My family's insane for this book. Me, I'm more of a Southern Living type of girl. Regardless, my best suggestion is that you go to ebay. These books have been around forever and should be available for a low price.

We love watching them on PBS on Sundays. I bought the Cook's Country cookbook last year on Amazon for $25. Hubby is fascinated with the show and the concept.

I got the book, we just did the Pork Ragu, very good.

I subscribed to cooks illustrated from the start (a very long time ago now!), and think they are great. I don't subscribe any more because there's only so many zillion recipes one can collect...the recipes are generally very well tested and solid, and will deliver a good to very good version of whatever it is. For more ethnic recipes, they tend to provide a solid middle of the road version of whatever it is. .chris kimball is no longer associated with the outfit, but he wasn't much into spicy foods, so the heat measure tends to be mild on their recipes (but that is easily adjusted to taste). Some times they have a lot of steps involved, that once you try to the recipe, you can then adjust (perhaps fewer pots). They have a famous pie crust recipe which calls for 2T vodka. They have a lot of books and mrspete is exactly right -- get them used, inexpensively!

I'm a huge fan. I get the magazine and joined online.

My son gave me a magazine subscription. I kept it a while, but let it go. I highly recommend "The New Family Cookbook" and "Cook's Illustrated Cookbook". Everything I have made from them is great. To me it is much easier to search a cookbook than to go through the magazine. Their Swedish meatballs is now my standard, as well as their pork loin roast. I also found Chop Suey, which we used to call goulash when I was growing up and my grandkids love it. I could type favorites for hours. Yes, I also have cut the number of steps and pots after I have mastered the recipe. Middle of the road seasoning is great, because while I like highly spiced, my husband does not. I also have "The Meat Cookbook", but I haven't used it as much for some reason.

I don't care much for the magazine, which I've subscribed to off and on and will like two issues out of a year of, and don't really like the show at all though that's on a do I want to sit through and pay attention level, but I have one or two of the cookbooks and they seem fine. I have others I prefer, generally, but occasionally they'll have something I'm looking for. I think they put too much theory and not enough flavor in a lot of their recipes.

I got an older America's Test Kitchen Family Cookbook (large red binder) in a box of free cookbooks. I prefer cookbooks over leafing through magazines to find a recipe.

I have bought one or two for Christmas presents for my foodie sons.

I am a huge fan. I subscribe to the magazines and website; I also own several of the cook books. Many times you can find discounted copies of the books at Costco and BJ's. Annie, I also baked the English current scones to rave reviews.

MJ

I used to watch the shows on Saturday morning while I still had television, and I get the magazines. I have a really BIG cookbook that Elery got me for Christmas a couple of years ago and I have their gluten free cookbook.

I think there are some unnecessary steps in some of their recipes, but I've not had a failure yet. Their lemon bars are my favorite, as is their shortbread. I bake my turkey at Thanksgiving per the CI instructions, since I carve in the kitchen and don't need a whole bird for presentation. I seldom agreed with their tastings, though, and always liked what they did not. Go figure.

Breakfast sausage? Now that's Alton Brown's recipe all the way, and I was one of those people who found Christopher Kimball enormously entertaining, so I'm probably not missing seeing ATK anyway.

Annie

Most of the Cooks Illustrated recipes are very good, but I find all the non-dessert recipes too salty. So with every recipe, I halve the salt, and like the results very much.

Very often you can find the recipes online at other websites, so that you don't have to pay for a Cooks Illustrated online subscription.

They do on occasion have some clunker recipes, that are just awful. But I think that is the case with every cookbook and/or cooking show. One comes to mind is the French Apple Cake. I made it after seeing it on the TV show where they oohed and ahed over how delicious it was. I followed each step to the letter. It was inedible. Herere is that recipe, and read the bad reviews, on food dot com: http://www.food.com/recipe/french-apple-cake-cooks-illustrated-487003

I also enjoy the equipment reviews from Cooks Illustrated. The only caveat is that they test for best functionality, but do not test for longevity. Sometimes their recommended items break quickly. Cooks Illustrated sometimes comes back the following year to revisit the equipment they tested, and say honestly that they received complaints due to the lack of longevity, so they are re-testing to look for a better option.

The magazine subscription is the way to go!

I'd be concerned about a mag subscription after my experience with cooking light. I'd get their magazine, and it seems that every issue published a recipe correction from one or more issues earlier. I'm sorry, but I'm not so organized that I'm going to pour through old mags looking to match the recipe with the correction...so then I stopped trusting any of their recipes. I figure a book has to have been proofread more thoroughly.

I was a charter subscriber to Cooks Illustrated. Loved the magazine, but no longer get it because I couldn't throw any away and was drowning in magazines.
There is so much more to a cooking magazine than recipes, I like the articles on other things and of course the ads.

I pay once a year for access to all their publications online. I can read each month's issue of each every month. I have been getting the mags from day-one and went online as soon as available. I also have all their books and have given many as gifts to family members. ou could say I'm hooked.

I received a free copy of ATK's Pressure Cooker cookbook from Amazon.com to review. It was truly horrible. All of the cooking times were waaaaaay over stated and the food tasted like cardboard.

I agree with Friedajune that the recipes are too salty - they even put salt in dessert recipes that do not need salt at all. I do watch the show, but more for equipment tips than anything else, although on a rare occasion I will learn a tip from one of their techniques. Most of what I see on the show I learned long ago, and their recipes do tend to be on the bland, Americanized side. I make things a lot spicier than they do, which is why I find their recipes boring, but they do appeal to a certain mass audience, which they do identify as American. They were extremely slow to pick up on the "dry salt" method for roasting turkey, and they use way too many brines, which I find dilute the flavors of the meats. Their barbecues are also always too sweet. Anyway - just not my taste, but I do find the show entertaining at times, although I will turn it off if one of the chefs annoys me. I like Christopher, Bridget, Jack, and Adam; Julia is okay, except when she rolls her eyes back in her head during tastings as if in some sort of religious ecstasy a la Teresa de Ávila. There are some younger guys that I never watch, due to their annoying speech habits. One of them begins every sentence with "So" and often with "So Chris..." He has a bit of an attitude problem also, and so I change channels when he comes on. I've watched him so little that I cannot remember his name. Fortunately, he is not on that much.

The amount of salt doesn't bother me, as I never, ever use the amount of salt called for in any recipe. I salt for my tastes, which is using very little. Except chips, I loooove chips.

I like the show a lot and have it on auto-record on my TiVo. I also have the magazine subscription which I love, and read the minute it arrives in my mail. In particular, the magazine has no advertising (like Consumer Reports), which makes me trust their food test and equipment tests results more. (Lindac92 said above she likes the ads so perhaps she is talking about something else?).

I agree the CI recipes use too much salt, but actually with every recipe I make, regardless of where I get it from, I use my own judgement about the salt.

One thing that bothers me is that the TV show recipe steps and measurements sometimes don't match the same recipe when they print it in the magazine. I just use my best guess when I see that.

I am not sad to see Chris Kimball leave the show and the magazine. He always made it seem that he was smug about that someone should live in Boston or Vermont, or else you didn't quite measure up. His editorials at the beginning of each magazine were insufferable about his Perfect New England Life. Just my impression, and am looking forward to new TV seasons without him there. I think they'll be even better.

I enjoy watching the shows and the personalities, as well as the science behind their recipes. I've learned lots about how protein reacts to heat and the differences in the starch or proteins in different foods. I also heard that Kimball is no longer involved but that this year's shows had already been filmed. I've yet to see an episode without him. It will be interesting to see how it changes.

I have their "Cover and Bake" cookbook. It's OK. Most recipes a little too involved for me but all I have made have tasted pretty good.

The one cookbook I have has one page of recipe, and 3 of what they tried and how that method failed and why. A waste of paper IMO. The recipes were good though. I don't use much salt, if any, so I ignore that! LOL Nancy