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Cook's Illustrated
Frequency of all magazines subject to change without notice. Additional double issues may be published, which count as 2 issues. We reserve the right to substitute gifts of equal or greater value. Applicable sales tax will be added. U.S. orders only. Offer void in Vermont.
4.8 star rating 26 Reviews
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Verified Reviewer
0.0 star rating 01/18/21
J
Janet J.
Verified Buyer
5.0 star rating 12/24/20
A magazine that?s impossible to throw away - ever.
Review by Janet J. on 24 Dec 2020
A great periodical to treasure - I thoroughly read and then re-read all of my saved issues years later. Love this magazine?s informative quality. Don?t miss the advertisements that plague most magazines. The recipes are detailed, with much-appreciated explanations of variations which improve on the recipe results. I enjoy reading the many practical kitchen tips sent in by readers. Most of all, I look forward to reading about the reviews of kitchen equipment and cooking ingredients - then go to Amazon.com & compare reviews (and watch how the magazine?s reviews impact Amazon?s price & availability of the top-reviewed items).
On Cook's Illustrated
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arnold s.
Verified Buyer
5.0 star rating 12/04/20
Great Cooking Magazine
Review by arnold s. on 4 Dec 2020
Great Cooking Magazine
On Cook's Illustrated
S
SANFORD S.
Verified Buyer
5.0 star rating 08/19/20
E
Erin H.
Verified Buyer
5.0 star rating 08/07/20
Great magazine for the chef
Review by Erin H. on 7 Aug 2020
Great magazine for the chef or novice cooker in your lift
On Cook's Illustrated
B
Bea M.
Verified Buyer
5.0 star rating 05/07/20
Love to read it cover to cover.
Review by Bea M. on 7 May 2020
Love the recipes and suggestions for making cooking easier. Always has great information and why a recipe works or has been improved. I am not always interested in the equipment reviews but when I need something for the kitchen I do tend to look it up digitally. I love the photos of the recipes and sometimes just HAVE to try to make what?s pictured.
On Cook's Illustrated
D
Debbie C.
Verified Buyer
5.0 star rating 04/06/20
Cooks Illustrated
Review by Debbie C. on 6 Apr 2020
Love this magazine. Lots of subscribers input!
On Cook's Illustrated
B
Barbara L.
Verified Buyer
5.0 star rating 03/19/20
Cook's Review
Review by Barbara L. on 19 Mar 2020
Did not realize how much I had missed this magazine. So happy to be receiving it again.
On Cook's Illustrated
M
MARY
Verified Buyer
5.0 star rating 02/29/20
Cook's Illustrated
Review by MARY on 29 Feb 2020
Excellent resource for all cooks. Easy to follow recipe instructions.
On Cook's Illustrated
B
Bphav614
Verified Buyer
5.0 star rating 09/29/19
Great Magazine
Review by Bphav614 on 29 Sep 2019
My wife loves this magazine she loves the recipes and has saved every issue for the last 10 years or more
On Cook's Illustrated
S
Sewist
Verified Buyer
5.0 star rating 08/17/19
I save and dog-ear Cook's Illustrated, give away other magazines
Review by Sewist on 17 Aug 2019
If you love cooking, read this magazine. If you want to learn how to cook or cook more, read this magazine. I read it cover-to-cover each month, and look forward to cooking new things and trying new techniques. I flip through back issues to review tips and favorite recipes. Delta: no web access.
I bought a copy of Cook's Illustrated French Recipes on a whim a few years ago, unusual for me, and weirder still because I'm vegetarian. I still have the same magazine, with pages taped in because it's that good. I save each issue, and plan to buy the annuals, something it never occurred to me to doâ??am I a library? I regularly donate my other magazines as soon as I'm done reading them.
The recipes are easy to follow and the articles explain why you should use which ingredients and preparation steps, which is important both for new recipes, and for applying new techniques to familiar recipes, for example a southern cornbread recipe last November, something I've been making my whole life. (I skipped the northern cornbread recipe because wth is that?)
There's several recipes a month that are vegetarian and a few more that are easy to adapt to be vegetarian. Many have a note regarding common adaptations, although if you are just starting out cooking gluten free or vegan, or are inexperienced, YMMV. For me, even the recipes I'll never cook often have tips I'll definitely use, such as one for pitting niçoise olives in a towel with a rolling pin that was tucked into a recipe for coq-a-vin or something that I wished I had seen a year earlier.
The tips are amazing, and I've been cooking my whole life, I'm comfortable in the kitchen, and I'm confident with equipment. I have the spread on honing a knife propped up in my recipe holder now. (I took a knife skills class at a cooking school in my early 20s, and it was the best money I ever spent. Reminders are always welcome.)
If you've seen America's Test Kitchen, you'll be familiar with the type of tips they offer, like cutting cherry tomatoes in half by placing them between two deli lids. I'm not necessarily a gadget person, and I definitely plan to buy a fish turner, a type of spatula I've never owned since I don't eat fish, based on a recent article on its utility. It's wider, it lifts more, it won't melt to the pan like my Chewbacca spatula (RIP).
The magazine is printed on thick matte paper with a protective coating, and I don't feel the need to scan it or copy a recipe in order to use it in the kitchen. My fingers don't smear the ink while I'm reading it or turning the pages while cooking, and it easily stands up in any of my recipe holders.
The equipment and ingredient reviews are reliable and helpful. While not as thorough as Consumer Reports, and I'm not suggesting they need to be, they haven't steered me wrong, they review equipment at a reasonable price point, widely available ingredients (as another reviewer mentioned), and they're regularly updated. I'm not sure what their policy is (as another person points out, no ads, and that's a plus), but I rate their reliability closer to Consumer-Reports than a women's magazine or a site like Buzzfeed, where I know the editors are in a codependent relationship with the products they're recommending.
For example, I was pleased that the highest rated chef's knife in a recent issue was the one I purchased for around $25 at a kitchen supply store two years ago. An example of an update is that in the French collection I bought in 2016, the editors recommend Plugra European butter over Land of Lakes for pastry. This summer they updated to say the results from Land of Lakes are just as good. I'm on a budget, and where I live, the American butter is half the price, so it's welcome news. I am glad I splurged on the Williams-Sonoma loaf pansâ??best I've ever had, and you'll pull my Le Creuset from my cold, dead hands.
I've never subscribed to Martha, but I've certainly made some of her recipes, and saved more because they're aspirational. Same with Better Homes & Garden, etc. Usually I've either looked up the recipe online to save or torn it out of the magazine and left it in a waiting room for someone else. With Cook's Illustrated, I go back and back, and I save the issues. The baguette is so good that I refuse to eat any otherâ??store bought, obviously, or farmers market. Mine is so much better.
The negative is that the print subscription doesn't include website access, not even to the current issue. I use the AnyList app for grocery shopping (and other shopping for that matter), and would love to be able to add recipes to it easily, and then add ingredients and equipment to my shopping lists and household budget. Because Cook's Illustrated is owned by America's Test Kitchen, the website subscription is through that site, and it's pricy. It includes quite a bit, but it doesn't include the print magazine. I'm a millennial, but I actually like print. Weird, I know. Consumer Reports and most other magazines give you an option and different subscription levels. It's really frustrating. I learned this when I was looking for a specific piece of equipment and couldn't remember which issue it was reviewed in. They don't have an index, either. Long story short, they have an affiliate link on Amazon.
I bought a copy of Cook's Illustrated French Recipes on a whim a few years ago, unusual for me, and weirder still because I'm vegetarian. I still have the same magazine, with pages taped in because it's that good. I save each issue, and plan to buy the annuals, something it never occurred to me to doâ??am I a library? I regularly donate my other magazines as soon as I'm done reading them.
The recipes are easy to follow and the articles explain why you should use which ingredients and preparation steps, which is important both for new recipes, and for applying new techniques to familiar recipes, for example a southern cornbread recipe last November, something I've been making my whole life. (I skipped the northern cornbread recipe because wth is that?)
There's several recipes a month that are vegetarian and a few more that are easy to adapt to be vegetarian. Many have a note regarding common adaptations, although if you are just starting out cooking gluten free or vegan, or are inexperienced, YMMV. For me, even the recipes I'll never cook often have tips I'll definitely use, such as one for pitting niçoise olives in a towel with a rolling pin that was tucked into a recipe for coq-a-vin or something that I wished I had seen a year earlier.
The tips are amazing, and I've been cooking my whole life, I'm comfortable in the kitchen, and I'm confident with equipment. I have the spread on honing a knife propped up in my recipe holder now. (I took a knife skills class at a cooking school in my early 20s, and it was the best money I ever spent. Reminders are always welcome.)
If you've seen America's Test Kitchen, you'll be familiar with the type of tips they offer, like cutting cherry tomatoes in half by placing them between two deli lids. I'm not necessarily a gadget person, and I definitely plan to buy a fish turner, a type of spatula I've never owned since I don't eat fish, based on a recent article on its utility. It's wider, it lifts more, it won't melt to the pan like my Chewbacca spatula (RIP).
The magazine is printed on thick matte paper with a protective coating, and I don't feel the need to scan it or copy a recipe in order to use it in the kitchen. My fingers don't smear the ink while I'm reading it or turning the pages while cooking, and it easily stands up in any of my recipe holders.
The equipment and ingredient reviews are reliable and helpful. While not as thorough as Consumer Reports, and I'm not suggesting they need to be, they haven't steered me wrong, they review equipment at a reasonable price point, widely available ingredients (as another reviewer mentioned), and they're regularly updated. I'm not sure what their policy is (as another person points out, no ads, and that's a plus), but I rate their reliability closer to Consumer-Reports than a women's magazine or a site like Buzzfeed, where I know the editors are in a codependent relationship with the products they're recommending.
For example, I was pleased that the highest rated chef's knife in a recent issue was the one I purchased for around $25 at a kitchen supply store two years ago. An example of an update is that in the French collection I bought in 2016, the editors recommend Plugra European butter over Land of Lakes for pastry. This summer they updated to say the results from Land of Lakes are just as good. I'm on a budget, and where I live, the American butter is half the price, so it's welcome news. I am glad I splurged on the Williams-Sonoma loaf pansâ??best I've ever had, and you'll pull my Le Creuset from my cold, dead hands.
I've never subscribed to Martha, but I've certainly made some of her recipes, and saved more because they're aspirational. Same with Better Homes & Garden, etc. Usually I've either looked up the recipe online to save or torn it out of the magazine and left it in a waiting room for someone else. With Cook's Illustrated, I go back and back, and I save the issues. The baguette is so good that I refuse to eat any otherâ??store bought, obviously, or farmers market. Mine is so much better.
The negative is that the print subscription doesn't include website access, not even to the current issue. I use the AnyList app for grocery shopping (and other shopping for that matter), and would love to be able to add recipes to it easily, and then add ingredients and equipment to my shopping lists and household budget. Because Cook's Illustrated is owned by America's Test Kitchen, the website subscription is through that site, and it's pricy. It includes quite a bit, but it doesn't include the print magazine. I'm a millennial, but I actually like print. Weird, I know. Consumer Reports and most other magazines give you an option and different subscription levels. It's really frustrating. I learned this when I was looking for a specific piece of equipment and couldn't remember which issue it was reviewed in. They don't have an index, either. Long story short, they have an affiliate link on Amazon.
On Cook's Illustrated