(Part 2) Best herb, spice & condiment cooking books according to redditors

$19 here in the states

The Botanical Bible: Plants, Flowers, Art, Recipes & Other Home Uses https://www.amazon.com/dp/1419732234/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_VeWBCbD2MCME3

$35 on amazon???? SO TEMPTING!!!


The Botanical Bible: Plants, Flowers, Art, Recipes & Other Home Uses https://www.amazon.ca/dp/1419732234/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_nbVBCbBYMBMJE

UPDATE: mine just came in the mail https://i.imgur.com/aASc0yv.jpg

For everyone interested in curry, I absolutely love this book.

It's separated by region/country, and each section starts off with a simple list of ingredients that you'll be using throughout, and instructions for the base of each curry. Each recipe then refers to one of those and expands upon it with all the goodies. It also lists which pre-canned curries and portions of coconut milk to use if you don't feel like building your curries from scratch.

It even has a "Curries in the UK" section for all your Westernized curry needs.

NOt definitive but extremely informative and beautiful as a first time Indian wannabe cook.

https://www.amazon.com/Great-Curries-India-Camellia-Panjabi/dp/1904920357

Rick Stein's "India" television series and associated cook book may be the way to go.
I cook a lot of curries, but found that the recipes that Rick discovers in the T.V. series really helped me to get out of a rut.

Two recipes from the series/book that I can think of are:

1. First Class Railway Mutton Curry (Whilst the original recipe states "Mutton" - it will work with Lamb too.
   
2. Lamb Rogan Josh
   
   The book: Rick Steins' India - on Amazon
   
   If you can find the T.V. series, or the Youtube clips, it really helps to inspire.
   
   IIRC whilst Mutton refers to a sheep of around 2 years or older, in the india recipes, I believe that Mutton actually means goat.
   
   The series is watchable here
   
   I really recommend it - three months of travel and food discovery packed into 6 episodes. It'll inspire you and you can pick up all sorts of knowledge and advice, whilst being entertained.
   
   Remember, if you don't have a particular ingredient, you can often substitute for something similar - if you don't have dried kashmiri chillies - use another mild/hot chilli pepper. If you don't have red onions, white/brown onions are fine.
   
   I prefer basmati rice, it's so different to American Long Grain rice, but, if you're in a pinch - then long grain will suffice. No lamb? Try goat, beef, etc.
   
   In the series, Rick uses mustard oil for some recipes, but I substitute sunflower oil, or ghee, or coconut oil, depending upon the recipe. I might throw some mustard seeds in for good measure.
   
   No curry leaves? Perhaps try a bay leaf.
   
   Some ingredients are more essential though, you can't really substitute Cumin seed/powder, Turmeric, or coriander seed/powder.
   
   Most of my spices in my cupboard are whole seeds that I either use whole, or grind if powder is required. This seems to give a better flavour and longer shelf-life.
   
   Edit: The recipe for the Rogan Josh is about 20 minutes into episode 1 - no - it's actually Episode 6, I think that the episode naming/numbering is incorrect.
   

This book is pretty helpful for getting started. I've used mine to cook scallops, steak, and chicken, and used it cold to season melon and pineapple. I haven't tried chocolate or caramel yet, but I plan to.

Aight girl-

Foreign Cuisine-
How to Eataly - Oscar Farinetti - We made the most AMAZING brisket meatballs and a super simple yet completely delicious red sauce out of this book
Around My French Table - Dorie Greenspan - Where the Cornish hens and gougeres came from.
Real Korean Cooking - Maangchi - Korean Fried Chicken. We've made them twice now because they're so good and can't wait to do more.
Mexican Everyday - Rick Bayless - Learned how to make perfect guac from this book and so far we've made these v tasty chorizo/mushroom/potato tacos. The recipe is SO cheap and SO voluminous that we had it as a taco filling, a quesadilla filling, and we're making a hash with it for brunch this morning.
Every Grain of Rice - Fuchsia Dunlop - We haven't tried anything out of here yet but there are sooooo many good-looking recipes in here.
Entice with Spice - Shubhra Ramineni - Likewise, haven't made anything out of here yet but looking forward to trying it all out soon.
Jack's Wife Freda - Dean & Maya Jankelowitz - This is actually a book from a restaurant that my fiance and I LOVED when we last visited NYC. It's got a lot of fusion recipes. Mediterranean/Israeli/South African/etc. Really unique flavors and also v comfort-food based. We're making rosewater waffles out of this book tomorrow!


Baking-
Rose's Baking Basics - Rose Levy Barenbaum - This book is incredible. She has tons and tons of step-by-step photos which is SUPER helpful. We made the dark chocolate caramel tart out of this book, but pretty much everything in here looks amazing.
Modern Baking - Donna Hay - I mean... There is some INSANELY decadent looking stuff in here. We haven't tried any of these recipes yet but I can't wait to!


Misc-
Cook Like a Pro - Ina Garten - It was really hard to pick just one Ina book but I liked most of the recipes in this one. She has this ridic recipe for a dijon mustard chicken that is INCREDIBLE. Also, this bitch knows how to cook some veggies. Big fan of this one.
The Food Lab - /u/j_kenji_lopez-alt - I just love this guy, tbh. We've made a really fantastic beef tenderloin out of this book and an incredible red wine sauce to go with it and of course, his famous roasted potatoes which are now my holy grail recipe for roasted potatoes. This book is like a science textbook only instead of boring stuff it's FOOD science, which is my favorite kind.


Those were all the ones we purchased ourselves (though technically Eataly was a gift BUT we love it and plan to use it often.) We have other cookbooks in our stable that we've received as gifts, which is what resulted in my fiance and I deciding we wanted to embark on this journey. We kept being given cookbooks and never doing anything with them. But man, do people love it when you send them pics of stuff you cooked out of a book they gave you. If people give you cookbooks, use them!! It will make their day to see it's being used. Here's what else is on our cookbook shelf-


The Forest Feast Gatherings - Erin Gleeson - This is a vegetarian book my fiance's mom gave us a few years ago for Christmas. We have a bunch of veggie friends (and friends with a lot of different allergies) so we turn to this book to have a few things that are edible by all of them when we have them over, as we often do. This book has a really delicious salad that has pomegranate seeds, pear, and hazelnut that is out of this world good. I also got my HG salad dressing from this book.
The Salad Bowl - Nicola Graimes - Another gift from my fiance's mom. Is she trying to tell us something?? Honestly haven't looked much into this book yet but it sure is pretty.
The Unofficial Harry Potter Cookbook - Dinah Bucholz - This was a gift from the assistant in my office. Everyone in my office knows me as the Harry Potter girl because I have a lightning bolt tattoo, haha. We haven't made anything out of this yet, but we probably will have some sort of epic feast with recipes from this book when GoT starts back up later this year.
Talk About Good - Louisiana Lafayette Junior League - My boss gave this to my fiance and I as part of an engagement gift. My fiance went to school in New Orleans. It's primarily New Orleansian/Cajun food. Haven't made anything out of it yet, but we are looking forward to it.

And that's what's on our cookbook shelf for now.

edit also omg thanks for the gold!! <3

The recipe came from high times cannabis cook book https://www.amazon.com/Official-High-Times-Cannabis-Cookbook/dp/1452101337

i've been recently exploring the paneer section of 660 curries, and can definitely recommend it. it includes directions for making your own paneer, which i haven't tried yet but doesn't look too hard.

I had this book but loaned it to someone and never got it back.
https://www.amazon.com/Great-Chile-Book-Mark-Miller/dp/0898154286

I got the book Herbs & Spices: the cook's reference by Jill Norman.

Haven't really used it though. How did you find out which herbs & spices fit a specific dish best or how to vary them effectively?

How do you deal with spices that lost a bit of aroma compared to when you first bought them?

I've been on the BBQ train for some time now. As a New Orleans native living in Michigan, it's hard to find good smoked meats up here, so you end up having to do it for yourself. And every time we throw a shindig, that's really all that gets requested.

My suggestions are as follows:

Franklin Barbecue
I love this book. It's not a recipe book, although it has a few basic ones in the back. He tells the story of how he came to BBQ, and then breaks down each individual aspect of BBQ process. You'll learn a lot.

Herbs and Spices
This book is really more fun than anything else. It's essentially wikipedia for herbs and spices, but there's so much in it that you can always come back and find something new.

The best advice I can give you is to never stop trying something new. When I first got in to BBQ/Grilling, I went to Amazon and bought a mess-load of books for $1-2 a piece about the basics, recipes, processes, and ideologies. Bobby Flay was my first read. I've strayed away from him now that I have my own style. And that's a phrase you'll here a lot among people. "Style". I wouldn't worry too much about it. Just light a fire and put some meat on it. Worst case scenario. You've got cooked meat.

Try smoking a Turkey with a Cajun rub (that you make, don't use prepackaged Cajun rubs) over hickory or apple wood. Patience and eventually it'll all be second nature too you.

Welcome to the game.

I like allrecipes.com too... found many good recipes on there that were easy to veganize.

Also You won't believe it's vegan and Sriracha Vegan cookbook are great cookbooks.

When looking for inspiration for Indian food I always reach for Raghavan Iyer's 660 Curries or Monisha Bharadwaj's The Indian Cooking Course.

The latter has become a house favourite. We ended up buying 5 extra copies to gift friends and family.

Go buy this book from Amazon. It is AMAZING if you are looking for food pairings that scientifically taste great.

The Flavor Matrix


Disclaimer: I have no association or affiliation with the author other than buying his book. I learned about it from Kenji @seriouseats.

Fire and Spice is a great vegan cookbook. The recipes are good enough to satisfy non-veg folks, too.

1. I have too many stories! My most recent is of my kitty Sagan who we rescued off the street. We found him on the side of the road cuddling with a bunny! Such a cutie! He had a broken leg that the vet told us would have to be amputated, a huge gouge under his eye, his tail was completely broken and he couldn't move or feel it, all of the fur was missing on his butt, and he was soooo skinny! Today, a little more than a year later, he's completely healed and can feel and move his tail, his eye never scarred, and his leg is completely perfect! We wouldn't let the vet amputate it and it healed by itself! <3 Here's [an album] (http://imgur.com/a/w1Ur5) of Sagan pictures, in chronological order so you can see him growing up <3 When I was eight, I rescued a golden retriever that was in the freeway being hit by cars. He was clearly abused before we found him because he couldn't be anywhere near men and if you ever played roughly with friends - like rough housing or pillow fights - he would freak out and try to stop it. Let's see, I've also rescued a duck that was strangled by fishing line and dying, a box of bunnies that someone threw into a dumpster, a mouse that neighborhood boys were throwing rocks at, a horse that was abused, a tarantula that was drowning in a pool, a ferret that was malnourished and the best ferret in the world, I could honestly keep going, the list is sooo long! And I love talking about it, so just ask if you're curious about more rescue stories :D Rescuing animals is sort of my hobby <3 If they're in need, I help!
   
   
2. My favorite vegan food is pancakes! I make some bomb thick and fluffy pancakes! I've never been able to get the "cheese" right on on pizza...maybe you can share a good recipe/brand of cheese for that?!
   
   
3. I want [this cookbook] (http://www.amazon.com/Vegan-Fire-Spice-Sultry-Recipes/dp/0980013100/ref=wl_it_dp_o_pC_nS_nC?ie=UTF8&colid=O3UEPU3FWTW3&coliid=I37GUOH8GOL22V) so so so SOOOO bad!!!! I'm all about the spicy foods, the spicier the better, and it's going to be a great way to make my roommate go vegan too! If you buy it used, it's only $4! And then I think $4 for shipping also, so about $8.00 altogether. I would be so so soooo happy with this vegan cookbook! <3
   
   
4. hugarabbitday

This book and a few bottles.

Some of my favourites:

• The Indian Cooking Course (Monisha Bharadwaj)
  
  
• Made in India (Meera Sodha)
  
  
• Fresh India (Meera Sodha, note: completely vegetarian recipes)
  
  
• I Love Curry (Anjum Anand)
  
  Note: The authors are all British-Indians.

yes this one Salted: A Manifesto on the World's Most Essential Mineral, with Recipes, it's a really excellent book on salt.

660 Curries is an excellent book for learning about the "bases" for Indian cooking and curries. Iyer does a great job of laying out several of the basic spice blends that are used and referring to those in each of his recipes. He also gives good information about how to make the onion base that is used in many curries.

There are two books I highly recommend you check out. One is called "The Flavor Bible" ( https://www.amazon.com/Flavor-Bible-Essential-Creativity-Imaginative-ebook/dp/B001FA0P86/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=the+flavor+bible&qid=1565833128&s=gateway&sr=8-1 ) and the other is "Herbs and Spices -- The Cook's Reference" ( https://www.amazon.com/Herbs-Spices-Recipes-Marinades-Spice/dp/1465435980/ref=sr_1_3?keywords=herbs+and+spices%2C+the+cook%27s+reference&qid=1565833243&s=gateway&sr=8-3 )

They'll help you learn how all the senses and flavors work together to extract the maximum enjoyment of food.

Also, try recipes from other people! As you become proficient with cooking in general and learn more about flavor combinations, you'll be able to try a recipe and think of ways to improve it and make it your own. Try different and unusual cooking methods. Ignore convention (I made a coconut cream pie on a barbecue smoker recently. It was awesome!) Don't be afraid to mess up, just don't experiment when you're having people over. :)

The main thing is to get in the kitchen and keep the beginning sentence "I wonder how it would taste if I..." in your head.

Have fun!

some other books:

https://www.amazon.com/Complete-Chile-Pepper-Book-Preserving/dp/1604695803

https://www.amazon.com/Peppers-Americas-Remarkable-Capsicums-Forever/dp/0399578927

I gave my brother (who is a great cook) this book for Christmas, along with a jar of Himalayan salt. There is a section (IIRC) on grilling on a salt slab. It looked like a fascinating book and had information on more varieties of salt than I even knew existed.

You need to use ripe chiles. Pull out the seed balls and let them dry, then remove the seeds. Superhots like yours need a little higher germination temperature, around 26-32C, so wet them down between layers of paper towels and keep them on a plate in a warm place, such as on a hot water heater, radiator or other appliance. Once the seeds have germinated, they don't require such high temps for growth; 20-23C will be fine.

After each seed germinates, I like to transfer it to a peat pellet. These are nice because when it becomes time to transplant to a bigger pot, you just place the whole peat pot in the new pot. Low transplant shock.



You can get the ebook version of Ruppenthal's How to Grow Tomatoes, Peppers, and Eggplant for $1.

Bosland & DeWitt's The Complete Chile Pepper Book is also a good choice.

Start them indoors; you'll need a grow light. Put the plants out on your balcony in the spring after the last danger of frost is past.

Check out the Food Lab, might not be AS technical as you'd like but it is along the lines of what you're talking about

https://www.amazon.com/Food-Lab-Cooking-Through-Science-ebook/dp/B00TG24C34/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1549666085&sr=1-1&keywords=the+food+lab

Also, something was done with Watson and flavor profiles. Highlighted in this book:

https://www.amazon.com/Flavor-Matrix-Science-Ingredients-Extraordinary/dp/0544809963/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1549666129&sr=1-1&keywords=flavor+matrix

I received The Complete Chile Pepper Book: A Gardener's Guide to Choosing, Growing, Preserving, and Cooking for Christmas and read it cover to cover. It's not as cook-booky as the Noma book but it goes into the history of peppers along with some how-tos on breeding and growing.

I actually double checked the Amazon listing to be sure. The line is so neat because it was between two other books on the shelf.

i love frozen veggies for this reason. Cruciferous greens are particularly healthy and easy to prepare. For a quick meal I saute a small mountain of greens in evoo, and garlic, throw in a handful of pre-shredded carrots and whatever odds and ends I have in my fridge, and serve over either sweet potato or chickpeas.

For brussels sprouts, this recipe is amazing (scroll down to Editorial Reviews).

The best advice I've heard is to eat a colorful diet, which ensures you're including a wide variety of fruits and veggies in your diet.

opal

Thank you for the contest :)

The Chili Pepper Book on my Book Wishlist

I haven't read all of the comments, so someone my have mentioned this but; buy some cook books! There are 1000's out there but here are a few decent ones:

​

Ingredient is a great book for understanding how different things interact and change each other

​

Salt to taste is one of my personal favorites, and has a wealth of knowledge, it offers insight on improvisation and may be one to get down the line

​

The Food Lab is a great book for base knowledge, it has tons of great recipes and it attacks them from a more methodical approach

​

There are tons of other great books out there, Escoffier, French Cooking with Julia Child, The Flavor Bible etc....

Anthony Bourdain's 'Les Halles' and Paul Bertolli's 'Cooking by Hand' will have special places in my heart. My personal most recent addition was 'Bottom of the Pot'

This is in Marco Canora's cookbook, and it's pretty damn good.

You aren’t using enough bud or cooking the butter long enough. Use an ounce, and let it simmer (never boil) for 5 hours, stirring every 1.5 hours. Strain it through a cheese cloth, throwing away any solids, and let the butter sit in the fridge overnight. The top layer of butter will solidify. Use that and discard the rest of the water in the bowl.

ETA: if you vape, you can make butter with vaped weed. Just use two ounces of that instead and no need to decarb. The butter won’t taste as good, but it’s still pretty effective.

Edit #2: This cookbook will save your life: https://www.amazon.com/Herb/dp/1941758258?keywords=herb&qid=1537103381&sr=8-17&ref=sr_1_17

I have not made too many recipes out of this, but I have liked the ones I have and it sounds kind of like what you may be looking for:

http://www.amazon.com/Vegan-Fire-Spice-Sultry-Recipes/dp/0980013100

If you don't find yourself drawn to meat dishes, and you've got the basics of French technique down, why not try exploring Indian cuisine? Obviously, they have a whole different take on spices --- it's a whole different layer in your cooking that should teach you how to draw out different flavors from the same ingredients, learn new flavors, and different ways of combining them -- there was an interesting study recently suggesting that in contrast with most Western cuisines, which tend to put complementary flavors together, indian cuisine tend to combine contrasting flavors, balancing them against each other. The thing with a lot of that California farm-to-table style is that a lot of it's about finding great ingredients and doing as little as possible to them, but if you're finding yourself bored with that something that's a little more sophsticated and layered might be an interesting challenge.

There's lots of places to start -- Madhur Jaffrey, of course, or Manjula on youtube, but I've always liked this cookbook, myself --- 50 Great Curries of India. has a solid introductory section on spices and really showcases a huge variety of stuff from differnt parts of the continent.

If you want to try unusual or new combinations I can recommend The Flavor Matrix which shows combinations based on the similarity of the aroma molecules.

Try getting an accessible Curry cookbook like this one:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/1849905789/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1510993558&sr=8-1&pi=AC_SX236_SY340_FMwebp_QL65&keywords=rick+stein+curry&dpPl=1&dpID=51xt8LEM4AL&ref=plSrch

Making curries needs the right blend of ingredients. The Rick Stein versions are amazing

Speaking of sriracha, I have gotten a hell of a lot of mileage out of [this] (http://www.amazon.com/The-Veggie-Lovers-Sriracha-Cookbook-Rooster/dp/1607744600) cookbook. I have yet to be disappointed by a recipe, and I particularly loved the jamacian jerk sliders.

This guy does it quite well (it is in duch though)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sqts6y_2-bI

High times
http://www.hightimes.com/tag/recipes


http://www.amazon.com/Official-High-Times-Cannabis-Cookbook/dp/1452101337

If you are trying to make a dry chili POWDER to add to your chili recipe, I suggest reading the ingredients on the back of your favorite chili powder and then purchasing the WHOLE spices listed there.

Whole spices toasted and then ground provide tremendously more flavor than any factory ground spices.

I agree with the dried peppers comments - but don't soak them if you are making a chili powder. Simply toast the whole chiles in a dry skillet, let them cool and remove the seeds, stems and inner white ribs of each pepper. Grind the toasted skins into fresh single variety chili powder powder.

How to pick a chile variety? Research! https://www.amazon.com/Great-Chile-Book-Mark-Miller/dp/0898154286

High quality dried garlic and onion powders are also necessary for a good chile powder. Penzey's is a good source for those. Buy only what you need as spices lose their pungency as they age.

You'll most certainly need: Cumin and Corriander seeds. We usually start with a 2:1 ratio of the two for our chili powder mixes.

Have fun with it, spice mixing is like art!

Reading rainbow

I got the salt block, now I need the book.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1449430554/ref=cm_sw_r_awd_ZED1wbH0K5RRA

I like Pushpesh Pant, India: The Cookbook. However, it isn't a beginner's cookbook, and might be hard to get into if you haven't cooked Indian food before.

For a great beginner's cookbook: Monisha Bharadwaj, The Indian Cooking Course.

Not as comprehensive as the first one above, and not as beginner friendly as the second, but a nice cookbook with some very good recipes: Priya Wickramasinghe, Food of India.

I picked up a copy of The Complete Chile Pepper Book: A Gardener's Guide to Choosing, Growing, Preserving, and Cooking (https://www.amazon.com/dp/1604695803?ref=yo_pop_ma_swf)

It’s a nice little resource, but that’s coming from someone who is just starting to get into growing peppers as a hobby.

For free resources I really like Gary Pilarchik’s Rustic Garden YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/pilarchik

Also Khang Starr is another great free resource: https://www.youtube.com/user/KhangStarr010

Hope these help!

http://www.amazon.com/Herb-Mastering-Art-Cooking-Cannabis/dp/1941758258

I had to search for this one. Don't judge me! It looks like an interesting read!

silhouette!

BTW, was searching for plant memes and found this older post about a literal plant bible which seems highly praised.

Edit: wrong link

I use this book for easy recipes - also it's written with an american audience in mind with suggestions for shortcuts if necessary. I like books more than online recipes, so thought I'd suggest it.