Collecting Award Winning Cookbooks:

France's Gourmand Awards Identify World's Best in Food Lit

Jul 25, 2009

When the prestigious Gourmand World Cookbook Awards were presented July 1, America was one of four countries with the most winners.

For cookbook lovers who want only the best in their collection, one of the quickest ways to sort through the roughly 26,000 cookbooks produced each year is to let someone else do the selecting. That’s why “award winners” is a popular cookbook category.

The Gourmand World Cookbook Awards

The Gourmand World Cookbook Awards were created by Edouard Cointreau in 1995, and each year, the best cookbooks from around the world are collected and judged against each other in a variety of categories. This year, the winners were announced July 1 in Paris. The U.S. was one of four countries to receive the highest number of awards.

Those who collect award-winning cookbooks or who simply want to acquire the best of the best should consider these just-minted award winners:

First Place Winners

Clotide’s Edible Adventures in Paris.By Clotide Dusoulier (Publisher: Broadway Books)

Dusoulier’s previous book, Chocolate and Zucchinis, is the name of her blog, chocolateandzucchini.com, where she writes about food and France.

Subtitled “An Appreciation of a Misunderstood Ingredient, with Recipes,” the book impressed judges with its photograph of a slab of raw meat.

Chalmers is an instructor at the Culinary Institute of America, and wrote the book to give culinary students and food lovers a range of career options.

Eric Ripert, Thomas Keller and Todd English are among the celebrity chefs who contributed recipes to food photographer and journalist Long.

The Ultimate Beer Lovers Cookbook. By John Schlimm (Publisher: Cumberland House)

The author comes from the Straub beer family and used his generations of expertise to come up with 400 recipes, all using beer, of course.

Reflections of a Wine Merchant: On a lifetime in the vineyards and cellars of France and ItalyBy Neal I. Rosenthal (Publisher: Farrar,Straus, Giroux)

A lawyer-turned-wine merchant recalls his experiences in the high-end wine trade, and some of the problems that have resulted from wine marketing.

The Gourmand World Cookbook Award: Second Place Winners

It’s not just the book with its 600 recipes Achatz gives to buyers. He also provides videos, interviews and an online forum on his Web site.

Fabulous PartiesBy Peggy Dark, Mark Held and Richard David.(Publisher: Ryland Peters Small)

Stuck for ideas for your next party? Turn to this trio of party planners who work for the top celebrities in Los Angeles.

The Billionaires Vinegar: The mystery of the world’s most expensive bottle of wine.By Benjamin Wallace.(Publisher: Crown)

In 1985, a bottle of wine, allegedly owned by Thomas Jefferson in the 1780s, was auctioned off at a record price. But was the wine authentic?

Third Place Winners

Serve the People – A stir-fried journey through China By Jen Lin-Liu (Publisher: Harcourt)

Lin-Liu was a food editor of Time Out Beijing. She now conducts cooking classes at her Black Sesame Kitchen Cooking School in Beijing.

Arab-American: Landscape, culture and cuisine in two great deserts.By Gary Paul Nabhan. (Publisher: University of Arizona Press)

The author compares and contrasts the Sonoran desert area with his native Lebanon, including culinary staples found in both cuisines.

Nobu Miami: The party cookbook. By Nobu Matsuhisa. (Publisher: Kodansha International)

The international chef shows you how to take his signature blend of cuisines (Japanese, Peruvian and Cuban) and apply it to the perfect party dishes.

The U.S. is gaining a reputation as the place to go for wine and wine books. This book highlights one of the reasons why: up-and-coming Oregon wines.

The Gourmand World Cookbook Awards: A Must Have for Cookbook Collectors

The category "Award-winning cookbooks" is a good one to collect but whether you collect cookbooks or not, these books are fine food and drink books and well worth owning. After all, would the French lead you wrong on food?

The copyright of the article Collecting Award Winning Cookbooks: in Home Decor/Cookbooks is owned by Karen Edwards. Permission to republish Collecting Award Winning Cookbooks: in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.