recursion

Having just prepared my first Thanksgiving turkey from its august pages, I browsed the Amazon.com listing for the New Joy of Cooking unaware that I was descending into a malestrom of criticism. I did not know how significantly the cookbook had been revised from Marion Rombauer Becker's final 1975 edition. Many recipies and entire sections were dropped. Some of this was for the better, as the reciepies were updated for today's (OK, 1997's) more healthy attitudes. Many ethnic recipies were added as well.

However, the 1975 edition is apparently a Bible of sorts for many people, who are distraught at the recipies omitted from the 1997 edition, the faddish nature of some of the new content, the harder-to-read typeface, and the elimination of Irma and Marion's personal style. (Fortunately for these people, the 1975 edition is still available. I find myself tempted to pick it up, along with another recommended cookbook, How to Cook Everything.)

But I found this review most amusing:

The "Joy of Cooking" (affectionately know by some as "Irma") is a wonderful collection of recipes, terms and techniques. However, I found it to be sadly incomplete.

For example, there is no recipe for baking hash brownies. Now, I've known that this recipe has been widely available since, at least, the late '60's. But is it in this book? No, sirreee. Of course, an accomplished cook could improvise on the basic brownie recipe (p. 645), but I'm a beginner, and not always clear thinking, so a more complete set of recipes would have been very helpful.