I love used book sales
Besides some routine "good reads" (Saving Fish from Drowning by Amy Tan, The Kite Runner, & 45 Fine & Fanciful Hats to Knit by Anna Zilbourg) I found this for a dollar:
and I had a Faulkner-rama
but the real treasure, and I'm guessing only a small group would recognize this, was:
A copy of "The Modern Family Cookbook" by Meta Given. The paper is coarse and the few photos are less than slick, but these spare photos were the wistful culinary dreams of my youth. Within its bland gray exterior are the bread-pudding tastes of comfort, the caramels & divinity of Christmas and my birthday and I forget what all. (In grade school, one of the benefits of having a birthday near Christmas when your mother is a queen of candymaking is getting to take in extra special treats like sugar-shocking divinity AKA sea foam. The detriment is hardly anyone notices.) No Better Homes & Gardens plaid, no Betty Crocker red, no Joy of Cooking blue, this was my mother's basic cookbook for those things that required a cookbook. Several years ago I was thrilled when my sister found a cache of a few copies and gave me one. Still, I couldn't pass up the chance for a spare. I do this. If I really love a book, I can't pass up a chance at a cheap second copy. You never know who might need The Sparrow or Under the Tuscan Sun or A Year In Provence ... or The Modern Family Cookbook. ( My copies of Moby Dick have grown to a downright collection... I just love Starbuck.)
posted by Gail | 9:24 AM
1 Comments:
I finally broke down and started using my "new" copy of Meta Givens. The old one was in almost unreconizable shape and I figured if my new one lasts as long as the old one did I won't need to worry about wearing it out. Besides, all the old favorites from that book now reside on my computer and I generally use the book for "special" things because it is still just about the most dependable cookbook I've ever used.
It is also the first cookbook I ever owned and I take special delight in the fact that it doesn't contain any microwave or diet recipes.
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