LibGuides: Culinary Arts (CULA): Home

How to GET HELP from a LIBRARIAN

Need help with finding sources, searching databases, formatting citations, or deciding on a paper topic? The NCC Librarians are here for you. Click on our schedule of operating hours to find out when you can visit the Mack Library (Bethlehem), or ESSA Library (Pocono), in person.

You can also chat online with a Librarian, wherever you are! Go to the NCC Library's home page and click on the orange "Ask the Librarian" tab to start chatting.

For more ways to reach us, and answers to our Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs), click here. You can also send an e-mail question to askthelibrarian@northampton.edu, or set up a private appointment with a Librarian by using the "Book A Librarian" request form.

We look forward to hearing from you!

Area of Study

Program: Culinary Arts

Area of Study: Business & Professional Services

For more information about the degree options in this program, click here.

To find your Academic Advisor, click here or call the Advising office near you:

Bethlehem: 484-275-0787
Pocono: 570-369-1871

Culinary Arts Resources

This Research Guide will direct you to specialized Library resources for studying Culinary Arts, including books, journals, online subscription databases, streaming videos, and websites.

Program Description

Culinary Arts graduates are trained for careers involving professional food preparation, including chef, line chef, banquet chef, executive chef, baker, pastry chef, and caterer. While students are being trained in all formal classical methods of cooking, they experience nearly 1,000 hours of hands-on practical application.

It's easy to borrow books with LIBRARY to GO!

Good news!

Both NCC Libraries are open, but you can still borrow books and other materials remotely by using our Library to Go service. You can choose quick pickup on campus, or free delivery to your home.

Use the same form to request:

Access to materials that your instructor has put on electronic reserve in Blackboard;
Scanned pages from reference books like encyclopedias;
Scanned articles from print journals in the Library's Periodicals Tower.

NEW for Fall 2025 MLA Handbook Plus!

NCC students, faculty, and staff now have access to the MLA Handbook online!

This searchable e-book version of the ninth edition is the authoritative guide to citing sources in MLA format.

In addition to the complete text of the print book, MLA Handbook Plus offers examples of citations, guidance on formatting research papers, instructional videos, and the Spanish-language translation, Manual MLA.

For more help with MLA format, visit the NCC Library's online guide to Citing Sources.

The image of the MLA Handbook pictured here is a scan of the NCC Library's own print copy! Please ask for it at the Research Help Desk.

NEW books in the NCC Library collection!

Dining Out: A Global History of Restaurants by Rawson, Katie.
Call Number: TX 945 .R39 2019 Online

ISBN: 9781789140576

Publication Date: 2019

A global history of eating out beyond white tablecloths and celebrity chefs, this book presents restaurants both as businesses and as venues for a range of human experiences. From banquets in 12th-century China to the medicinal roots of French restaurants, the origins of restaurants are not singular -- nor is the history this book tells. Authors Katie Rawson and Elliott Shore highlight stories across time and place, including how chifa restaurants emerged from the migration of Chinese workers and their subsequent marriages to Peruvian businesswomen in 19th-century Peru; how Alexander Soyer transformed kitchen chemistry by popularizing the gas stove, pre-dating the pyrotechnics of molecular gastronomy by a century; and how Harvey Girls dispelled the ill repute of waiting tables, making rich lives for themselves across the American West. From restaurant architecture to technological developments, staffing and organization, tipping and waiting tables, ethnic cuisines, and slow and fast foods, this illustrated and profoundly informed (and entertaining) history takes us from the world's first restaurants in Kaifeng, China, to the latest high-end dining experiences.
Fermentation Kitchen by Cooper, Sam.
Call Number: TX 827.5 .C667 2024

ISBN: 9780241697115

Publication Date: 2024

From kimchi to miso, kombucha to ginger beer, this book introduces you to the alchemy of fermentation -- taking simple ingredients and transforming them in form and flavor. Explore a wide range of authentic and adapted techniques from across cultures and continents, and harness bacteria, yeast, and fungus to create a variety of ferments to add flavor to dishes, boost gut health, and give perishable produce a new lease on life. Reconnect with these natural processes and learn to incorporate ferments into your everyday cooking with guides to flavor, texture, and aroma, alongside recipe ideas serving as inspiration.
Making It: Success in the Commercial Kitchen by Meiser, Ellen.
Call Number: TX 911.3 .V62 M43 2025

ISBN: 9781978840126

Publication Date: 2025

The restaurant industry is one of the few places in America where workers from lower-class backgrounds can rise to positions of power and prestige. Yet with more than 4 million cooks and food preparation workers employed in America's restaurants, not everyone makes it to the high-status position of chef. What factors determine who rises through the ranks in this fiercely competitive 'pressure-cooker' environment? This book explores how the career path of restaurant workers depends on their accumulation of kitchen capital, a cultural asset based not only on their ability to cook, but also on how well they can fit into the workplace culture and negotiate its hierarchical structures.
Sweet Land of Liberty: A History of America in 11 Pies by Anastopoulo, Rossi.
Call Number: TX 773 .A52 2022

ISBN: 9781419754876

Publication Date: 2022

From pumpkin pie gracing the Thanksgiving table to apple pie at the Fourth of July picnic, nearly every American shares a certain nostalgia for a simple circle of crust and filling. Author Rossi Anastopoulo cracks open our relationship to pie to examine America's history with pie -- and how pie become the symbol of a nation. With corresponding recipes for each chapter and sidebars of quirky facts throughout, this food history is for bakers, dessert lovers, and history aficionados.