I am not a vegetarian, but love vegetables, grains and legumes and am as happy eating vegetarian dishes as meat dishes. I love the two cookbooks produced by the owners of Greens restaurant in San Francisco, titled, "The Greens Cookbook" and "Fields of Greens". They are wonderful books full of recipes delicious to long time vegetarians as well as dabblers or outright omnivores. They are written with a true appreciation for variety and balance, using ingredients that almost everyone would be familiar with. A few years ago, I began to teach myself how to cook the foods of India, and found a wonderful book called, "Dakshin..Vegetarian Cuisine From South India" which is a wonderful introduction to a cuisine and method of eating that is vastly different from what most of us are accustomed to, but quite delicious and satisfying. Be warned that if you are unaccustomed to eating spicy hot food, as in food prepared with chili peppers, you should probably cut down the amounts that are listed in the recipes. Also, you will be using many spices that you might be unfamiliar with and might be hard to find if you don't have a local Indian grocery store. However, there are many sources on line. The cuisine also makes ample use of Curry Leaves, which are an herb that really has nothing to do with what we think of as curry. They are a pungent, strongly flavored tree-leaf that nothing can really substitute for. In fact, the first time I bought some, I thought they smelled like a mix of B.O. and old socks. But cooked into food, they lend a wonderful depth of flavor. Most cookbooks will tell you to use cilantro instead, which is a completely different flavor, but compatible to most recipes that call for Curry Leaves. Again, you can find them in Indian grocery stores. They last quite a long time in the refrigerator, and I have had some success freezing them. Dried Curry Leaves aren't worth the bother.

Here is a basic philosophy I've evolved: some cookbooks are reference books for techniques, nutrition, or how to make something, jelly, for instance. Joy of Cooking, Jane Brody, and Better Homes and Gardens fall into this category. Other cookbooks can give technique as well as provide a unique "taste bud experience". For me here are some of the books that fall into this category: 1) a 30 year old, probably out of print, Barbara Kafka book, the Microwave Gourmet, even when I don't do her recipes in the microwave her tastebud choices are so awesome, tasty, interesting that I pull out this book all the time to consult; 2) Emeril's New, New Orleans Cookbook (at least I think that's the name since I'm not at home), an interesting combination of flavors and techniques that I've learned that I don't need to follow every ingredient or technique exactly to create a great meal very quickly. I wasn't surprised at how good this cookbook turned out since I ate at his restaurant in New Orleans before he was famous and went back again in the same week because I was so impressed; 3) Gordon Ramsey's A Passion for Seafood for which I had very low expectations since I just knew him as someone who yelled on TV. This cookbook is also one that you can pull out techniques and ingredients without treating it as gospel and still come up with a meal that both family and guests will appreciate; 4) someone has already mentioned Julia Child's The Way to Cook and if you don't have anything else this is the one to have. My mother was a great cook and never used a cookbook and none of her recipes were written down. I was in despair that i would never be able to replicate her cooking. After I started using this cookbook I realized that dear Julia had compiled the wisdom of all our mother and grandmothers in one beautiful and well written book.

CeltinNE, I have both shared and private Google Docs. We have a shared doc for family recipes. This is so handy when we're at Mom's and she can't find her beautifully handwritten recipe card, but we can find it on one of our devices and finish making it by the time she finds her card. You can set the sharing settings for each document individually. If you have handwritten recipes you'd rather scan than type, you can upload them as PDFs. Another option I've just started using is Evernote. It has an awesome web clipper browser extension that will copy the meaningful part of a web page, minus the ads, into a note in your Evernote account. Evernote will also do OCR on scanned handwriting I believe, so that it is searchable. I like Google Docs or Evernote, because I don't want to be tied into a proprietary technology that could disappear. Google supports common standards that will not be disappearing; it will export to PDF, text, Word, etc. Evernote supports PDF. Evernote is committed to the portability of your data and supports every device platform out there. I would not to get a lot of recipe content locked up in some app that's not supported a few years from now. A lot of these apps are going to fall by the wayside. Also, I want my recipes in files so I can have them on any device. And yes, there are cabinet mounts for iPad. Any kind of mount or case you can imagine, they're out there. Check out ilounge.com for a dizzying array. If you are thinking about remodeling a kitchen, and thinking about an iPad, the iPad suddenly seems cheap if you figure you can use it instead of a bunch of shelves for books, binders, or files. I have several pieces of furniture full of music in my office and realized that another piece of furniture to store music is so many hundred dollars. I am scanning and getting rid of many originals, so just in furniture storage space, the iPad is helping pay for itself. Just think about how much that shelf space in your kitchen or den is going to cost you. Now granted, this is not going to help the avid cookbook collectors, but that's not me.

My go-to's are Joy of Cooking ... I used to be afraid of it lol but then I realized it is full of basics and quick-n-easy meals, as well as more detailed instructions and recipes ... And Pease Porridge Hot, one of those fundraiser books. It's from our "drop-in center" for young children, so some of the recipes are very family-friendly and busy-mom-fast ... And Menu Mailer from Saving Dinner! Weekly menus with shopping list and recipes saved our mealtime from "mom, are we having chicken or fish with the rice and peas tonight?", words spoken by my 7-year-old. And now I can improvise and cook-on-the-fly. Oh, that 7-year-old is now 21, and on moving into his apartment he said he was intimidated to cook because of having two parents who are good cooks. Me? Wow! I gave him a couple of Menu Mailers.