I have a ton of cookbooks. Maybe not 101 Cookbooks, but I counted the other day and there are definitely 70+. I love reading about food almost as much as eating (okay, well maybe not quite that much).

But how many cookbooks do I actually use? Sad to say, it’s actually a pretty short list of our “go-to” books, with only occasional side-trips to the other many books on the shelf. And I’m finding that even more so now that I’m trying to report in regularly on our meals… lots of repetitive references.

So, without further ado… books that keep ending up on the kitchen counter instead of on the shelf:

• All About Braising: The Art of Uncomplicated Cooking
• How To Cook Everything: Simple Recipes for Great Food
• Mark Bittman’s Kitchen Express: 404 inspired seasonal dishes you can make in 20 minutes or less
• Bones: Recipes, History, and Lore
• Perfect Scoop: Ice Creams, Sorbets, Granitas, and Sweet Accompaniments
• Baking

And the most commonly used magazines… recent issues of Fine Cooking, Real Simple, Gourmet (ok, becoming less and less recent), and Bon Appetit.

Watch this space for more experimentation with recipes from all of these sources — and the rest of the books pictured. (Maybe not the Alinea cookbook… Carol’s got that under control).