ONE OF MY FAVORITE KITCHEN ITEMS.......

 For this post I'm going to step away from the usual recipe and instead discuss one of my favorite kitchen tools.  COOKBOOKS!!!  I have at least 10 different cookbooks, but today I want to focus on one.  My 1970, second edition, Betty Crocker Cookbook ♥ It's a 5-ring binder, "red pie" cookbook that I commandeered from my mother. (Here's what it looked like new).

 Here's what mine looks like:

 What makes this particular cookbook soo special?  I was a sophomore in high school when I made my first recipe from this book.  It was snickerdoodles, and that was when I discovered I enjoyed baking and also, that I was good at it!  The recipes in this cookbook are also relatively easy to follow, and use common ingredients.  It's frustrating to me when I want to try a recipe, only to find out that it requires an ingredient (or ingredients) that are uncommon, and rarely used.  Such is not the case with this cookbook.  Not to mention that the food is DELICIOUS!!!

 I 've made several recipes from this cookbook.  Some of my favorites are: snickerdoodles (of course!), coffee cake, streusel coffee cake, strawberry-rhubarb pie, corned beef and cabbage, German chocolate cake and the coconut frosting, apple cobbler, peach cobbler, peach crisp and peanut brittle.

 This cookbook is older than I am!  It has been used and loved over the years and shows the wear.  The spine of the book has seen better days.

 There are splatters/stains from use in the past.  Going through the book it is easy to see the more used recipes due to the residue left on the pages.

 Many of the pages bear evidence of heavy use by the presence of reinforced labels along the holes for the binder rings.  The following picture is a page where all five ring holes are reinforced!

 I've looked on eBay and Amazon to find a "cleaner", more pristine copy, but I think I'll stick with my copy.  It has seen me through many years and various recipes.  Here's to you, my 1970, second edition, Betty Crocker's Cookbook!