The other day, in the comments of a Spike TV Guys’ Choice Awards post, the discussion turned to Chrissy Teigen’s cookbook, Cravings — your reviews, by the way, may have been universally positive — and started to reference other celebrity cookbooks. That’s a clear call for an afternoon chat if I’ve ever heard one, and by sheer coincidence the timing dovetails with the release of Freddie Prinze Jr.’s tome, Back to the Kitchen. (Doesn’t sound like that should be Michael J. Fox’s book? Shouldn’t Freddie’s be I Know What I Cooked Last Summer?) I had NO IDEA Freddie’s was in the offing until one of his recipes popped up in… People, I think? I hope it’s great. He’s so damned likable. But I desperately hope there are no tribute recipes to that scene in She’s All That where… ugh, I can’t even say it without retching; it’s the reason I won’t ever turn on that movie when I notice it on cable. (It’s the scene where… a private hair… is placed on a person’s food as revenge.)
Anyway, movie subplots aside: What are your favorite celebrity cookbooks? Which ones surprised and delighted you, or disappointed you, or lived up to exactly what you expected them to be? Have any of them yielded go-to recipes for you, or are they mostly just lovely to read and ogle? Feel free to open this up to well-known chefs’ cookbooks, too. (We might do a separate chat someday for recommending more obscure ones.) Only you, Fug Nation, can tell me whether I really need to pay attention to Laura Prepon’s kitchen skills or Gwyneth Paltrow’s recipe for a lettuce wedge.
