I’m an avid American cook, but not an inventive one. Hence, one wall of my central Arkansas dining room is lined with cookbooks in a tower of shelves. It’s my cookbook wall, and it’s full of treasured volumes that date back several decades. If a cookbook proves its worth by being the source of at least several recipes worth making again, it stays put. Duds are donated to the local public library for used book sales. I’ve acquired many more keepers than duds, and space is tight amid the shelves. When one of my daughters asked me for the hummus recipe (see my first post here), it made me think: How will my kids ever find anything among these hundreds of books? So I started a blog to point out the treasures.

(All recipes have been adapted to reflect my cooking preferences. Sources are always properly credited, but the instructions and any other ingredient changes are in my own words.  Any mentions of specific products are because I like them. I have no sponsors, and companies mentioned know me only as a customer.)

If you’re reading this and don’t happen to be one of my two daughters, then please look for these great cookbooks at your bookstore or library. Some of them are out of print, but many are still being published or can be found through second-hand sources. And some are brand new, because my cookbook-buying habit knows no bounds. My girls can come over and borrow a copy off the cookbook wall, if they promise to put it back where they found it.

Photographs are by me unless noted otherwise.

—  Kath Hale

© 2017 by Kath Hale