Joy of Cooking, often known as "
The Joy of Cooking", is one of the United States' most-published
cookbooks. It has been in print continuously since 1936, and has sold more than 18 million copies. It was
privately published in 1931 by
Irma S. Rombauer, a
homemaker in
St. Louis, Missouri who was struggling emotionally and financially after her husband's suicide the previous year. Rombauer had 3,000 copies printed by A.C. Clayton, a company which had printed labels for fancy St. Louis shoe companies and for
Listerine, but never a book. In 1936, the book was picked up by a commercial printing house, the
Bobbs-Merrill Company.
Joy is the backbone of many home cooks' libraries and is commonly found in commercial kitchens as well.