Yes, I have a lot of cookbooks, probably more than any person not actually in the restaurant-chef business perhaps ought to have.

( William teases me unmercifully about this: on a day trip to Fredericksburg, trying to get me inside one of the shops on Main Street full of dubious Texas-themed tschochkes: "Look! They have cookbooks!"  "Bite me, sweetie!")

But the fact is, each one of those cookbooks has at least one or two sterling recipes in it, and the ones I use the most have a dozen or so--- those cookbooks are on a special shelf, as the ones I use all the time.  I used to make this cake from leftover Halloween candy--- and I would make sure to deliberately purchase Milky Way bars, just for this. It's from Jane and Michael Sterns' Square Meals Cookbook.

Melt together in a double-boiler, and allow to cool:

4 2.1 oz Milky Way Bars
8 Tbsp. (one stick) butter

Cream together:

8 Tbsp. butter
2 Cups sugar

Add, one at a time
4 Eggs

Add to the butter and sugar mixture alternately
1 Cup buttermilk
And
2 ½ Cups flour mixed with
½ Tsp baking soda.

Add the melted butter and Milky Way mixture to the batter, along with
2 Tsp. vanilla

Fold in
1 Cup coarsely chopped pecans

Pour into a greased and floured bundt pan, and bake in a pre-heated 350 degree oven for about an hour, or until cake tester comes out clean. Cool for 15 minutes in pan, before turning out onto cake rack. This cake is supposed to be superb with ice cream. When I baked it, it came out a pale chocolate color, like German chocolate cake, but very rich. Pay no attention to the sound of your arteries clogging....