I have always loved to read.  If I don’t have something with me to read I will read whatever is available.    Perhaps this is how I began to read cook books, rather than just using them for the recipes.  I got hooked on the historical and cultural clues and images that are sprinkled throughout old cook books.  I enjoy those cook books the most that deliberately explore the origins of the recipes.

If you are interested in reading cook books too, I’d recommend Helen Evans Brown’s West Coast Cook Book.

Helen Evans Brown was known for changing the way people thought about food in the Pacific Northwest  during the 1950s and 1960s.  She lived in Pasadena, CA  from 1937-1964.  Helen wasn’t originally from the West coast.  Maybe that is why she brings to her writing an almost palpable feeling of excitement about the natural abundance of fresh food in the Pacific Northwest.  I felt the same way when I moved here.  What a green and fertile land we are privileged to enjoy.

I have read her West Coast Cook Book (1952), Patio Cookbook (1951), and California Cooks : a Collection of the articles on Cookery appearing in the Californian (1948).  The West Coast Cook Book is my favorite because her focus is

…recipes using foods which are indigenous to the Coast… Pioneer recipes brought West, particularly to California, by the ’49ers and their adventurous successors, and adapted for modern use.   Recipes inspired by the various nationalities that have settled on the Coast especially Chinese, Italian, Mexican and Spanish. (from the dust jacket of the West Coast Cook Book)

The great thing about Helen Evans Brown is that researching the food was as important as the quality of ingredients, or the techniques used to prepare them.

The foundation of her writing in the West Coast Cook Book had to be the amazing library of cook books that she and her husband Philip, a rare book collector and dealer, put together.  Her collection included a fair number of charitable cook books, or cook books produced by various groups in order to raise money for their organization.  The charitable cook books carry a wealth of information about the history of cooking and food in the region in which they were produced.  Just as family recipes can give clues to the genealogy and cultural history of a family, the charitable cook books can give clues to the history and cultural makeup of the inhabitants of a given region.  Helen Evans Brown was such a big influence on the evolution of food in the Pacific Northwest because she discovered a way to investigate the history of eating local.