Peace Corps Volunteer Cookbooks You Need To Download

Everyone knows that Peace Corps volunteers resourceful. That included the challenges of cooking in a new culture abroad. So, they created volunteer cookbooks to share what they learned about local foods. These cookbooks were valuable resources for new volunteers using unfamiliar ingredients and cooking methods.

Peace Corps sends volunteers to live and work in developing communities around the world. Volunteers spend 2 years immersed in new cultures while doing projects like education, health, agriculture, and community development.

In the early years of the Peace Corps, volunteers were living in isolated villages around the world. They often didn’t know how to cook the local foods. And when homesick, it was hard to cook familiar dishes from home.

At first, they created recipes for themselves. But over the years, volunteers combined their knowledge into cookbooks to share. These cookbooks had local dish recipes, ingredient swaps, detailed cooking methods, and more.

Beyond just recipes, these cookbooks provided important cultural and practical tips. They helped many volunteers enjoy the local foods where they lived and worked.

More than just collections of recipes

But these weren’t regular cookbooks. Yes, they had recipes for local and American dishes. But they had much more. They had to. The foods, ingredients, and cooking methods were very different. So, they included local names for foods at the market. They had swaps for available ingredients. And they described the cooking methods volunteers needed to use.

Finding More Volunteer Cookbooks

Mongolia volunteer cookbooks — **Mongolia 2009 Cookbook**

I was a volunteer teacher in Mongolia. There were few foreigners in this isolated Asian country, except Peace Corps volunteers. I became good friends with one volunteer, Travis. He shared his Peace Corps materials about Mongolia. One thing he gave me was the Mongolia volunteer cookbook. It was a goldmine.

The Mongolian cookbook had local food names. It had pictures to identify foods at the market. It had recipes for marmot, horse, and camel meat. I wouldn’t have known how to cook those! Back home, the cookbook helped me make Mongolian dishes like buuz for my family and friends.

By the time I joined Peace Corps, I knew the value of these cookbooks. I used the internet to collect more from different places. Below are the cookbooks I found. Some sources aren’t available anymore, so I’m very happy I can share them.

I hope you enjoy the foods these cookbooks teach you to make. Bon appetit!