I definitely appreciate most community cookbooks as more of a historical relic than a source of recipes. They can give such an interesting look at not just what people actually were cooking at the time, but the dishes they wanted their neighbours to know they were cooking.

I recently picked up one from the city I currently live in, from the late 1960s or thereabouts, and it was wild to see how many people were brewing their own booze here. Four different recipes for parsnip wine alone!