Authors comments:

Cookbooks reflect everyone's differing styles. But I cannot imagine how some recipes get into some cookbooks. Are they jokes to see if anyone would really try this recipe if I included it? There are rules to determine if a cookbook is any good. Look at one or two recipes for food that you know how to make. If the recipe completely misses it, don't try it and there is no reason to assume that other recipes in the same book are any better. Also, if a recipe book has only three ingredients to make a dish, the author most likely does not know what they are writing about. The best food is very complex and this requires many ingredients. The best example is the original Paul Prudhome cajon cookbook. The gumbo and red beans and rice recipes have over a dozen ingredients. And those two recipes (and his praline recipe) are unsurpassed. I assume that the rest are most likely very good as well. They also are serious proof that the calorie is the best unit of measure of flavor. Like the time we tried to make the gumbo without the bacon that is called for. Melinda and I agreed that it just missed something and nothing I tried helped. Then I addred two tablespoons of bacon fat. Then it was perfect. I believe that eating healthy food does not help you live longer. It just seems like it. Like a month I spent one week in Dayton.

There are several styles of cookbooks for different audiences. There are serious cookbooks like the Diane Kennedy Mexican Food Cookbooks that are for people that like good mexican food and know it. There are other cookbooks like the "Mexico the Beautiful" cookbook that have decent recipes but great pictures of the country and of the food. And great writeups about the people in the region. But perhaps not serious recipes. Also, there are cookbooks from chefs that are famous like Rick Balis and Mark Miller that reflect foods of their famous restaurants (Frontera Grill and Cayote Cafe).