The official Peace Corps Volunteer Handbook and the organization’s various country guides tell new volunteers how to do many things related to their service, from dressing appropriately to getting proper vaccinations. But there’s not much in the literature about food.

So where should a volunteer turn if she needs to know what do to with uncooked fufu from the market? Or if she finds herself craving pancakes in sub-Saharan Africa? She turns to the wisdom of her predecessors. Because, chances are, at the start of her service, she was given a newly-printed copy of a country-specific cookbook, written by volunteers who came years before her, and updated frequently since. Though the cookbooks often look simple, with copy-shop plastic ring bindings and MS Word layouts, they’re intricate products of their