If you're like me and you've got everything from The Fannie Farmer Junior Cookbook to the French Laundry Cookbook, you're a candidate for Cookbook Addicts Anonymous. I'm just as thrilled to find a second- or third-hand copy of The Vegetarian Epicure at a yard sale as I am to get the latest CIA tome. So when I need a fix, one of the best places to go is Beer's Books.

In their old location on L Street, the cookbooks were back in a dark corner. But at the new, spiffy location on 9th Street, they're well lit and loosely organized by sections. There's also a "newly arrived" shelf of food books. You'll find mostly barely used copies of books from cocktail guides to foodie biographies. I recently saw Bill Buford's Heat there (just released last year).

I've always suspected that there are thousands of mint-condition KitchenAid mixers and Cuisinarts out there on America's shelves, not getting used. So I'll bet there are just as many cookbooks going unloved, and hopefully some of them will find themselves in a great bookstore like Beer's. Keep a special eye out for the $1 racks out front. You never know when you'll find that copy of Clementine's Kitchen you've always wanted. Plus, like any self-respecting used bookstore, they have a great cat. And now they also have coffee and free WiFi. Once you get there, you'll never need to leave.

Beer's Books
915 S Street
442-9475