High temperatures. Sharp blades. Batters, goos, and the occasional splash of blistering vegetable fat. Doesn't it sound like the perfect place to do a little reading?

A working kitchen may be the wrong place to make a commitment to Infinite Jest, but cookbooks rank right up with good knives and quality cookware as essential tools for running your kitchen.

No matter what your level of culinary expertise, a good shelf of food books adds immeasurably to your cooking by providing ideas and a place to turn when the inevitable questions arise. Whether you follow recipes to the letter or use them as a loose framework for improvisation, it always helps to have reference materials for answers or inspiration.

But a bookstore's "Cookbooks" section is likely to trigger an intense case of option anxiety for novice food enthusiasts. Among the million new releases describing the joys of every kind of cookery, where should you begin reading? And, almost as important, where should you stop?

To get your kitchen library started, allow me to give you a guided tour of my kitchen bookshelves. With any luck, these books will see you through many years of happy cooking.

Just watch the grease, OK?