Fix-it and forget-it cookbooks

[janiebug]

I have 5 different ones including a slow cooker one. Couldn't live (or cook) without them!!GREAT COOKBOOKS!

[Rozzer]

Hey, janiebug, I guess you've moved along and are no longer here. That's a shame. But I too have a treasured "fix-it-and-forget-it" cookbook (and cookbook author) to recommend. Her name is Jacqueline Heriteau, she's French-American and she has published quite a number of cookbooks. The one we've had for years, and have never once been deceived by, is her The Best of Electric Crockery Cooking, published by Grosset & Dunlap (yes, publishers do mean something). Her recipes are very consistently easy, delicious and sophisticated. I'm a big crockpot fan, and this lady knows how to use a crockpot in a wonderfully French way. Which makes sense, since she's French, married to an American and living in America.

And no, French people, male or female, are not "automatically" better cooks than Americans in my experience (though they may think so). But serious French cooks from serious French cooking families and backgrounds do have "food insights" that I've found well worthwhile listening to. The reason? Easy. French people are (like Italian people and Chinese people) truly serious about eating. And to my mind, that's what counts.

I had an uncle like that. The man lived to eat, and only to eat. He worked hard and was a good family man, but everything else faded into nothingness when dinnertime came around. Then after his open-heart surgery he was told he couldn't eat this and he couldn't eat that. And he just faded away and died. A jolly fellow all his life, kind and gracious, when they took away his food he just faded away and died. Goes to show, I guess.