Your parameters exclude most of my favorites, but one that never fails me for good home cooking, though I think doesn't include cocktails, is the Black Family Reunion Cookbook.

We have a cookbook club but we change cookbooks each month. So we may not do a cookbook in the same depth as you but we have 10 months of different kinds and styles of cooking. I know one of our favorites was Lidias.

I love JT's Volume 1...Every recipe is fabulous. But I don't think there are any cocktails in there...but her carrot cake, butter bright rolls crab and spinach mousse timbales.
It's out of print but available used and very cheap.

I like all the recipes that I've tried from the Frugal Gourmet cookbooks, especially the first one, but I also especially the the Immigrant Ancestors book. If you rule out specific cuisines, then I guess you could not consider Justin Wilson's books, since they are essentially Cajun, but to me they represent the way I cook much of the time.

It occurs to me that if you really want drinks included, an entertaining cookbook, rather than a recipes cookbook, is the thing to look for. The kind of thing celebrity chefs (or just celebrities) put out that's more geared to a complete meal at a time, like your group does.

We might need to re-think the cocktails. I think that is causing us to overlook some fantastic cookbooks. Not that we are going to give up the cocktails ;-) but maybe we need a separate source for them.

LindaC, I'm blanking out on "JT." Who is that?

plllog, I looked at the "Black Family Reunion Cookbook" (as much as I could on Amazon). Being from the South, it was like reading a cookbook written by my mother or my grandmother! Gumbo, peach cobbler, red beans and rice! Many of the dishes are already in our repertoires, however, it did cause me to look at some of Edna Lewis' cookbooks. I find "The Gift of Southern Cooking" especially appealing.

Martha, do each of your members buy a new cookbook each month? How does it work? Maybe our group could switch things up for the coming year. Tell me more, please.

Lars, one of the cookbooks we are considering is the River Road series from the Baton Rouge Junior League. I suppose it could be argued that those recipes are Cajun. I think I'd like to explore one of Diana Kennedy's cookbooks, but I really can't imagine us having Mexican food for lunch for 8 months.

Our menu yesterday from "Cooking for Jeffrey" was Aperol Spritzer; English Oat Crackers with fruit and cheese; Brisket with Leeks and Onions; Tsimmes; Raspberry Roasted Applesauce with vanilla ice cream. We had a beet and orange salad from another Ina Garten cookbook. I can highly recommend the brisket! It is the one recipe from yesterday, that I will make again.

bbstx -- no, our rule is that NO ONE has to BUY the cookbook. Sometimes we chose a "chef" (Ina Garten) while other times a theme (Italian) and occasionally, we DO cook from the SAME book and that is passed around at the meeting before and we all take pictures of what we want to make. With a chef or theme, there are plenty of recipes on line or if you have a book in that category, you can cook from that. We even did one of "Church Lady Cookbooks" and you could use whichever one you wanted so we had a big variety -- in fact NO ONE cooked from the same book. We alternate what we're bringing, having a rotating list with the hostess always providing any drinks and the main dish -- the rest of us bring dessert, salad, vegetable, starch, bread -- we have duplicate on some items as there are more than 5 in the group. But that's fine because often we have some that can't make it.

Last month we did "pizza" and cooked together in the kitchen of our Catholic church -- we had an amazing variety of pizza and one of the members brought "Pizza dip" so we had an app and another brought a "dessert pizza" so we had a sweet. Our other "etched in stone" rule is that you cannot have fixed the dish before -- you can have EATEN it but nothing you take is a tried and true! Because it is supposed to be a learning experience. We've had non bakers bring amazing desserts and members that were yeast challenged produce perfect loaves.

The hostess selects the theme for the month and provides any alcoholic drink and main course. That's another rule.

It's fun this is our third year and we've had some amazing meals!

What about the classic French chefs, even Julia and Jacques? Try something new from either of them!

I'm still having a hard time wrapping my head around why you wouldn't want to try regional cuisines. Whether your region is Japan, Mexico, Italy or Russia, or even San Diego, CA, there's a whole gamut of foods that the people actually eat. The foods we eat at classic Mexican restaurants--the tacos, burritos and enchiladas, etc.--aren't what most Mexicans make at home. There are something like a dozen regional cuisines within Mexico, with different flavors which should all suit a Texas tongue. And even in your boonies, I'd think a lot of the ingredients might be available.

The books I want to crawl into and dwell in are Yotam Ottolenghi's Jerusalem and Plenty. There are flavors from all over, not just Israel, and quite a bit of variety, but it's all food I'd love to eat (if I were only not so busy with other cooking obligations).

If your crowd likes fancy cocktails--which I assume given the idea of having recipes--may I suggest Bar Rescue? It's a TV show about saving bars from going bankrupt, and they always have an expert mixologist creating drinks for each bar, showing the recipes on the screen. There are severalPinterest pages that show the recipes (not just links). Those would be new and no extra book required.

Interesting format, Martha. We have 8 members, 8 courses, and meet for 8 months a year. I don't think a greater number would work for us because we have a seated luncheon. We go full out - china, crystal, silver, fresh flowers, etc.

At the beginning of the year, we all buy the same book. A spreadsheet is drawn up with which month who is responsible for what. The hostess makes the entree and last month's hostess gets a breather. She only brings wine and bread, which does not have to be homemade. I guess our immutable rule is even if you can't come, you still have to send your dish or get another member to make it for you.

When we first started, we were all doing trial runs of our dishes before each luncheon. Then we got comfortable, realized we are all good cooks, and stopped the trial runs.

The hostess selects and prepares the entree. Then each member tries to make a complementary dish. The closest we've come to a theme is one month we made "brunch" instead of lunch.

I'm going to bring up your chef/theme ideas at our next luncheon! Maybe we'll break out of our cookbook box! Thanks for sharing!

plllog, if we adopt Martha's group's way of choosing chefs and/or themes, we might be able to do more ethnic/regional cuisine. But I just don't think our group would do a year of Japanese cooking, for example.

I'm glad you mentioned Yotam Ottolenghi's book. It reminded me to look back at the Splendid Table for inspiration. As I run up and down the highway, I listen to The Splendid Table podcasts. I'm bereft that Lynn Rosetto Casper is retiring. Even though Francis Lam is certainly knowledgeable, I could listen to Lynn's voice forever!

Thanks for the Pinterest link!

Oh, and bbstx, we find that the "potluck gods" always smile on us -- we DO NOT talk about the entree nor if there are two desserts or two salads those members do not talk with each other but we always have a dinner where the sides and dessert compliment the main course and we have no duplicates! I should have mentioned that we have 11 members but most often there are one or two that cannot make it --obviously we have a hostess -- then with two salads, vegetables and desserts, there should be at least one. We do only have one signed up each for starch or bread and if they cannot come, we just skip it! If you want to see some of our past selections, go to my blog: lflinderhof.com and at the side, it gives a list of categories, find "cookbook book club" or cookbook club" and click on it. It should bring all of them up.

The River Road series is not Cajun cooking.

Oh, I'm sorry to hear that Lynn Rosetto Casper is retiring.

To quickly follow up about "River Road Recipes". While there are recipes for many classic creole & cajun dishes, it offers much more than that. It's a general cookbook series with Southern flare. I have I & II and both are excellent.

Just an FYI -- our Cookbook Book Club theme for this month is "breakfast for dinner" . . . I have Marion Cunningham's Breakfast Book and Brunch at Mildred Pierce's plus a bunch of bed and breakfast cookbooks. I'm sure I'll find something fantastic!

Martha, I enjoyed reading your blog about your cookbook club. Sounds like y'all have great fun and super road trips!

If you need a meat to pair with it, try Millionaire Bacon. I first ate Millionaire Bacon at Fred's Coffee Shop in Sausalito, CA. It was divine. I use the recipe below from BaconToday.com, except I cut back on the cayenne and black pepper. I probably only use 1/2 teaspoon of each. And, 5 Tablespoons of brown sugar will only cover a bit over a 1/2 lb of bacon for me.

Millionaire Bacon

1 pound of thick-cut bacon
5 tbsp packed brown sugar
1 tsp. Cayenne Pepper
1 tsp. Black Pepper

Directions:
Line a baking pan with foil. Combine all of your spices and sugar together into a bowl and mix thoroughly. If you want your bacon more coated in sweet and spicy flavor, add more ingredients to your liking. Apply liberally to each strip of bacon by taking each strip and hand rubbing them. Bake until crisp for 20- 30 minutes (depending upon your crispy liking).

Please let your bacon cool a little after you’ve made this recipe.

NOTE from bbstx: Keep a close eye on the bacon after about the 15 minute mark. The ends will burn. I sometimes cover the ends with strips of foil to prevent burning. Do not attempt to drain this bacon on paper towels. You will end up picking little pieces of paper off the very sticky bacon - or, if you're like me, you'll get frustrated and just eat the little giblets of paper!

Thanks for the recipes -- they both look good.