Cookbooks Plus: Three Quirky New Shops
These bookstores offer serious home cooks more than recipes.
Rabelais in Portland, ME
The owners—a rare-book appraiser and a former pastry chef—stock quirky texts like notes written in 1905 on breeding pigs for bacon. 86 Middle St.; rabelaisbooks.com.
La Cocotte in Paris
The owner sells her own line of tea towels and aprons as well as great cookbooks. 5 rue Paul Bert; lacocotte.net.
Mmmmh! in Brussels
This year-old cooking school–cum–bookshop also sells esoteric ingredients like Orleans vinegar. 92 de la Chaussée de Charleroi; mmmmh.be.