Cast Iron Nation: Great American Cooking

The dessert chapter alone is worth it—I've already made three of the skillet sweets and each one turned out perfect. With 200 recipes, I'll never run out of ways to use my cast iron beyond cornbread.

The "new twists on old favorites" chapter is where this book really shines, I've already made three recipes from it and even the instructions for basic skillet cornbread are worth the price alone. Desserts section had me skeptical but the cast iron brownie adaptation came out perfectly crispy on the

The section on regional stews alone is worth the price—I've already cooked three dishes from it and each one had that deep, slow-cooked flavor my grandmother's kitchen used to have. Desserts included too, which surprised me, and the cobbler recipe turned out perfectly in my old skillet.