i agree about taste.com - good site but when you're a beginner, you type in one phrase and SO MANY recipes for that come up, it is confusing to know which one to use. I typed in carrot cake and got SO MANY recipes pop up.

some great ideas in this thread, of simpler books. (eg less recipes for the one thing).

thanks for starting this thread Ginger. i need it too.
Gigi -i search on taste and then i click on the tab to sort by rating. It then gives you the highest rated recipe in your search, i figure it's more likely to be good if lots of people have tried it and gave it good feedback. :-)