What is the lure of a beautiful cookbook?  What is it exactly that draws me in, lifts my hand to the cover, begs me to open it to see inside?  I have a confession…I am a closet cookbook addict.  Addict, you say?  How can you be addicted to cookbooks?  They’re so practical, so useful! 

Yes.  Yes, they are.  Provided you actually use them.  But when you do like I do, stalk the pretty ones, drool over photos, purchase to add to the shelf of gorgeous potential – well, it gets a little sad.  Why do I keep buying them?

Case in point?  My latest indulgence, the eye-poppingly tantilizing David Rocco’s Dolce Vita:

I dare you to flip through this book without wanting to take it home, make it a cup of espresso, gaze at it lovingly and start talking about your future together.  People talk about food porn, and yes, okay, there is a certain lustful quality about the photos of delectable dishes, fresh ingredients and the lure of life in Italy.  But for me, it really is about dolce vita, translation:  ”the sweet life”.  This is the best definition I’ve ever come across to describe what I spend my days trying to create.  What I want most of all for myself, my family, my kids.

So does buying the cookbooks become part of the sweet life for me?  Is it the time I steal from the overflowing lists of things to do?  Time to sip a coffee, wander a bookstore, dream of days with nothing else to do but savour time, food, cooking, wine?  Yes, that counts.  For me, that is a moment of sweetness.

Having them in my kitchen, knowing that all this potential lies at my fingertips, that someday my life will slow down enough to create some of the beauty that lies between the covers of each volume.  Knowing that perhaps the quiet, sweet life I dream of lies around the corner of all this chaos…yes, that counts too. 

Dreaming of seeing the Italian countryside for myself someday, imagining the warmth of the sun, the smells of the markets, the taste of the wine counts also.

Back to real life.  For now, I’ll be happy with what I have.  A life that has much sweetness of its own, and a little time to gaze dreamily at this:

and this:

and this:

What are your favourite “dreamy” cookbooks?  Have you ever bought a gorgeous cookbook and not used it?  Are your cookbook purchases always practical?  

*Please note:  the photos above are my photos of this beautiful book open on my counter offering inspiration and temptation.  In no way do I mean to suggest that the actual photos are MY photography…the book lists Francesco Lastrucci as the photographer, as well as additional photography by Devon Tsz-Kin Hong and Rutendo Sabeta.  This is just to give you an impression of the beauty of this book.  In real life, the book is packed with photos like these, each more beautiful than the next…none of them taken by me.  ; )