The “I Hate To Cook Book”
Fifty years after the original publication of “The I Hate to Cook Book,†it has been updated, revised and re-released this summer, its publisher hoping to find a new generation of homemakers who appreciate the processed-cheese, canned-soup and alcohol-laden recipes that made it beloved among several million rebellious housewives in the 1960s and 1970s.
I grew up with Peg Bracken’s I HATE TO COOK BOOK (along with a few dozen other books, especially Julia and THE JOY OF COOKING). It’s not really a “processed-cheese, canned-soup, and alcohol-laden” cookbook. I just looked through it, and I couldn’t find any processed cheese recipes, and only 1 or 2 that called for canned soup. Actually, there are some very solid recipes. They’re just relatively simple, for people who don’t have a lot of time and/or money, and whose kitchen skills are medium-low.