Thursday, December 20, 2012

great numbers this week


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That cookbook post was cookin'!

Monday, December 17, 2012

fun on a monday

without further ado....

book cart drill teams!

http://bookriot.com/2012/12/16/book-cart-drill-team-further-proof-that-librarians-kick-ass/

Thursday, December 13, 2012

Cookbooks


Our next meeting will be Wednesday, February 13th at 9am at the GARDENDALE LIBRARY to discuss Fiction of Choice.

What a treat (pun SO intended)!  Our meeting today was for the discussion of cookbooks.  Not only did we all leave with some good ideas, but we also got to see some of the outstanding vintage/rare cookbooks in the Southern History department of the Birmingham Public Library downtown.  Cookbooks proclaim their utility in their very name, but did you also know that they are useful for genealogists and historians?  True story.  Mary Anne found a great article for us that appeared in Vol. 8 #10 (pg. 3) of Yore Lore, the newsletter of the Baldwin County (AL) Genealogical Society titled “Genealogy from a….Cookbook?”



The items from BPL’s vintage/rare collection that we were privileged to see and handle include:

Cooking with a “Southern” Flair---The Vintage and Historic Cookbooks of the Southern History Department

Cookbooks can be valuable sources of historic, genealogical, and literary information. Sometimes they can even be used for cooking!

Here are some examples of cookbooks from our Southern History Department:
Compiled and edited by Lily May Spaulding and John Spaulding
Godey’s Lady’s Book was a 19th-century magazine that dealt with everything from food to fashion. An interesting aspect of this cookbook is that, as the editors point out, some “army” recipes are included; food shortages forced soldiers to be creative if they were to have anything to eat at all. Or there’s the attitude toward oatmeal: today it’s a health food, but then it was seen as only good for very small children or for invalids.

The Kentucky housewife by Lettice Bryan ; with a new introduction by Bill Neal
The original edition was from 1839 and contains “nearly thirteen hundred full receipts.” Mrs. Bryan’s introduction urges us to “shun the deleterious practices of idleness, pride, and extravagance, recollecting that neither of them constitutes the lady . . . examine frequently your cupboard and other household furniture, kitchen, smokehouse, and cellar, to see that every thing is in its proper place . . .”

Mme.Bégué's recipes of old New Orleans Creole cookery by Mme. Elizabeth Kettenring Bégué
Bégué’s was a famous restaurant in 19th-century New Orleans. It is referenced in the novel Saratoga Trunk by Edna Ferber; the beautiful Clio Dulaine insists on having breakfast in the restaurant because her mother has described it to her so many times during their exile in France.

Transcribed by Karen Hess with historical notes and copious annotations
Here’s some more of the full title: “ . . .being a Family Manuscript curiously copied by an unknown Hand sometime in the seventeenth century, which was in her Keeping from 1749, the time of her Marriage to Daniel Custis, to 1799, at which time she gave it to Eleanor Parke Custis, her granddaughter, on the occasion of her Marriage to Lawrence Lewis.” Some of the recipes and instructions could have been handed d own from the Elizabethan and Jacobean eras: e.g. “A Creame With Snowe” that is very similar to a recipe in an English cookbook from 1545.

By Ola Powell Malcolm
If your grandmother canned vegetables or made jams and jellies, she may have learned how from a book very much like this one. This edition is from 1930; the original publication date was 1917.
Detailed instructions plus lots of wonderful period photography and diagrams.

By Alexis Soyer
Modern . . . for 1850. A truly exhaustive (in all senses of the word) resource.

Culinary crinkles : tested recipes by the ladies of the Church of the Advent ; compiled by Mitylene Owen McDavid; Published by Unit No. 2 of the Women's Guild, Church of the Advent, c1919.
Check out the directions on “Husbands—How to Cook Them.”

This collection was compiled by author Lafcadio Hearn, known for his writing about New Orleans where he lived for ten years.

A collection of recipes known to have been used in Virginia in the 1700s and 1800s. It has been reprinted many times---page through some of it here:

Mobile cook book compiled by the Ladies Aid Society of Government Street Presbyterian Church. Mobile, Ala. : Patterson & Hawes, Power Print, c1884.
Contains a recipe for “Brain Cakes.” Talk about being thrifty and using every part of the animal!
Also many seafood recipes, as might be expected in a port city on the Gulf of Mexico.

The Savannah cook book; a collection of the old fashioned receipts from colonial kitchens; collected and edited by Harriet Ross Colquitt; with an introduction by Ogden Nash and decorations by Florence Olmstead.
From the introduction by poet Ogden Nash:
Pilgrim’s Progress is a good book, and so, I am told, is Deuteronomy,
But neither is to be compared with this epic of gastronomy . . .” 
If your cookbook rates an intro by Ogden Nash, you have arrived. Check out the entry on the Take One Cookbook blog, complete with a recipe for Chatham Artillery Punch. Try it if you dare:
As a co-worker put it, “not for people who have liver or insulin . . . challenges.”

That’s only a small sample of our cookbooks---come and browse. Let us know how your cooking turns out. And if you write a cookbook, donate a copy to the BPL collection!

Here are the books the rest of us brought to the table:

Weight Loss Surgery Cookbook for Dummies by Brian K. Davidson, David Fouts, and Karen Meyers.
This book is super useful on a couple of fronts.  Not only are the recipes healthy and nutritious, they are small batch.  For those of us (and I’m mostly speaking of myself) who may have difficulty reducing recipes, small batch recipes are great but hard to find in regular cookbooks.  Since this cookbook is designed for people who’ve had bariatric surgery, the batch size is perfect.  There’s even a section in the back for cooking for one or two people.  Desserts and appetizers are featured as well.  In addition to the recipes, there is also valuable pre- and post-surgery lifestyle advice and information which I have found invaluable.  Overall, a great book on many levels.
Holley, Emmet O’Neal

Samuel, BPL Business/Science/Technology

Samuel, BPL Business/Science/Technology

The Auburn Cookbook by Fariss Prickett (c1969)
Gina, Gardendale

Gina, Gardendale

Patrick, Leeds

Patrick, Leeds

Jon, Avondale

Jon, Avondale


HONORABLE MENTIONS

The Italian Slow Cooker by Michele Scicolone
The French Slow Cooker by Michele Scicolone
The cookbook resulting from the recent Year of Alabama Food, Alabama Food: Classic Dishes, Restaurants and Chefs.  The only place I found online offering it for sale was the Birmingham News.

What is popular in libraries these days?

Books by people writing cooking blogs
Bite-sized desserts and appetizers
Anything published by Southern Living

Here is a bookmark created by staff at the Hoover Library

Monday, December 10, 2012

Meeting, this week!

The Reader's Advisory Roundtable meets this week on Wednesday, December 12th at 9am in the Southern History Dept of the Birmingham Public Library downtown.  We'll be discussing cookbooks and viewing selections from BPL's vintage cookbook collection.  This is also our annual Holiday Potluck so, if possible, bring a small dish to share.

RA Roundtable is geared towards adult services staff, but everyone is welcome!
Holley

Monday, December 3, 2012

Meeting next week


Good morning fellow JCLCers!  This is your official Friendly Reminder that the RA Roundtable will be meeting next Wednesday, December 12 at 9am AT THE BIRMINGHAM PUBLIC LIBRARY DOWNTOWN and it's going to be spectacular!  This is our annual holiday potluck, so please bring a small dish to share.

We'll be discussing cookbooks, and as an extra special treat, we'll be meeting in Southern History at the Birmingham Public Library where we'll get a look at their vintage cookbook collection.  This area does tend to be on the cool side so wear layers and the BPL parking lot tends to fill quickly in the mornings, so an early arrival may be a good idea.

RART is geared towards adult services staff but everyone is welcome!
Holley