Keeping cookbooks that spark joy

This month is National Cookbook Month, an ideal time, my wife "suggested," for me to pare down my cookbook collection, numbering in the hundreds.

Tired of seeing cookbooks not just in burgeoning bookcases, but all over the house, she reasoned that since we are staying home due to the pandemic I'd have plenty of time to tackle the job.

She was right, but even with all that time, trying to determine which of my cookbooks were essential and should be kept and which could be gotten rid of was not an easy task.

To be sure, some decisions were easy. After all, many of my cookbooks I've had for years and use often. They remind me of the one described by food writer Bee Wilson, a volume with "so many food stains it could probably be boiled and served as soup." Those I kept.

Other decisions were not easy. Do I need an Oreo cookbook containing dozens of recipes using the crushed cookie as an ingredient, none of which rival simply eating a couple of Oreos with a glass of milk? No. Do I need a cookbook devoted entirely to polenta? Probably not. Do I need a half dozen books on pie? Well, yes, actually.

Blitzkuchen or lightning cake, one of the many reasons why the Joy of Cooking has been the quintessential American cookbook for almost one hundred years.Submitted by Tom Harte

My idea of essential cookbooks is admittedly idiosyncratic. Besides all those pie cookbooks, I'd definitely pick Anne Bryn's beautiful "American Cake," a chronology of recipes spanning the last 350 years or so; Toronto pastry chef Regan Daley's marvelous "In the Sweet Kitchen," which contains my favorite frosting recipe, a fabulous coffee meringue buttercream; every book I have by Ina Garten, Dorie Greenspan, and Donna Hay (the Australian Martha Stewart); plus the classic "Silver Palate" cookbook.

These books are essential to me, but they might not be to everyone. Yet there is one book that I suspect most cooks would not want to be without, a truly essential cookbook. Julia Child thought so. She called it "the one book of all cookbooks in English that I would have on my shelf if I could have but one." She was talking about the "Joy of Cooking."

I've acquired several different editions of "Joy" over the years, and they are staying on my bookshelf, joined by the latest version, published last year. I believe it is the best in the book's almost 100-year history. It was lovingly put together over nine years of recipe testing by John Becker, the great-grandson of Irma S. Rombauer, the original author, and his wife, Megan Scott.

The "Joy of Cooking" is something of the odd duck in cookbook publishing. It's a general interest book, has virtually no glossy photographs, and it was not written by a celebrity. But it has endured for decades, selling like hotcakes, some 20 million copies to date. That's because for beginning and experienced cooks alike it is an encyclopedic source of culinary information. Moreover, its authors treat readers not as pupils, but as friends. "Stand facing the stove" was Irma's first injunction to them.

Thus, what I learned from combing through my stacks of cookbooks is that any list of essential culinary treatises should have the "Joy of Cooking" at the top. I also learned how, even in the internet age, there is still a place for cookbooks, the genre Joseph Conrad said has no other purpose than to "increase the happiness of mankind."

Blitzkuchen (Lightning Cake)

Called Lightning Cake because you can make it in a flash, this recipe is adapted from the current edition of the Joy of Cooking, but goes back to the original, published in 1931.

• 1 stick butter
• 1 cup sugar
• 3 eggs
• 1 tablespoon grated lemon zest
• 2 tablespoons lemon juice
• 1 cup flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 cup sliced almonds
• 4 teaspoons sugar

Cream butter and sugar until fluffy. Beat in eggs one at a time, then beat in lemon zest and juice. Whisk together flour, baking powder, and salt. Stir into butter mixture just until combined. Transfer to greased and floured 8-inch cake pan. Combine almonds and sugar and sprinkle evenly over top. Bake at 350 degrees for 30 to 35 minutes or until cake tests clean. Cool 10 minutes and dust top with powdered sugar.