Anyone who knows me knows I love my cookbooks. Like many of us, they are a place of salvation. Even if it is only for a moment, they can transport us to another land, to a place of joy, and remind us of the past while offering a way to look forward to a happier future.

I measured my books recently, at least the ones I care about, the ones I will most likely never send to Goodwill or the bookstore down the street.

I am planning on how to display them, store them for easy access, or at least have them nearby to comfort my emotional well-being, how many feet I have of them can be a way to help understand how much comfort I really need.

Conservatively, I have less than 36 feet of cookbooks, which can sound like a lot but really it is only 4 shelves tall and 9 feet wide. This includes the piles of cookbooks I have on the dining room table and on the floor of the library.

It does not include the 10 feet or so of Frank Lloyd Wright books, though.

You ask why so many—well, probably not you—but non-cookbook people can't understand this. Those who are younger think you can find every recipe on the Internet, but that's not true. And now AI can create a recipe for you. Just tell it what ingredients you have, and it will generate a recipe for you in under 15 seconds! Quite remarkable, even if the result is unremarkable.

I, though, still cling to my written cookbooks, and my Mom's 3x5 card files of recipes, recipes that have evolved overtime, with traces of flour and sticky fingers, they are remnants of dishes made years before my time.

Within these cards and cookbooks lies the little tweaks, scribbled in pencil, to make it a little bit better. That little bit, that's what makes them special! Are they good or great? Sometimes. Are they a piece of memory that is tactile? Yes, definitely!

It is these recipes I like the most. The ones with history that I know, that I still make. Am I partial to cookbooks when I know the auteur? Of course. But not just because of that, but because I know that they have put their heart on their sleeve.

Tradition. That is the comfort food I have been looking forward to!

What more could you want from a friendship that is virtually impossible to screw up? It is just plain right.

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Every year I have shepherd's pie on my birthday. Even if we talk about options, it always comes back to shepherd's pie.

And cake.

Tradition, it is the comfort food of the time right now.

Dive deep into the history of Shepherd's pie and Cottage pie is in the story, too. One might say they happened at the same time, sometime in 18th or 19th century. Another might say Cottage came first. One story says Cottage had a crust of flour and Shepherd's did not. Both, or one or the other, originated in Britain or Ireland.

What is clear, in a foggy way, is the main difference is the meat. In food, isn't that always the way? The protein is the descriptor, even if its contribution is minimal.

So, most likely my version of pie is a Cottage pie without the crust, or Shepherd's pie with the wrong meat. Oh well.

My variations are, either, spend more time for something amazing, or just put it all together quickly and wow! It is still good.

First, cook the onions to sweet perfection in a little bit of butter to caramelize (actually Maillard reaction), remove from the casserole.

Add the minced garlic and brown lightly to create the Maillard reaction and remove from the casserole.

Add the mutton, lamb, Italian sausage, ground beef or tofu (kidding) and cook as crispy as you want. Adding back the onions and garlic when it feels right.

Or, skip all that and just cook your meat with the onions and garlic.

Top with freshly cooked shelled corn, just harvested peas and cleaned carrots, or just go with a bag of your favorite organic corn or frozen vegetable mix, which is what I do.

Cover with mashed potatoes making cool wavy forked patterns to achieve crispy bits and bake.

Remember this recipe is about using leftovers, it's about whatever you have on hand to make everything go a little bit farther. It is not a fussy dish. It is a great dish!

Fabulous for leftovers!

See the Easy Shepherd's Pie Recipe here!

Jason is one of our regulars. He always comes in with a mission. Something he has found to make, to try, to experiment on. And always looking for a hard-to-find ingredient! And often gives us ideas for things we should have!

Jason tells me that he ALWAYS makes crab cakes on Christmas Eve. Apparently his version is a "riff" on a recipe from the New York Times by Pierre Franey. His version of this recipe is here. He serves them with a French Creole-inspired remoulade sauce, also from the same NYT article.

See the Crab Cakes Baltimore Style Recipe here!

There are so many variations of this recipe, including the original from Nashua, New Hampshire, a debatable food fact, which included caviar.

Mix it up and adjust it to your taste buds. We include some of the common additions. The key here is that it is fast and wickedly easy to make, and really hard to screw up...finding great corned beef to make a Reuben is much harder!

See the Russian Dressing Recipe here!

This is most likely the flavor of hot mustard you have at a restaurant for your BBQ pork. Dry mustards can be, and usually are, super hot to the nose, giving you a nice nostril flare!

Store in your essential pantry to pull out when you need it. Keeps a good long time, actually almost forever, though it will lose its punch eventually.

This is a great mustard to take camping!

Shop now for S&B Oriental Hot Mustard Powder!

So easy, so satisfying and the smells. Oh the smells, as it all cooks in the oven are so wonderful!

See the Basic Baked Beans Easy Recipe here!

A variety dating back to the 1800s from the northeastern US, this Vermont Cranberry Bean is great tasting. It has a similar but fuller flavor than the pinto bean. Good eating almost any way you want: soups, boiled, refried, or in a cold salad.

More vibrantly "red" than the standard, midwestern cranberry bean, these beans are beautiful. Perfect for refried beans or a red bean stew.

Shop now for Organic Vermont Cranberry Beans!

This recipe came from a locally produced cookbook, 40 Seasonal Soups, publish by Sacred Heart Shelter. All the recipes were "donated" by local chefs and food purveyors, including this one, from Master Butcher, Rick Friar.

This recipe reminds me of the stew my mother used to make. So comforting and so good. The key is using great stew meat trimmed by an experienced butcher so that you end up with more meat, and less gristle.

See Rick's Beef Stew Recipe here!

This Coconut Caramel is a combination that has come together perfectly in a jar. Combine creamy delicious coconut milk into the caramel making process and you have a spoon ready spreadable dessert that has a twist that is delish!

Smooth and silky, as soon as you dip your spoon (or finger) into the glossy "sauce" your visual mind immediately goes to spiraling it over your favorite vanilla ice cream. To the taste, that first taste is truly an anticipatory moment of curiosity and pleasure!

The smoothness and the stickiness melts away into flavors of questions (think of the coconut), sweetness, and smokiness of sugars. It seems simple to one taste bud and to the other bud, complex and fascinating. The fabulously "butteriness" flavor is dairy free with coconut milk being the first ingredient. Next cane sugar (no corn here), organic agave syrup, inverted sugar, salt from the sea, and cream of tartar. The result is, as you might be able to tell, heaven on a spoon.

Let us start with breakfast (who doesn't wish for sweetness early in the morning) pancakes, waffles & toast. Granola, dutch baby, or mix it into your cream cheese. Stir caramel sauce into your coffee with a cinnamon stick or bake your bacon with a brushing of coconut caramel sauce!

If breakfast is not your thing (just get a spoonful on the way out the door), then add it to your popcorn, mustard sauce, cookies, applesauce, top the freshest fruit you can find, or mix it with bourbon or mix it into a banana smoothie! For nighttime, add to hot chocolate, chai lattes, or a dollop to your hot toddy! Cheers!

Shop now for Hey Boo Coconut Caramel Sauce!

This is the perfect cream to have in the cupboard, ready at anytime when unexpected guests show up.

Then when no one surprises you in the next couple of days, it is best to check and make sure they are still good. Don't worry, eating one a day is good for you.

These wonderful treats are slim rounds of creamy peppermint centers enrobed in dark chocolate. And not just any peppermint. So powerful is the mint you can smell it through the wrapping.

This mint's particular flavor is soft and lingering with a cool intensity. The chocolate pairs perfectly with the mint cream, just the right amount of both!

Never too sweet, these are exactly what you wish your peppermint creams to be!

These are my favorite mints of all time!

Shop now for Summerdown Mint Chocolate Peppermint Creams!

You know we love our Effie's! This new flavor with Gruyere cheese is a wonderful surprise!

The first bite you get the great crunch that every Effie's has and then whilst your nose smells your taste buds tell there is cheese here!

It's like getting a crunch cheese and cracker all at once in a bite, without the topping of cheese. It's like perfect!

Shop now for Effie's Gruyere Oat Biscuits!

I learned that making sure it cools completely, like refrigerator cold, before consuming yields a much better bite! And it can even come back up to room temp, it is just that chilling seems to meld the flavors together.

And this is so crazy easy!

See the Basque Cheesecake Recipe!

The extracted juice is not sweet; instead, it is a full, vibrant flavor of citrus juice combined with the oils from the peel, making for an amazingly thick, rich flavor of yuzu.

This 100% pure Yuzu extract is made from the Yuzu grown in the Kawakami region of Yamaguchi, Japan. Registered as a national monument in 1941, Kawakami is a native habitat of yuzu.

Unlike many juice manufacturers, which crush the citrus to extract as much as possible, Kankitsu Labo finely presses from the sides to emulate hand squeezing.

The result produces a pure extract that has elements from the whole fruit, oils from the skin to the juice inside, creating a lot of yuzu flavor.

This extract is made from whole fruit, cold-pressed yuzu.

Shop now for Labo 100% Pure Cold Pressed Yuzu Extract !

This homemade spicy harissa mayo recipe is amazing with fresh veggies for a new spin on the classic vegetable tray, or a good way to add heat to healthy sweet potato fries.

See the super easy Spicy Harissa Mayo Recipe here!

This delectable couscous is much larger and has a creamier texture than the tiny, fluffy North African version. Served warm, this pearl-like pasta is pure comfort food.

In Lebanon, where it may be known as "maftoul," it is traditionally served pilaf-style with chicken or lamb. Cook it with a little vegetable stock, and then add some petit black lentils, chopped peppers, olives, onions, tomatoes, herbs, a good squeeze of lemon juice and some olive oil for a superb salad.

Israeli Couscous is a small, round semolina pasta that should not be confused with the tiny, yellow North African couscous; it's a different animal altogether! Sometimes called pearl couscous or maftoul, it resembles barley, or very small, white peas.

After being shaped and rolled into small balls, these semolina pearls are toasted in an open-flame oven. This distinguishes the couscous from most pasta, which is dried but not toasted.

Toasting lends the Israeli couscous a distinctive, nutty flavor and particularly satisfying mouthfeel, and it also seals in the starch and reinforces the exterior, allowing the pearls to absorb liquid without falling apart.

This is why Israeli couscous is ideal for saucy preparations—whatever the sauce or reduction, the couscous absorbs the flavor beautifully, and the sauce sticks well to every tiny pearl.

Shop here for Israeli Couscous!