I love cookbooks. As you can see, I buy far more cookbooks than my life realistically needs. I read them, ponder the recipes and commentary and consider their cultural context with great joy; when I find scribbled notes beside recipes or scraps of paper in used volumes it thrills me. What I don't tend to do is cook from them. This strikes me as kind of silly, a waste of paper and space. It's time to change that. I'm going to explore some of these volumes, especially the older, odder ones, and record my adventures here. I look forward to some gloriously unpleasant dishes (because our gastronomic sensibilities in 2010 are not the same as they were in the 1940s - who boils broccoli for 30 minutes anymore?) and some gems. I hope you'll keep me company on the journey and let me know what you think. I'd like to thank my step-daughter, Cara , for the off-handed remark that led to this idea. To start, let's take a look at my bookshelves. For a librarian's daught
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The first time I ever ate anything calling itself Mexican food was probably when I was little and my mother prepared tacos at home. If you grew up in the U.S. anytime before 2000 you have probably had these, too. Brown some ground beef with the seasonings in the packet; chop up some lettuce, tomatoes and onions; stuff it all into hard taco shells with some grated cheddar cheese. Tacos. Or something resembling them, anyway. It was years before I had real Mexican food, but somehow I caught the idea that Mexican cooking is one of our great cuisines and often overlooked. The balance of seasonings, the emphasis on fresh ingredients and the incredible range of what we call Mexican cooking have won me over. Give me a good mole´ any day. Since moving to Kansas City I've had excellent Mexican food, from mole´ to menudo and various things that I can't really identify but taste great. It's been a delight. My local supermarkets have aloe, cactus pads, dried chiles and more. Yum.
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