A Quote by Alicia Silverstone

One of the things that often frustrates me with cookbooks is that there are one or two recipes that are really good and the rest of them are not so great. — © Alicia Silverstone
One of the things that often frustrates me with cookbooks is that there are one or two recipes that are really good and the rest of them are not so great.
I have one room off my kitchen filled with nothing but cookbooks and recipes that are sent to me from around the world. Every two years, I have to go through them and pick out ones to send to the local schools. There's a need for books, especially cookbooks.
When I first started writing cookbooks, I remember thinking to myself, what makes me think I can write a cookbook? There are these great chefs who are really trained. And, as I started, I realized, actually, what is my lack is actually exactly right, because I can connect with - cooking's hard for me. I never worked on... And that's why my recipes are really simple, because I want to be able to do them.
I'm a fan of the hand-me-down recipes - friends, family, bake sales, community cookbooks - those are the recipes that have withstood the test of time and fed many hungry fans.
I have strong feelings about cookbooks because I am a lover of them and student of them and devourer of them and collect them. I find them to be a great source of inspiration. When I was a cook and not making much money, I always used to spend most of what I had on cookbooks.
I love cookbooks. I certainly have my fair share at home, but I'm a really funny cookbook person: I don't really ever cook out of cookbooks. I like cookbooks for the commentary or the pictures or the history.
As far as cookbooks go, I think Joy of Cooking is a classic. I've used it over and over again. Julia Child frustrates me. By the time you get all her herbs together, you're exhausted
Cookbooks hit you where you live. You want comfort; you want security; you want food; you want to not be hungry and not only do you want those basic things fixed, you want it done in a really nice, gentle way that makes you feel loved. That's a big desire, and cookbooks say to the person reading them, 'If you will read me, you will be able to do this for yourself and for others. You will make everybody feel better.'
We believe in the wrong things. That's what frustrates me the most. Not the lack of belief, but the belief in the wrong things. You want meaning? Well, the meanings are out there. We're just so damn good at reading them wrong.
I love the 'Barefoot Contessa' cookbooks - they're so nicely done, and her recipes are beautiful and simple.
My passion for writing cookbooks really came from my love of collecting cookbooks.
The wonderful police officers who spend time with me I don't think appreciate that, but I do still drive. I do still cook: not often, but just last week, I really felt like making one of my mum's old recipes - so I did. I do still go to our local department store to buy things like maternity jeans that no one else can really do for me.
There was no Internet, not even many cookbooks except the old reference books. So we would sit down at night, a group of six chefs, and we'd exchange recipes and each talk about how we were doing things. It was the only way to learn new ideas.
Everything is tested in my little kitchen. The recipes are mine and that's really important to me. When I do a cookery show I know these recipes really well, because every recipe I've ever published has been tested by my kids.
If you can find two poems in a book, it could be a pretty good book for you. You know, two poems you really like. There are some poets who are fairly big names in contemporary poetry and who write a book and I might like three or four poems in the book, but the rest of them don't appeal to me personally; but I think that's the way it really ought to be. I think it's really a rare thing to like everything that somebody has written.
I often write into recipes techniques that I learned in the restaurant kitchen. There are ways of organizing your prep and so on that are immensely useful. Those are woven into all the recipes I do.
It's really great to see the queer landscape really change to include everybody and make the rest of the world understand that we're not just one or two things. There's so much about the queer community that needs to be represented.
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