10 Things Every Cookbook Publisher Should Know - From a cookbook reviewer
Five common mistakes that make a cookbook unusable
Cookbooks remain a non-replaceable, hard-copy artifact in a digital world. They are used as physical objects in a way other books are not. Every time a cook tries a new recipe, she returns to the page at least a dozen times. Format matters, as do details and specifications. The good news is, these mistakes are easy to fix.
1. Page Format.
There is nothing worse than a cookbook printed in a miniature typeface. Bear in mind, we're not reading these books in a comfy chair or on the beach. They're often on a messy kitchen counter, three feet away from our eyes and our steamed-up glasses. Often we have to find our place in a rush. Too-small type is a nightmare. Turning a page with sticky fingers is also a problem, so double-page spreads for longer recipes are ideal (even if it means not including a photo). Is the book too long for big type? It's better to cut a few recipes to make your $35 price point than cram them all in in a way that makes them hard to use.
2. Measurement.
I know, it's not fair, but American cooks just don't use litres and grams. We work with cups and tablespoons for volume, pounds for weight, and ounces for either. Whenever possible we'll use volumes rather than weights. If you're publishing a buy-in for the U.S. market, make the conversions, or you will have an expensive flop on your hands.
3. Ingredients.
American cooks--a great many of us anyway--are adventurous, and we're not afraid of obscure ingredients. But if it's not available at your average Midwestern supermarket, don't be a snob. Tell us how to get it! Tell us what to substitute! Name the online source! If only one chilli paste will do, and there's not a word of English on the label, include a picture, preferably in colour.
4. Equipment.
This one's for authors who happen to be chefs. Don't assume anyone has a restaurant kitchen. If most of your recipes demand a Paco-Jet, a Hobart mixer, or a full set of ring molds, don't bother trying to retail your book. Just give it out free to other chefs, who don't buy cookbooks anyway. Also, if you scale your recipe down on paper to feed four to six instead of 40, actually test it at that scale, and remember the aromatics and spices don't scale down the same way.
5. “Turn to page 578.”
Often people like to clean up a cluttered page by nesting multiple sub recipes in the ingredients. “Spicy Tomato Reduction (see page 247).” “Oven-roasted Peppers (see page 135).” Then you get to the end of the recipe and it's “Serve with Eggplant Coulis (page 446), toasted Sourdough Crackers (page 394) and Cucumber Trifle (page 752).” Have a heart, publishers! Incorporate them as extra steps in the main recipe, or if you must, reprint the sub-recipe just after. Our hands are sticky, our glasses are steamed up, and we can't be rifling through a cookbook for hidden recipes.
Five Things that Make a Good Cookbook Great
Design plays a role in making a great cookbook, but for the most part, it's the content that separates the wheat from the chaff. The author of a great cookbook has passion to spare, and a vast fund of knowledge. That shows up in the details, whether they’re technical, historical, scientific, or anecdotal.
1. Great headnotes.
Headnotes are what make me fall in love with a cookbook, because that's where the author tells us what this recipe is doing in this book, and why they love it so. It's a place for stories and helpful tips ("if you can't find banana chiles, serranos will do"). Headnotes aren't just decorative--they can give you vital clues. If the author describes how she first was captivated by this recipe because of the smell of perfectly caramelised onions wafting out a window, that gives you a sense of something to watch for in the cooking.
2. "Instant classics."
It's always disappointing to buy a cookbook and then find it's filled with recipes for things you already know how to make because they're commonplace: meatloaf, spaghetti carbonara, roast chicken--or a scarcely altered variation on those themes. I always look for "instant classics": recipes that aren't overly familiar but are good enough and straightforward enough to adapt as a household standard. Two Dudes, One Pan’s baked penne frittata and Dorie Greenspan's Chicken Tagine with Dried Apricots are two examples.
3. “What to Look For.”
This is perhaps the clearest indicator of a great cook and, more importantly, a great teacher. The halfhearted cookbook author might merely say, "Fry for five minutes over high heat," maybe adding a perfunctory "until golden". But gas and electric burners are variable, and times vary. Tell us how the spices should smell when they're toasted, how big the bubbles in the sauce should be when it's simmering properly, how salty the curry paste should be. There's nothing wrong with a wordy recipe--it just shows someone cares.
4. Sidebars, glossaries, indexes.
Although we don't use them while we're actually cooking, these peripheral materials distinguish the cookbook that stays on your shelf for years from the one you give away after a season. It's not just the useful information, like how to shop for Japanese groceries, or the equipment you need to make your own pasta. It's the quotes from other cooks, the story about Nana and the fishmonger, the lore that makes your cookbook different from anyone else's.
5. Art.
Good design is essential; good art can make a buyer fall in love with your cookbook right there in the store. But don't let your food stylist go so crazy with the shot that it no longer bears a relationship to what the home cook can reasonably produce. Nothing's more infuriating than seeing perfect grill marks on a piece of meat when you've been told to run it under a broiler, or having beautiful little heirloom cherry tomatoes not mentioned in the recipe prettying up a beige risotto under false pretences. Honest photographs, preferably facing the recipe page, are great. Drawings, whether whimsical or realistic, can work, too. (And type can be every bit as powerful as art. I am partial to the mixed-typeface designs you see more and more these days--they punch up a page and often help me parse a recipe at speed.)
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