If I claimed to be a collector of anything, it would be cookbooks. My house is a collector of dirty dishes and mismatched children’s socks, but that’s an entirely different story. Cookbooks are displayed throughout my home on bookshelves and coffee tables, readily available to peruse at any time. I love to read them for various reasons: the connection to a chef or a place that I’m fond of, the pictures, or the recipes. But my favorite aspect of a good cookbook is the narrative, and Vertamae Smart-Grosvenor is the ultimate storyteller through her book Vibration Cooking. 

On the surface, you can see what initially attracted me to Vibration Cooking. An African American woman from South Carolina’s low country sails off to Paris at nineteen to live among the bohemians and make a path for herself. Vertamae was a poet, an actress, a writer, a culinary anthropologist and a commentator on NPR. Just to name a few things. She wrote Vibration Cooking to document her travels, her philosophy on food as culture, and her life’s experiences through the lens of a well-cooked meal. She is a woman after my own heart and with a mutual connection to these two parts of the world that shaped my appreciation for food.

But we’ve been told since elementary school not to judge a book by its cover, and there is certainly much more to Vibration Cooking than what is printed on the back of the book.

One of the things that makes Vibration Cooking so unique is that it’s equal parts cookbook and memoir. It’s hard to decipher where one ends and the other begins. Stories flow into recipes, and her recipes are tightly connected to people, places and moments in time. As Vertamae notes, “Back in the day, a cookbook had about a page and a half of introduction, recipes and no narrative. Coming from a culture of storytellers, I wanted to tell stories about the gatherings, the people, the food, and the history of food.”

Contrary to a world where images of food on social media can make you famous, Vibration Cooking does not contain any pictures within its pages. And if you’re looking for precise measurements on how many eggs to use or how much salt to add, you can forget it. Any measurement that Vertamae provides is approximate. Think of it like the technical challenge on “The Great British Baking Show”.  As Vertamae will tell you, “When I cook, I never measure or weigh anything. I cook by vibration. I can tell by the look and smell of it.” She wants you to do you. Take liberties in the kitchen and use your senses to guide you. 

If I had a dollar for every time I highlighted a quote in this book, I’d be at least $50 richer. Vertamae is full of wit and wisdom. You can’t help but love her. She demystifies food in a way that is simple yet meaningful, putting the emphasis on “being able to turn the daily ritual of cooking for your family into a beautiful everyday happening”.  And when it comes to expressing herself, she once told a man in the courtyard of the Sorbonne in Paris “I am who I think I am. I am free and free to define myself.” How’s that for a daily mantra?

It’s been over fifty years since Vibration Cooking was published, but Vertamae Smart-Grosvenor’s book is just as relevant today as it was in in 1970. I’d highly recommend it for those of you who love to cook, to learn about food culture from different perspectives, or are simply looking for a book to add to your list of “must reads”.