We’re pleased to officially launch the Cookbooker Forum. For a social site which revolves around cookbooks and recipe reviews, it’s about time we had a way for members to chat with each other and share ideas outside of the review pages.

We’re using the light and speedy Vanilla Forums software for this, and have integrated it into the site so that members automatically have membership in the forums. All you have to do is sign into Cookbooker and then click ’sign in’ on the forum main page and it will link your accounts.

I’ve started things off with a ‘what’s for dinner’ topic, as well as a ’site improvements & suggestions’ topic. Feel free to start your own topics, and suggest new categories too. See you on the forum!

The James Beard Foundation recently compiled The Baker’s Dozen, a list of 13 essential baking books that span almost four decades, from 1973 to the present. This is the first of what will be a series of themed lists from the foundation.

The books were selected by cookbook author Naomi Duguid; Carol Mighton Haddix, food editor of the Chicago Tribune; Martha Holmberg, cookbook author and editorial director of Watershed Communications; Kathleen Purvis, food editor of The Charlotte Observer; Ellen Rose, former owner of the Los Angeles cookbook store The Cook’s Library; Matt Sartwell, manager of Kitchen Arts & Letters in New York; Irene Sax, food writer and food-writing instructor for New York University; Tara Q. Thomas, senior editor, Wine & Spirits; and Grace Young, cookbook author.

If you’re going to start a baking library, this is a list of greats. Of course there are many, many more worthy books on the subject, but given the pedigree of the selection committee, this list carries a lot of weight. Here they are linked to the titles on Cookbooker.

The James Beard Book Awards Committee Essential Book List: The Baker’s Dozen:

1. “Baking: From My Home to Yours,” by Dorie Greenspan (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2006).
2. “Beard on Bread,” by James Beard (originally published 1973; reprinted by Knopf, 1995).
3. “The Book of Great Desserts,” by Maida Heatter (Andrews McMeel, 1999).
4. “The Bread Baker’s Apprentice,” by Peter Reinhart (Ten Speed, 2001).
5. “The Cake Bible,” by Rose Levy Beranbaum (William Morrow, 1988).
6. “Classic Home Desserts,” by Richard Sax (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2000).
7. “Cocolat,” by Alice Medrich (Warner Books, 1990).
8. “The Fannie Farmer Baking Book,” by Marion Cunningham (Gramercy, 1996).
9. “Great Pies and Tarts,” by Carole Walter (Clarkson Potter, 1998).
10. “The Italian Baker,” by Carol Field (William Morrow, 1985).
11. “Martha Stewart’s Cookies,” by Martha Stewart (Clarkson Potter, 2008).
12. “My Bread,” by Jim Lahey (W.W. Norton, 2009).
13. “The Simple Art of Perfect Baking,” by Flo Braker (Chronicle, 2003).

I’m sure everyone has their own suggestions – feel free to add them to the comments below. Books I’d think to add from my personal experience: Rose Levy Beranbaum’s Rose’s Heavenly Cakes, Shirley Corriher’s Bakewise, Naomi Duguid’s HomeBaking.

Known as “the Oscars of the cooking world,” the James Beard Awards were announced in early May. We’re highlighting the book awards here with links to the titles on Cookbooker.

2010 Book Award Winners

American Cooking: Real Cajun by Donald Link with Paula Disbrowe

Baking and Dessert: Baking by James Peterson

Beverage: Been Doon So Long: Randall Grahm Vinthology by Randall Grahm

Cooking from a Professional Point of View: The Fundamental Techniques of Classic Pastry Arts by FCI with Judith Choate

General Cooking: Ad Hoc at Home by Thomas Keller with Dave Cruz

Healthy Focus: Love Soup: 160 All-New Vegetarian Recipes from the Author of “The Vegetarian Epicure” by Anna Thomas

International: The Country Cooking of Ireland by Colman Andrews

Photography: Seven Fires: Grilling the Argentine Way Photographer: Santiago Soto Monllor

Reference and Scholarship: Encyclopedia of Pasta by Oretta Zanini de Vita, Translated by Maureen B. Fant

Single Subject: Pasta Sfoglia by Ron and Colleen Suhanosky with Susan Simon

Writing and Literature: Save the Deli by David Sax

Cookbook Hall of Fame: A Book of Middle Eastern Food by Claudia Roden

Cookbook of the Year: The Country Cooking of Ireland by Colman Andrews

Online Winners

Website Focusing on Food, Beverage, Restaurants, or Nutrition: Chow.com

Food Blog: Serious Eats

Special Issues

Many magazines publish special issues each year for holidays or to collect categories of recipes published previously. Until now, it was difficult to add these to Cookbooker, but we’ve just launched the option to add these issues in a new category, linked to the main magazine.

When adding a new issue, there’s a separate section for special issues which currently allows you to add the issue title, date (month is optional) and optional issue number. We’ve also changed the magazine display so that special issues appear separately from regular issues.

I’d be delighted if people with special issues could try this out and let me know if it makes sense and works with the issues in their collections. Any special issues previously added as separate magazines will be converted to the new format. Comments are, as always, welcome.

Cover View

You’ll now notice that in any bookshelf you can choose between list and cover view. When you change it, the system will remember which one you prefer for later visits. For now, the cover view will just show you the covers and nothing else, but I’m planning on enhancing this with a tool-tip type feature which will show you star ratings, number of reviews etc when you mouse over each cover.

Adding magazines to Cookbooker is, how shall I put it, imperfect (okay, how about confusing?). I’ve noticed that a number of members have added magazines that already exist on the site, which I’ve deleted – but the fault is all mine. I’m going to work at making it simpler, but at the moment, I’ll try to explain it as clearly as I can.

1. Check the magazines page to see what magazines we already have – it’s preloaded with most of the common food magazines from the US, Canada, Australia, NZ and UK. You can click the ‘browse’ tab at any time to get to the list of magazines.
2. Click the title of the magazine you want to add. You’ll see a main page for the magazine itself.
3. This is the important/confusing part. You then have to add the issue you want to have on your bookshelf. Since recipes are published in particular magazine issues, we have to treat each issue as a separate publication, just like cookbooks. Someone may have put your issue on already. If so, click the little green + button to add this to your bookshelf. Otherwise, you’ll have to click ‘Add a New Issue’.
4. Once you add an issue it will appear in the magazines tab in your bookshelf and you can add individual recipes to it.

Hope this helps!