Does one have to be “a cook” to enjoy the pleasure of reading and collecting cookbooks and recipe booklets?

In my case, the answer is no. I’ve been collecting recipe booklets (cookbooks too) since the 1960’s. It’s the vintage recipe booklets I treasure the most.

The colorful little booklets often came with appliances and cookware, but they also were acquired “with purchase” or free at the grocers like the A & P and Safeway. Some of them came from writing to the ingredient makers like Baker’s Chocolate and Heinz. Others were produced by the Cooperative Extension Service at various universities.

Just recently, while rearranging my cookbook collection, I browsed through my own stack of recipe booklets. Whenever the time allows, this treasured collection sparks so many fond memories of my personal journey.

One example is a booklet by Sunbeam that came with my Automatic Electric Fry Pan. The pan was a wedding gift from my boss at the company I worked for back in 1961. The booklet’s bright red cover shows a woman stylishly dressed in the fashion of the times. She is holding the pan filled with fried eggs while showing the heat control plug-in that promised “Everything you cook will be more delicious because you get the correct heat every time.”

Another booklet from 1965, Proof of the Pudding, came with General Foods introduction of Jell-O Instant Pudding. No more time spent cooking pudding when you could make great desserts in an instant. Two other booklets by Baker’s Coconut stir memories of my children’s birthday parties–I know I made that cut-up Teddy Bear cake for one of them.

Since I grew up on Bond Bread and my dear mother baked Duncan Hines cakes with a passion, those booklets bring flashbacks of so many good times at the kitchen table and the sweet aroma coming from the oven.

There are many more in the stack for me to enjoy at my leisure. Really, it’s a pleasure to read and collect these low-cost vintage recipe booklets. I’m always keeping an eye out for more to add to my collection when I’m out and about the antiques malls, thrift shops and second-shops. Prices usually range from 50 cents to a couple of dollars. Some of the rarest can go for $15 but I have yet to come across any that price.

If you are looking for a low-cost collectible, hunt for treasured little recipe booklets at home first. You probably have a few on a shelf or in a cupboard that could start your collection and stir up a fond memory or two for you .