Paper Palate

Between the years of 1880 and 1924, some two million Eastern European and Russian Jews immigrated to the United States to escape from pogroms, poverty, and mandatory conscription in the Russian Army. They settled in many parts of the country, many ending up in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
Native Milwaukean Lizzie Black Kander was one of the […]

For the past month I’ve been trying to write this review of Laurie Colwin’s Home Cooking and More Home Cooking, two of my all-time favorite books on food and cooking. Why am I having so much trouble? Because I’m afraid that nothing I write can do justice to the wonderful experience that is […]

Looking for the perfect Mother’s Day gift? Here are some recent cookbooks that might just fit the bill.
The Gourmet Cookbook: More than 1000 recipes, Edited by Ruth Reichl (Houghton Mifflin, 2004)
If your mother considers herself to be a true chef, The Gourmet Cookbook is a must have. For sixty years […]

Not being familiar with slow cooking, I thought it would be more helpful if I tested at least three recipes from Not Your Mother’s Slow Cooker Cookbook before I rated it. I decided to make things from different categories so I could get a feel for the range of the book. I chose […]

I’ve always been intrigued with the idea of slow cookers. You throw everything into the pot in the morning, turn it on and leave it alone all day while it cooks your dinner. But I never really knew how to use it for that purpose. I’ve used my slow cooker to cook […]

The Good Housekeeping Illustrated Cookbook found its way into my house the way many best-loved pets find their way into people’s lives—it was a stray. I was working at the Austin Public Library in Texas at the time. We could order books at a discount through our distributor. Once a year they […]

My love affair with cookbooks started when, as a young girl, I discovered my older sister’s copy of Betty Crocker’s Cook Book for Boys and Girls. I went through it page by page countless times, mesmerized by words like sift, blend, chop and mince. I fell in love with the pictures of Pigs […]