How to Play the Game Cookbook
It’s time to pull out your weirdest, most dated cookbooks and text your friends!
One night in December 2008, when I was in my early twenties, the snow began falling heavily like powdered sugar and didn’t stop for eleven days. My roommate Cynthia had declared that she wasn’t going to smoke weed anymore; she was only going to eat it. So I baked some weed shortbread cookies, we each ate one, and we didn’t stop dosing until the snow stopped falling a week and a half later. She told me that when we were done, it would be Christmas. I skipped work without calling in. We sledded and decorated a Christmas tree with the x-rated Shrinky Dinks my parents made in the early 80s. As the snow covered up the world as we knew it and Portlanders drove like toddlers in Little Tikes, I let the margins of my life shrink to my own neighborhood. It was the snowiest December on Portland record. The first day that I didn’t eat a weed cookie was Christmas. Cynthia had been right.
One night in the middle of that week, friends came over and someone (could have been me, I have no idea) cooked a pot roast. We were in that magic of snow when staying inside with loved ones feels like the totality of the world.
The shelving behind our dining room table is filled with my cookbooks as well as a bunch my parents have left behind. After we ate, someone began thumbing through them and before long we had invented a game called Cookbook, inspired by the game Dictionary. It has become my favorite game, hands down.
How do you play? One person selects a recipe that either has a cool name or with ingredients or instructions that are somehow evocative. They read the recipe aloud, omitting the name. Then all players write down a name for the recipe. They can write a name that attempts to fool people into thinking it’s the real one, or they can write something outlandish. Both tactics are great. The person who selected the recipe collects all the recipe names and then reads them aloud, slipping the real name into the mix. Then people vote. We’ve never had winners or losers because we’ve never kept track; we’re always too excited to simply keep playing.
A few weeks ago, as my birthday approached, I realized that a party of any kind was off the table (zoom birthday, no thank you!). I decided that perhaps if I created a version of this game by text, I could convince my friends from that era of my life to text me all day along—albeit with ridiculous recipe names. And so, I tried it out. It was even better than I’d dreamed. This game reveals the silliness of your friend’s minds and the diversity of human interpretation. If you are feeling lonely, if you want a lot of texts that make you grin, I highly recommend starting up a game of Cookbook with friends via text. Playing somehow transports me to that dreamy week, feeling very young, reckless, and goofy and building such a sweet loose energy with my friends.
How to Play Cookbook via Text
The following instructions are for the person “hosting.”
Choose a recipe. Take a photo of the ingredients and instructions but omit the recipe name. i.e.:
Send a group text with the recipe photo and let them know the book title and publication year. Assign a time (ideally 8 to 24 hours later) when everyone should send you, and only you, their name.
Collect the names as they arrive. (I put mine in a notes app.) Be sure to copy and paste rather than rewrite as that’s the best way to ensure you don’t make typos and the name, as entered, gets submitted. If certain people you expected to send in a name have not, give them a direct nudge.
Once the allotted amount of time has passed, begin sending the names to the group. Make sure each name is its own text. Once you have sent all names (including the real one), let them know it’s time to vote. Give them a certain amount of time to vote, say 1 to 6 hours.
Voting happens through “reactions” in two ways. A thumbs up means they think this is the real recipe name. A heart means this recipe name was their favorite. Near the end of the allotted amount of time, make sure everyone who entered a name has voted. If someone didn’t, send them a quick text reminding them to get their vote in. Here’s what it might look like:
Tally the votes. Count hearts and thumbs up separately. For example, if a name got 3 thumbs up and 1 heart, count those as separate tallies. i.e.:
There are three categories of winners: (1) those people who guessed the actual name, (2) whoever got the most thumbs up and therefore fooled the most people, and (3) whoever got the most hearts and therefore wrote the most beloved name. Announce the winners with their recipe names!
Pass the baton to another person in the group. Give them at least a week, or more, to find a recipe. This is an engrossing game while it’s happens so it’s nice to leave plenty of time between recipes for people’s phones to stop buzzing.
And a few additional petty tyrant rules so people don’t lose their minds:
Limit commentary about unrelated stuff.
Limit reactions to voting on recipe names and when you are truly moved.
As soon as this bores or annoys you, remove yourself.
How to Play Cookbook in Person
For your post-pandemic life…
What you need
A bunch of cookbooks—the more dated, the better—pens, and blank paper cut or ripped into business-card sized slips
Setup
Everyone takes one pen and a stack of paper slips. Cookbooks should be everywhere!
Number of players
4 to 10
How to Play
Everyone chooses a cookbook and looks for a recipe with a name that speaks to them. Whoever volunteers first becomes the Recipe Host for one round. Omitting the recipe name, the host reads the instructions aloud of the recipe they chose. If people ask, they can read it again.
Everyone writes the name they think the recipe should have on a slip of paper, folds it in half, and passes it to the host. The host writes the actual recipe name on a slip of paper and adds it to their hand. Once the host receives all entries, they shuffle them.
The host now reads all the entries aloud, at least once, often twice. Everyone votes aloud. The host makes a tally mark on the slips for every vote a given recipe receives. Then they reveal the true name.
How to score: Sadly, we have never gotten this far in our thinking. We just play for fun. You will have to decide if you care whether someone wins, and make this up for yourself.
Then someone new volunteers to be host and the game goes on, indefinitely.
Best Cookbook We’ve Found for Playing Cookbook
Oregon Cattle Country Cookbook
Personal Favorite Recipe Name
Oregon White Paella