Cooking Through a Cookbook

Cooking through a cookbook is a fun adventure. My cookbook challenge this year is cooking through Smitten Kitchen Every Day and Night + Market.

A few years ago, I took on a year-long challenge of cooking as many recipes from the Smitten Kitchen Cookbook as possible. I ended up cooking 59 out of 105 recipes and recapped that experience in this post. At that point in my life, I didn’t know much about cooking and cooking through the cookbook helped me learn about new ingredients, practice new techniques, and overall, become more confident in the kitchen. With my success with the first cookbook, I had been eyeing the new Smitten Kitchen cookbook – Smitten Kitchen Every Day – that recently released, and my secret Santa was so kind to include it in my gift at the end of the year.

A few months ago, Boyfriend announced he impulsively bought a Thai cookbook because he heard an interview about it on NPR. (My public relations background is yelling SEE! DIRECT ROI ON PR!) “Oh great,” I, the Debbie Downer, thought, “something that is only going to take up space.” But when it came in the mail, we excitedly looked through it, recognizing dishes we had enjoyed during our Thailand trip.

So, we have some new cookbooks. Now what?

Pineapple Shrimp Fried Rice from Night + Market Cookbook

#CookbookChallenge This Year!

How many cookbooks do you have and how often do you use them? These days, I rely on blogs and food websites to give me recipes and ideas. Search for a recipe and you’ll likely find a handful, if not more, solid versions of the recipe. Cookbooks are beautiful to look at but for me, they collect dust more often than being used. I don’t like being wasteful and with these new cookbooks, I decided we go ALL IN, and that’s how my goal of cooking through Smitten Kitchen Every Day and Night + Market came about.

We’re going to try our best and make all 232 recipes by the end of this year.

If you’re doing the math in your head, that’s roughly 19 recipes a month and four recipes a week, a pretty tall task. There’s a slim chance we will truly make all the recipes but the fun is in the journey, right? We usually cook at home on weekdays, and there will be potlucks and co-workers who will devour sweet treats. 🙂

Nevertheless, we’ll have fun with these cookbooks. Smitten Kitchen Every Day has a strong variety of recipes, including recipes for every meal time and sections for cookies, tarts and pies, cakes, and puddings. Night + Market is all Thai recipes, though some feature other Asian flavors.

It’s an ambitious goal, I know, but in this journey, I know I’ll learn/re-learn a lot.

I’ll experiment with new ingredients.
I’ll make dishes of different cultures.
I’ll try out new cooking techniques and processes.
I’ll save money by cooking more at home instead of going out to eat.
I’ll find favorite recipes I’ll come back to for years.
I’ll share the experience with friends by hosting dinner parties or making things for gatherings.
I’ll become more comfortable with cooking.
I’ll have a boost of adventure and creativity!

It’s a commitment to cook through a cookbook, but when it comes to food, it feels more like a fun hobby than work. It also helps that Boyfriend is on board (or at least lovingly going along with my plans) for this adventure. Many times, we are cooking the recipes together or for timing reasons on weekdays, I prep them for him to execute. Cooking more at home AND bonding time – sounds like a win-win to me!

Blueberry Muffins from Smitten Kitchen Every Day

How I Keep Track of the Progress

My previous challenge included a Word Document list of all the recipes, and I crossed them out digitally, changing the number of recipes made manually.

This time around, I’m all about the SPREADSHEET. I have every recipe listed with a place to add the date I made it, the difficulty level, and any notes about the process or result. Most importantly, I’ve created it to automatically add up how many recipes I’ve made so far. #NerdAlert, I know, but it makes my organizational brain so happy.

Here’s a screenshot of the Smitten Kitchen Every Day spreadsheet. I added some arrows and notes for you. 😉

Oh, I already know how nerdy this is. When I excitedly showed Boyfriend my creation his response was a slow “ok…whatever makes you happy.”

Want to Join in the Fun?

Our current count is 35 out of 232 recipes made! 😀 Moving along!

If you’re interested in joining the cookbook challenge, DO IT! Make it fun for you, whatever that looks like. Let me know what cookbook you’re cooking through, and I would love to keep up with your progress.