Disclaimer: I received a copy of The Joy of Cooking for my 21st birthday. I received no compensation for this review. Links are not affiliated.
I love cooking and baking. I love creating new dishes and tasting the fruits of my labor. However, I am not a typical millennial when it comes to using cooking blogs. I do not enjoy trying to weed through recipes to find a quality choice and often just want the recipe, rather than the story behind it. (Yes, I can see the irony in this blog post.) My favorite cookbook, by far, was given to me by my parents for my 21st birthday: the 75th anniversary edition of The Joy of Cooking. (Note: The 75th anniversary edition was published in 2006. The most recent update was published in 2019.)
The original Joy of Cooking was published in 1931 by a mother-daughter team living in St. Louis. Irma, a widower, and her daughter Marion created a cookbook to teach people how to cook. Nine revisions later in 2006, with Marion’s son Ethan in charger, this cookbook still serves to teach people how to make basic kitchen staples as well as more complicated recipes. I appreciate that all of the chapters have several pages, textbook style, to teach you more about the content and particular food category. There are new recipes, such as no-dairy white sauce (use pureed rice and white wine!) and tempeh. There are also plenty of classics, such as scones and egg dishes.
While it does not bother me, it is worth noting that there are no illustrations or pictures of finished recipes. This may bother some people.
I would highly recommend this cookbook to anyone looking for a no frills, no nonsense set of directions. It is extremely informative and detailed!
Here are some pictures of recipes I have made from the Joy of Cooking.