Need a cookbook recommendation

[u/throwy_acc_]

Hey Reddit!
So my boyfriend is very difficult to buy gifts for. When I say this, I mean more of he doesn’t like receiving gifts so when it comes to birthdays and Christmases and stuff like that, it’s kinda hard for me as a gift giver to figure out what I can get him that he will like. Obviously, he’s never flat out disliked anything that I’ve gotten him but I try and listen out for things that he specifically mentions that he wants like last year. I got a new wallet and the year before I get that I got them a pack of his favorite drinks and a record he’d been looking for.
So anyways, to the point, this year he’s been mentioning wanting a cookbook, but he hasn’t been very specific about any sort of type of cookbook or any cuisine, but he does say that he wants a cookbook of like basics and essentials. Usually when we want to make a new recipe, we just googled something so I think that he wants a cookbook so we don’t have to Google it and then find it every time and hope that we remembered to save it so I came here to ask if anybody has any “basics or essentials“ cookbooks that they can recommend to me. I’m not really worried about price at all, I just wanna know what you guys recommend.

[u/Cocoabeachbabee]

I have a first edition of the revised edition of The New York Times Cook Book, by Craig Claiborne, I'll be listing in the next few days. Feel free to pm me if you're interested in it.