperback with his own hand drawings called Basic French Cooking. That’s what I buy for special students, my young cousins who learn every Thanksgiving a new technique from Ms. Dee.
The earth is turning around me and things are moving faster than I am these days, but even with the dry air up here my fingers love to turn a page. I love the music from Crazy Heart so much, and Jeff Bridges deserves to do a couple dozen push-ups on stage when he wins the Oscar, that I bought the novel on Sunday and downed a good 120 pages that afternoon.
If books are going by the wayside, consider me an afficianado or collector, or just set in my ways. I’m just a gal that spent half her formative years in the school or public library. The Diary of Anne Frank, Death Be Not Proud, To Kill a Mockingbird, all read before I was eight. Betty Crocker’s Boys and Girls Cookbook. That’s the stuff I grew up on. Perhaps we need a larger home and more bookcases so Jim and I can each amass our 400 favorites. Of course his are all paperbacks and have camels or cranes on the cover (software tech books).
The one thing this article barely mentions is the author. Just as in the movies, the producers and director and actors get the credit and money and the annoying gnat in the background is “just the author.” Same with publishing houses, who probably would love the book business if there weren’t any pesky authors hanging around. The creative types are always the most maligned, but that’s another story for another day. Have a good one, Dee
Cooking with Dee 