Two New (To Me) Cookbooks, And Where I Have Been

I'm not much of a cookbook person, but I have to say, I am so excited about my two new cookbooks! Nic gave me The Flavor Bible for my birthday, and I couldn't resist picking up How to Cook Everything when I saw it on super-sale at Costco. I read Mark Bittman's blog, and after much consideration decided that this was the perfect all-purpose, general reference cookbook which my small cookbook collection was lacking. (Sorry Joy of Cooking, you're just too old-fashioned for a modern girl like me. No offense.) All I have had time for so far is a quick scan of both, but I'm sure you will hear me (or rather read) reference these two books a lot in the coming months. What I like about both of them so much is that they are more general reference and less specific "have-to-follow-exactly" recipes, so they allow for a lot of creativity and flexibility.

I know I haven't been a very good blogger this week, and I know this is kind of cheating for a post, but I have mostly been remaking some of the holiday goodies that I posted last week for more packages for coworkers and friends. And this weekend I will be doing it all a third time for the family I will see on Christmas. I have made second batches of the candied pecans and almonds, both types of marshmallows, and the fudge--but this time I added 3/4 cup of dried cranberries, which made this SO much better. (I'll put a little note on the original post.) I am going to try out a few new goodie recipes for the rest of my packages tonight, if time permits, so those should be coming up soon. And eventually I will get back to cooking (and posting about) real food.