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Introduction
This is a listing of sites that legally offer free Cooking, Food & Wine books , for reading and listening (audio).
All of these sites listed have content that is legal for them to distribute. If you find that any site listed is offering content that can not be legally transferred, please let me know in the comments below.
Also, I would appreciate it if you would post comments about any sites that you like or do not like so that information can be added to the site's listing here. This would help new users to decide which sites to try.
This list is not comprehensive and if you know of any other sites please post in the comments below or at our forums.
A comprehensive alphabetical listing of free books for reading or listening can be found on these pages:
There will be other books on Cooking, Food & Wine at the sites listed there, but they are not categorized at the sites. There are also links to other genre pages at those sites.
Libraries are also an excellent source for reading and listening materials for children. To find out more information on your local library, the links here may help: Library Information
There are 13 other book pages here at Gizmo's covering other various popular book genres and offering links to free online books listed here: Book Genre Pages
This page's listings can be accessed as follows:
Cooking, Food & Wine
2020k (CFW) Large collection, nicely divided into sub-categories, available for download in a variety of formats.
AssociatedContent has several cookbooks available for download in pdf. Most are short and specific (muffin recipes etc.), but the Chocolate recipe book is over 600 pages and the Blue Ribbon recipes are over 400 pages.
Bartleby has the famous 1918 Fannie Farmer The Boston Cooking-School Cook Book available for online viewing.
Bored.com (Cooking) has 70 cookbooks available for online viewing. Searchable by title. Some interesting entries.
Bookyards (CFW) 23 interesting cookbooks available in pdf download
ChestofBooks (Cooking) Around 100 books available for online viewing
CreativeHomemaking 
has a number of free cookbooks available for download in pdf. Some interesting entries here, including "How to Make a Gingerbread House".
DoverCentreBooks has a very large collection of links to online cookbooks. They are sorted alphabetically and since they are to a variety of download sites, the availability of online viewing and download formats vary.
e-booksdirectory has several interesting free cookbooks available for download in pdf (click on sub-categories on page).
e-cookbooks.net has 14 smaller cookbooks available for free download in pdf.
FreeBookSpot (Cooking) Around 30 cookbooks available in pdf download
Freeebooks.info (CFW) 18 books available for download in varying formats
FreeeBooksCanada has a large listing of free cookbooks available for download in pdf. Very interesting collection worth checking out.
FreeQuickRecipes 3 cookbooks available for download in pdf and a large amount of recipes for online viewing as well as other information on kitchen and diet
GetFreeBooks (Cooking) 6 cookbooks available in pdf download
Globusz (cooking) 3 cookbooks available for online viewing or download
GoogleBooks has a large number of free cookbooks under its "Cooking" category available for download in pdf. There are about 400 listings all together under that category and about half are full cookbooks.
Gutenberg (Cookery) Large collection of cookbooks and other informative food books available for download in several formats.
HealthRecipes 8 cookbooks available for download in pdf
Heygidday (Recipes) Large collection of cookbooks available for download in pdf
InternetArchive has over 1300 free ebooks under its "Cookery" heading. many are from the 1800s and while age has not much bearing on recipes, the books have an older view on a woman's place.
ManyBooks (Cooking) 108 cookbooks available for download in a variety of formats
Maria'sCouzina has 3 free cookbooks available for download in pdf. Two of the books are Greek recipes an the other is world cuisine. These appear to be shortened versions of the full cookbook, but still have some interesting entries and information.
MeatBook has an online cookbook image of the Ground Meat Cookbook available for online viewing.
MemoWare (Food and Nutrition) 266 works, including cookbooks and nutritional information available for download in varying formats
Nancy'sKitchen has a nice size collection of small cookbooks available for free download in pdf.
QuickFound has links to many and varied free online cookbooks for viewing and for download in pdf. Definitely worth checking out.
Vitalita The Vitalita Culinary Group is offering two free vegan cookbooks for download in text. A Taste of Vitality and Desserts of Vitality include pictures of the finished dishes.
Witguides (Cooking&Recipes) 26 cookbooks available for download in pdf (zipped)
Wowio (CFW) 18 books available for online viewing
Cooking, Food & Wine (Audio)
LibriVox has ten free audio books available for download in MP3 (64kb/128kb) or ogg vorbis. All are human read.
I assumed there would not be many audio books on Cooking as it would be hard to follow audio recipes and I could only find this one site. If you know of others, please post in the comments below.
Recipe Sites
I was not originally going to list recipe sites, but a few visitors listed recipe sites in the comments and I thought I would start this section. Only sites suggested by visitors will be listed here.
BBC Food has a database of over 10,000 recipes that can be searched by recipe title, chef or program. Also has feature of entering up to 3 ingredients for compatible recipes. Suggested by Torresmagnifico.
CookBooks.com supposedly has over 1 million recipes in its database that can be searched in every way imaginable, including ingredients. The only problem is the number of hits you get, so you have to get pretty specific. Information provided by Phil.
Epicurious has a large database of recipes that can be browsed in a good variety of ways.
FoodDownUnder has a large listing of recipes nicely divided into many clear categories.
Recipezaar is a recipe site that allows you to create your own cookbook (after registration). Many of the people who create cookbooks allow the books to be seen publicly, so this is also a cookbook site. You can search by recipe or ingredient and then filter by category or nutrition, which is helpful for those on restricted diets. Suggested by Torresmagnifico.
Wine & Other Alcohol
DrinkNation has a large database of alcoholic drinks that can be browsed in a variety of ways. They also have a "Your Bar" feature where you enter all the drink ingredients that you have and it gives drink recipes for those that can be made from your bar. This information can be saved there if you register.
QuickFound has a large listing of free books on wine available for download in pdf.
TheWebtender has a good size database of alcoholic drinks that can be browsed, searched in various ways and they also have an "In My Bar" feature where you enter in all the ingredients that you have and it will list all the drinks that can be made from those ingredients.
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Hi Steve,
I forgot to mention RecipeZaar, it has 385,000 recipes and if you become a member -by simply supplying an e-mail address- you can save your favourite recipes in your own personal cookbook. You can search by recipe or ingredient and then filter by category or nutrition. The latter I think is an excellent filter for people on restricted diets such as diabetics and others with high cholesterol etc.
https://secure.recipezaar.com/
Enjoy!
Torresmagnifico
Nice site. I like the fact that other peoples' cookbooks are available also.
Plus you gave a secure (https) link.
Thanks again
Steve
As a vegetarian I usually have problems but this site whilst not a vegetarian site is remarkable friendly and finds by ingredients and other search patterns
http://fooddownunder.com/
Oh yeah, that site looks real good.
I am going to add a recipe site section above and that will definitely be there.
Thanks
Steve
Try this, OK they are not books but there are over 10,000 recipes, which you can search for by ingredients, TV show or chef!
http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/
Torresmagnifico
I originally was not adding recipe sites, but then I decided that they are just as valuable as books if they have good recipes.
So I will add the site you suggest in when I have time.
Thanks
Steve
Edit: I notice they also have a search by ingredient feature.
I live in a small country town in Australia - these sites will be invaluable as I love cooking different things, but if I buy another cook book or food magazine - my bookshelf in the kitchen will collapse.
Thanks!!
jellibabi557
What a great list...there are definitely a ton of books available, however, I don't have time to go through them all so I would appreciate it if anyone could recommend a book/site that would make recipe/meal recommendations based on ingredients that I type in (already have in the house). The same would be incredibly handy for mixed drinks as well. Since I'm at work I'm unable to devote the appropriate search time now and will likely forget by the time I get home and my attention is fully diverted to/by my 16 month old.
Thanks in advance,
-John
try www.epicurious.com
Good site.
I will add in above when I get a chance.
Thanks
Steve
http://www.cook-books.com
Supposedly 1,000,000 recipes, searchable in every way imaginable, including ingredients. I have had this one bookmarked for at least 10 yrs and have used a lot of recipes. Thje only problem is the number of hits you get, so you have to get pretty specific.
Enjoy
Phil
I guess you have to register to search.
I will take a look around this site when I have the time and will probably add to above list.
Thanks
Steve
I was adding some sites in today and in my search did run across a site that did the meals. I did not save it, but searching now I found two.
AllRecipes looks to be a bit better:
http://allrecipes.com/Search/Ingredients.aspx
There is also recipe matcher
http://www.recipematcher.com/
At Drink Nation you can enter in the alcohols and other ingredients you have and then search for drinks that can be made with those. You can register so it saves that info.
http://www.drinknation.com/bar
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