An eight-hundred page cookbook that begins with a quote from Goethe's Faust seems an unlikely candidate for a spot on a list of the best-selling books of the century, but Irma S. Rombauer's Joy of Cooking (first edition 1931), sold 14 million copies before 1997—a record that speaks for itself in terms of the enormous influence it has wielded in the development of social culture. In 1977 a revised edition was issued by its new publisher, Simon & Schuster, and despite the vast changes in the eating habits of American households over the decades, the detailed tome again landed on the best-seller lists. By the end of the twentieth century, it was the top-selling all-purpose cookbook in publishing history, deemed the bible of American culinary customs, from cocktails to custards.

Part of Joy of Cooking's success lies in the way it presents the art of food preparation...