Recipe Madness

Every week when I make my grocery list, I give a passing glance at all of my cookbooks, and then proceed to plan on making the same things that I make every week. I really think I’m the least creative cook on the planet.

The thing is, I have nearly 75 cookbooks on the two bookshelves I have in my kitchen. In addition to my cookbooks, I subscribe to a monthly cooking magazine, all copies of which I keep on a bookshelf in my bedroom rather than throwing them away. As if this isn’t enough, I have electronic recipe boxes on allrecipes.com and foodnetwork.com, both which are full of recipes. And whenever a new and interesting cookbook is published, I get it from the library. I think I’ve got a mental illness!

I love cookbooks. I can sit literally for hours and peruse a cookbook. I was positively giddy with happiness when my mother-in-law offered me her old Joy of Cooking last time we visited her. Joy of Cooking tells you how to do EVERYTHING. In addition to telling you how to clean a fish and cut up a chicken, it explains how to prepare wildfowl, from plucking it of its feathers to hanging it up to tenderize. Here is an actual excerpt from Joy of Cooking:

…(P)roper care immediately after shooting determines the ultimate excellence of flavor in wild birds. While the bird is still warm the neck is split and the carcass bled. To keep the blood for use in sauces, see 339. Check the neck for any undigested food and remove it.

Some birds ….. are cooked with the trail still inside, see 440. Although quail and a few other smaller birds should be plucked, drawn and cooked within 24 hours of killing, it is important in general not to pluck or draw any wildfowl until you are ready to cook it, since the added surface exposure of the carcass to air will induce spoilage….. .

To tenderize and improve flavor, it is advisable to hang many wild birds…. . How long to hang depends first on age….. A second consideration is the weather. In muggy periods, ripening is accelerated…..However long birds are to be hung, suspend them, undrawn, by the feet in a cool, dry, airy place.

I doubled-checked our homeowners’ association guidelines, and found nothing that prohibits me from cutting and hanging wild game from the patio overhang in my backyard. That’s good to know in case my husband suddenly decides he wants to serve wild turkey for Thanksgiving this year.

But I digress. My point is, with so many cookbooks, so many recipes, so many options to make interesting and imaginative things, shame on me for serving baked chicken thighs with olive oil and lemon juice almost weekly.

So I have made a resolution. Starting immediately, I will serve at least one meal from one of my recipe sources each week. I will choose a different source each time.

Last night I prepared Shrimp and Chorizo Stew from the Food Network Magazine, and it was absolutely scrumptious. I cut the recipe in half, and cooked it in my little 2-1/2 quart cast iron Dutch oven that I bought at IKEA last time we were in Phoenix.

My husband, (who, whenever I ask him what he would like to have for dinner, will always request some sort of a sandwich – ugh) seemed to enjoy every bite.

I will not, however, dress a deer in my back yard, no matter what.