Cook's Illustrated

[james]

I bought the newsstand copy of Cook's Illustrated, and really enjoyed it. These are the guys who have a "test kitchen" where they make the same recipe over and over until they get it right.

I have already done:

Better Mashed Potatoes
Crisp Roast Chicken
Roast Winter Vegetables
Tuscan Bean Stew (Ribollita)

and I still have a few more to look forward to.

The recipes work, and it's fun seeing the thought process behind the recipe. It even has sidebars on the Science of Cooking.

One other thing. They rated the Cuisinart mixer ($350) over the KitchenAid Pro 600 ($400).

I'm going to sign up for a subscription.
James

[BrianShaw]

Re: Cook's Illustrated

I've always enjoyed Christopher Kimball and his team. Sometimes they are a bit finnicky for my taste but always offer lots of good info and advice. I've had mixed luck with recipes in their books - some don't work well; others are simply FANTASTIC. His e-mail messages are frequent but informative and often quite cute (especially the "letter from Vermont" messages).

[gjbingham]

Re: Cook's Illustrated

I used to subscribe. Definitely a great mag. I let the subscription run out when I went to Japan. I should start that one up again!

[Ed_]

Re: Cook's Illustrated

We really enjoy Fine Cooking too, for whatever that's worth. Now and then we pick up Cuisine at Home, which has the attractive feature of having no advertising.

$0.02

-Ed

[PizzaPolice]

Re: Cook's Illustrated

I have the online subscription. The only problem with it is they bombard you with "sister subscriptions". Just when you think you have the key to the entire recipe vault, they pull the "Subscribe to our Country Home Kitchen recipes" bit.
So... take it with a grain of salt ...over your left shoulder.

[Dutchoven]

Re: Cook's Illustrated

We subscibed to both Cooks Illustrated and Cuisine at Home...liked both but ultimately went with the latter...you can by the compendiums from CI...got one of those ar Christmas
My $0.02 and the salt
Dutch

[Xabia Jim]

Re: Cook's Illustrated

They're a good reference and you can buy them in volumes by year too!

I've seen them on EBAY.....