There is more there than recipes. Just the cover picture is mouth watering.

Last Thanksgiving one of the appetizers was a sausage plate including both the Hunter and Thuringer sausage from this book. There was at least one other sausage from the book, but I’m not certain what, I think Andouille (please excuse spelling, I can’t). I’ve also done at least two other sausages from this and some more than once. Between this book and the CIA book with sausage and pate (Garde Mange ?) we don’t buy sausage anymore, just meat, casing and spices.

Another great veg cookbook I bought recently in Oberlin: Vegetarian Supercook by Rose Elliot. Good stuff, lots of good ideas even if you’re not veg (which I haven’t been for years).

I also tried the dry cured ham instructions, as I told him in an e-mail, it took five months but I’ve 10 lbs net of dry cured ham that isn’t too bad. Good enough for a first try that I will use decent pork next time rather than Shoprite’s cheapest.

“The last thing we need to do is to kill trees so Rachel Ray can copy another set of instructions off the back of a pasta package.”

And I convulsed in laughter. Thanks for the yuck.

LOL!

I like to think that good cookbooks will always find a market, and that if the cookbook market is overloaded, then the fallout will just wash out the weaker entries.

I may be over-optimistic, there, but we’ll see.

kevin: thriving in that more and more books are published each year. i like your point about more being fine as long as more’s better.

Chris: i hope soon to have a place for charcuterie discussion. Firmness in the bacon, don’t stress about it. a lot depends on the meat. you simply want to give the salt and pink salt time to penetrate to the center, which happens fairly quickly with something think like belly.

sausage should never be dry. you either didn’t use enough fat or cooked it too long (or both) or more likely, your meat and fat wasn’t cold enough when you mixed it–what you describe sounds like a broken forcemeat. now you know! freeze your meat and fat for a half hour or hour before mixing next time.

“This two-hours later course is especially recommended if grass is smoked socially at your house. If you have passed a joint around before dinner to sharpen gustatory perceptions, you most likely will pass another one after dinner, and everyone knows what that will do–the blind munchies can strike at any time.”

I have a feeling this part got deleted in the newest edition.

Off topic, sorta, but I would love to see Michael add a small discussion area to this site where we can talk about his recipes in Charcuterie. For example, I am making some bacon right now and I am a bit unclear on what texture constitutes “firm” enough to stop the curing process. Or, I made the Italian Sausage last week, and it came out a bit dry in mouthfeel – is this the result of having too-warm ingredients, or is it just the way that recipe comes out? Etc.

Is it thriving? You probably know better than I do, but when the computer book business got this overloaded (a smaller market, admittedly, but I’m allowing for that) it crashed. I watched the fall from the back of the beast. I suspect the cookbook biz is teetering on the verge.

I was tempted to make a snide remark about Charcuterie being a waste of pulp, but I love that book (and really need to find more time for it). I haven’t seen David’s book and ice cream doesn’t excite me, but David has a rare gift of gab — he chatters delightfully. I just reviewed the 25th Anniversary Edition of The Silver Palate Cookbook. I was disappointed that it was still mostly the same book I had, but “Damn” that was a good book filled with great ideas, interesting tid-bits, and thoughtful asides. I was happy to rediscover it.

There’s nothing wrong with more cookbooks. In fact, the more the better — just so long as the more are better. The last thing we need to do is to kill trees so Rachel Ray can copy another set of instructions off the back of a pasta package.

Anxious to read your review of The Perfect Scoop. I’ve only tried one recipe — the roasted banana ice cream — and found it kind of lacking in the flavor and creaminess departments, probably b/c there are no eggs or cream (I was hoping I wouldn’t miss them!). But I hold faith that some of the other recipes are delicious.

P.S. Use up rendered duck fat in the fridge well before appt.

P.P.S. Ascertain whether or not deep frying the wheat berries in duck fat is bad? Cancel out factor at work?

cheeks