Italian Regional Cooking, by Ada Boni, was instantly appealing to me because of it's strong, leather-like binding. After flipping through the cookbook, I also appreciated the large pictures scattered throughout the book. This cookbook seems like it would appeal mostly to those interested in Italian cooking. The entire book sticks to the main theme of regional Italian cooking with all recipes relating to the theme. The cookbook is organized by region, and there is information about and recipes from 14 unique regions in Italy. There is no clear table of contents: the title page simply lists the regions with the corresponding page numbers, which can be a little confusing.
My second cookbook, The Menu-Cookbook for Entertaining by Libby Hillman, was very different upon first glance in that it had no pictures, which was a little disappointing. Once I began reading, however, I found Hillman's writing style to be much more entertaining than Boni's. This cookbook has a much larger appeal, and Hillman's intended audience can include anyone that wants to cook for a large group of people. After an interesting introduction about cooking in general, the book is divided into sections by season. Each of the four sections starts with recipes for major holidays for that particular season. For example, Winter's section starts with recipes specifically for Christmas Day and New Year's Eve, and Spring's section begins with Easter recipes. Later on in the section, Hillman describes basic recipes for that season. I like the way she has organized her cookbook, and although I'm not big on cooking, I enjoyed flipping through her cookbook.
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