Munching through books

This month I'm munching. Munching my way through books is an obsession, but the compulsion at present is to take great bites out of our cookery collection. Ah, you say, do you have the usual suspects? Bill? Jamie? Kylie? Maggie? Manu? Well yes, but there's also Annabel Karmel, Micheal Moore, Matthew Evans, Margaret Fulton, Rick Stein, Yottam Ottolenghi, Belinda Jeffery, Jenny Ferguson, Dany Chouet, Valli Little, Luke Nguyen, Ed Halmagyi, Annabel Langbein, Antonio and Gennaro, the Two hairy bikers, the Australian Women's Weekly cookbooks, the 4 ingredients ladies, the CWA and many, many more. I can choose from low fat, high protein, low GI, no sugar, gluten, egg and or dairy free, vegan, vegetarian, meat lovers, super grains, super foods, shakes, raw food, slow cooking, roasting, baking, slow cooking or fast family meals.
Now that's before I think about countries, any country, any food, any spice and any cookery skill level.
So where will I start? If I make an organised list the month will be over and I may only have consumed the pictures, not actually dirtied a pan, scraped a carrot, sizzled an onion, drizzled a sauce or savoured the taste of any morsel, poached, pickled or macerated.
I need to think about this. With a pile of books, magazines and DVDs. With a platter of delicacies, stuffed, crumbled, preserved, baked, candied and oozing with decadence. By the fire. I have time and the expectation of  wonderful experiences from this month's munchreads.

Speaking of fires, Wingecarribee Shire Council is participating in the State Governments WPA Wood Smoke Reduction Program for 2014. Councils' role is to provide community education on techniques to reduce wood smoke pollution.
So, as you curl up with your hot chocolate in front of your fire, munch your way through some more information here http://www.wsc.nsw.gov.au/woodsmoke and help to create a healthier environment for our shire.
Helen