Asian Cookbooks for Winter Reading by Ruth Paget
When I saw that the Monterey County Free Libraries (California) had an online winter reading program for adults through www.beanstack.org, I signed up with the goal of learning more about the food of Asia.
I received a BA in East Asian Studies from the University of Chicago and have learned to cook many Asian dishes to add to my study of Japan and China that began when I was an exchange student in Japan and a study tour participant in China. Over the years, I have accumulated cookbooks from Southeast Asia as well as East Asian ones in paper and kindle formats to learn more about the foods I have sampled for fun and as a restaurant reviewer for the Monterey County Weekly newspaper (Circulation: 200,000).
The books I have read so far for winter reading at the Monterey County Free Libraries include the following:
*Bhutan
-Foods of the Kingdom of Bhutan by Ernest and Eric Nagamatsu
*Cambodia
-Num Pang by Ratha Chapouly
*China
-All Under Heaven by Carolyn Phillips
-Complete Chinese Cookbook by Ken Hom
-Cooking South of the Clouds by Georgia Freedman
-Dim Sum Field Guide by Carolyn Phillips
-Every Grain of Rice by Fuschsia Dunlop
-Invitation to a Banquet by Fuchsia Dunlop
-Land of Fish and Rice by Fuchsia Dunlop
-Land of Plenty by Fuchsia
-Nom Wah Cookbook by Wilson Tang
-Phoenix Claw and Jade Trees by Kian Lam Kho
-Revolutionary Chinese Cookbook by Fuchsia Dunlop
*India
-660 Curries by Rhagavan Iyer
-Chaat by Maneet Chauhan
-Complete Book of Indian Cooking by Suneeta Vaswani
-Feasts and Fasts by Colleen Taylor Sen
-Indian for Everyone by Anupy Singla
-Masala by Anita Jaisinghani
*Indonesia
-Balinese Food by Vivienne Kruger
-Indonesian Regional Food and Cooking by Sri Owen
*Japan
-Bento for Beginners by Chika Ravitch
-Harumi’s Japanese Kitchen by Harumi Kurihara
-Japanese Cooking by Shizuo Tsuji
-Japanese Grill by Tadashi Ono
-Mastering the Art of Japanese Home Cooking by Masaharu Morimoto
-Modern Japanese Cuisine by Katarzyna Cwiertka
-Ramen Obsession by Naomi Imatome-Yun
-Tokyo Cult Recipes by Maori Murota
-Washoku by Elizabeth Andoh
*Korea
-Korean Cuisine by Michael J. Pettid
-Korean Home Cooking by Sohui Kim
-Koreatown by Deuki Hong
*Malaysia
-The Malaysian Kitchen by Christina Arokiasamy
*Myanmar
-Delicious Myanmar by Juan Gallardo
*Nepal
-Foods and Flavors from Nepal by Jyoti Pahak
*Philippines
-7000 Islands by Yasmin Newman
-Amboy
*Polynesia
-Totally Polynesian by Sarah Spencer
*Russia (Most of Russia is in Asia)
-Cabbage and Caviar by Alison K. Smith
*Thailand
-Bangkok by Leela Panyaratabandhu
-From the Source – Thailand by Lonely Planet Food
-Pok Pok by Andy Ricker
*Vietnam
-Asian Dumplings by Andrea Nguyen
-Into the Vietnamese Kitchen by Andrea Nguyen
-Phô Cookbook by Linda Nguyen
-Rice and Baguette by Vu Hong Lien
To tie all my Asian cookbook reading together, I read Leading with Cultural Intelligence by David Livermore. Livermore writes for readers who want to become expatriate managers who want to live overseas or become diplomats. He says that one of the best ways to prepare for these professions is to learn foreign languages and eat foreign food. Both of these activities can be done by young people before college.
You can also prepare foreign foods while listening to foreign music to further enhance what you read about in Asian cookbooks.
Happy cooking!
By Ruth Paget, author Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France
