All About Roasting: A New Approach to a Classic Art


Molly Stevens - 2011
    Molly Stevens brings her trademark thoroughness and eye for detail to the technique of roasting. She breaks down when to use high heat, moderate heat, or low heat to produce juicy, well-seared meats, caramelized drippings, and concentrated flavors. Her 150 recipes feature the full range of dishes from beef, lamb, pork, and poultry to seafood and vegetables. Showstoppers include porchetta ingeniously made with a loin of pork, a roast goose with potato-sage stuffing, and a one-hour beef rib roast-dishes we've dreamed of making, and that Molly makes possible with her precise and encouraging instructions. Other recipes such as a Sunday supper roast chicken, herb-roasted shrimp, and blasted broccoli make this an indispensable book for home cooks and chefs. All About Roasting is like having the best teacher in America in the kitchen with you.

Bon Appetit, Y'all: Recipes and Stories from Three Generations of Southern Cooking


Virginia Willis - 2008
    These divergent influences come together splendidly in Bon Appétit, Y'all, a modern Southern chef's passionate and utterly appealing homage to her culinary roots.  Espousing a simple-is-best philosophy, Virginia uses the finest ingredients, concentrates on sound French technique, and lets the food shine in a style she calls "refined Southern cuisine." More than 200 approachable and consistently delicious recipes are arranged by chapter into starters and nibbles; salads and slaws; eggs and dairy; meat, fowl, and fish main dishes; sides; biscuits and breads; soups and stews; desserts; and sauces and preserves. Collected here are stylishly updated Southern and French classics (New SouthernChicken and Dumplings, Boeuf Bourgignonne), rib-sticking, old-timey favorites (Meme's Fried Okra, Angel Biscuits), and perfectly executed comfort food (Mama's Apple Pie, Fried Catfish Fingers with Country Rémoulade). Nearly 100 photographs bring to life both Virginia's food and the bounty of her native Georgia. You'll also find a wealth of tips and techniques from a skilled and innovative teacher, and the stories of a Southern girl steeped to her core in the food, kitchen lore, and unconditional hospitality of her culinary forebears on both sides of the Atlantic. Bon Appétit, Y'all is Virginia's way of saying, "Welcome to my Southern kitchen. Pull up a chair." Once you have tasted her food, you'll want to stay a good long while.

The Food Lab: Better Home Cooking Through Science


J. Kenji López-Alt - 2015
    Kenji López-Alt has pondered all these questions and more. In The Food Lab, Kenji focuses on the science behind beloved American dishes, delving into the interactions between heat, energy, and molecules that create great food. Kenji shows that often, conventional methods don’t work that well, and home cooks can achieve far better results using new—but simple—techniques. In hundreds of easy-to-make recipes with over 1,000 full-color images, you will find out how to make foolproof Hollandaise sauce in just two minutes, how to transform one simple tomato sauce into a half dozen dishes, how to make the crispiest, creamiest potato casserole ever conceived, and much more.

The Asian Grandmothers Cookbook: Home Cooking from Asian American Kitchens


Pat Tanumihardja - 2009
    Their mastery of delicious home-cooked dishes and comfort food makes them the ideal source for this cookbook. Author Pat Tanumihardja has assembled 130 tantalizing dishes from real Chinese fried rice to the classic Filipino Chicken Adobo to the ultimate Japanese comfort dish Oyako donburi. This is hearty food, brightly flavored, equally good to look at and eat. Flavors range from soy and ginger to hot chiles, fragrant curries, and tart vinegars. The author has translated all of the recipes to work in modern home kitchens. Many of them have been handed down from mother to daughter for generations without written recipes, and some appear in tested and written form for the first time. An exhaustive Asian Pantry glossary explains the ingredients, from the many kinds of rice and curries to unfamiliar but flavorful vegetables.

The Tummy Trilogy


Calvin Trillin - 1994
    With three hilarious books over the next two decades--American Fried; Alice, Let's Eat; and Third Helpings--he established himself as, in Craig Claiborne's phrase, "the Walt Whitman of American eats." Trillin's three comic masterpieces are now available in what Trillin calls The Tummy Trilogy.

The Science of Good Cooking: Master 50 Simple Concepts to Enjoy a Lifetime of Success in the Kitchen


Cook's Illustrated - 2012
    Unlike other food science books, we make a direct and practical connection between the science and the cooking. We divide the book into 50 core principles, support them through detailed yet friendly explanations, bring them alive with color illustrations and inventive experiments, and reinforce them through recipes that put the principle to work. At Cook's Illustrated, we've been asking why in the kitchen for over 20 years and often find our answers in science. We believe good science makes great food and that understanding basic science will make you a great cook.

Joy the Baker Over Easy: Sweet and Savory Recipes for Leisurely Days: A Cookbook


Joy Wilson - 2017
    Here are 125 recipes to tackle any brunch craving from juices and coffees, to breads, eggs, pancakes, sandwiches, salads, and definitely bacon."

Life From Scratch: A Memoir of Food, Family, and Forgiveness


Sasha Martin - 2015
    As cooking unlocked the memories of her rough-and-tumble childhood and the loss and heartbreak that came with it, Martin became more determined than ever to find peace and elevate her life through the prism of food and world cultures. From the tiny, makeshift kitchen of her eccentric, creative mother to a string of foster homes to the house from which she launches her own cooking adventure, Martin’s heartfelt, brutally honest memoir reveals the power of cooking to bond, to empower, and to heal—and celebrates the simple truth that happiness is created from within.

America's Best Lost Recipes


Cook's Country Magazine - 2007
    The result is this collection of more than 120 old-fashioned recipes that deserve a place in home kitchens today.Americas Test Kitchen

Heat: An Amateur's Adventures as Kitchen Slave, Line Cook, Pasta-Maker, and Apprentice to a Dante-Quoting Butcher in Tuscany


Bill Buford - 2006
    Heat is the chronicle—sharp, funny, wonderfully exuberant—of his time spent as Batali’s “slave” and of his far-flung apprenticeships with culinary masters in Italy.In a fast-paced, candid narrative, Buford describes the frenetic experience of working in Babbo’s kitchen: the trials and errors (and more errors), humiliations and hopes, disappointments and triumphs as he worked his way up the ladder from slave to cook. He talks about his relationships with his kitchen colleagues and with the larger-than-life, hard-living Batali, whose story he learns as their friendship grows through (and sometimes despite) kitchen encounters and after-work all-nighters. Buford takes us to the restaurant in a remote Appennine village where Batali first apprenticed in Italy and where Buford learns the intricacies of handmade pasta . . . the hill town in Chianti where he is tutored in the art of butchery by Italy’s most famous butcher, a man who insists that his meat is an expression of the Italian soul . . . to London, where he is instructed in the preparation of game by Marco Pierre White, one of England’s most celebrated (or perhaps notorious) chefs. And throughout, we follow the thread of Buford’s fascinating reflections on food as a bearer of culture, on the history and development of a few special dishes (Is the shape of tortellini really based on a woman’s navel? And just what is a short rib?), and on the what and why of the foods we eat today.Heat is a marvelous hybrid: a richly evocative memoir of Buford’s kitchen adventure, the story of Batali’s amazing rise to culinary (and extra-culinary) fame, a dazzling behind-the-scenes look at the workings of a famous restaurant, and an illuminating exploration of why food matters. It is a book to delight in—and to savor.

Ad Hoc at Home


Thomas Keller - 2009
    . . don’t miss it.”—People   “A book of approachable dishes made really, really well.”—The New York Times Thomas Keller shares family-style recipes that you can make any or every day. In the book every home cook has been waiting for, the revered Thomas Keller turns his imagination to the American comfort foods closest to his heart—flaky biscuits, chicken pot pies, New England clam bakes, and cherry pies so delicious and redolent of childhood that they give Proust's madeleines a run for their money. Keller, whose restaurants The French Laundry in Yountville, California, and Per Se in New York have revolutionized American haute cuisine, is equally adept at turning out simpler fare. In Ad Hoc at Home—a cookbook inspired by the menu of his casual restaurant Ad Hoc in Yountville—he showcases more than 200 recipes for family-style meals. This is Keller at his most playful, serving up such truck-stop classics as Potato Hash with Bacon and Melted Onions and grilled-cheese sandwiches, and heartier fare including beef Stroganoff and roasted spring leg of lamb. In fun, full-color photographs, the great chef gives step-by-step lessons in kitchen basics— here is Keller teaching how to perfectly shape a basic hamburger, truss a chicken, or dress a salad. Best of all, where Keller’s previous best-selling cookbooks were for the ambitious advanced cook, Ad Hoc at Home is filled with quicker and easier recipes that will be embraced by both kitchen novices and more experienced cooks who want the ultimate recipes for American comfort-food classics.

The Flavor Bible: The Essential Guide to Culinary Creativity, Based on the Wisdom of America's Most Imaginative Chefs


Karen Page - 2008
    Drawing on dozens of leading chefs' combined experience in top restaurants across the country, Karen Page and Andrew Dornenburg present the definitive guide to creating "deliciousness" in any dish. Thousands of ingredient entries, organized alphabetically and cross-referenced, provide a treasure trove of spectacular flavor combinations. Readers will learn to work more intuitively and effectively with ingredients; experiment with temperature and texture; excite the nose and palate with herbs, spices, and other seasonings; and balance the sensual, emotional, and spiritual elements of an extraordinary meal.Seasoned with tips, anecdotes, and signature dishes from America's most imaginative chefs, THE FLAVOR BIBLE is an essential reference for every kitchen.

The Art of Eating in: How I Learned to Stop Spending and Love the Stove


Cathy Erway - 2010
    An underpaid, twenty-something executive assistant in New York City, she was struggling to make ends meet when she decided to embark on a Walden- esque retreat from the high-priced eateries that drained her wallet. Though she was living in the nation's culinary capital, she decided to swear off all restaurant food. "The Art of Eating In" chronicles the delectable results of her twenty-four-month experiment, with thirty original recipes included. What began as a way to save money left Erway with a new appreciation for the simple pleasure of sharing a meal with friends at home, the subtleties of home-cooked flavors, and whether her ingredients were ethically grown. She also explored the anti-restaurant underground of supper clubs and cook-offs, and immersed herself in an array of alternative eating lifestyles from freeganism and dumpster-diving to picking tasty greens on a wild edible tour in Brooklyn's Prospect Park. Culminating in a binge that leaves her with a foodie hangover, "The Art of Eating In" is a journey to savor. Watch a Video

Tartine


Elisabeth Prueitt - 2006
    Acclaimed pastry chef Elisabeth Prueitt and master baker Chad Robertson share their secrets, fabulous recipes, and expertise to create a truly priceless collection of culinary delights."One peek into Elisabeth Prueitt and Chad Robertson's sensational cookbook whisks you into their popular Tartine Bakery and reveals everything you need to know to create their superb recipes in your own home." –Flo Braker, author of The Simple Art of Perfect Baking and Sweet MiniaturesIt's no wonder there are lines out the door of the acclaimed Tartine Bakery in San Francisco. Tartine has been written up in every magazine worth its sugar and spice. Here, the bakers' art is transformed into easy-to-follow recipes for the home kitchen. The only thing hard about this cookbook is deciding which recipe to try first.Features easy-to-follow recipes meant to be made in your home kitchen. There's a little something here for breakfast, lunch, tea, supper, hors d'oeuvres and, of course, a whole lot for dessert.Includes practical advice in the form of handy Kitchen Notes, that convey the authors' know-how.Gorgeous photographs are spread throughout to create a truly delicious and inspiring party cookbook.Makes a delectable gift for any dessert lover or aspiring pastry chef.Pastry chef Elisabeth Prueitt's work has appeared in numerous magazines, including Food & Wine, Bon Appétit, and Travel & Leisure, and she has appeared on the television program Martha Stewart Living. France Ruffenach is a San Francisco-based photographer whose work has appeared in magazines and cookbooks including Martha Stewart Living, Real Simple, and Bon Appétit magazines, and in Cupcakes, Everyday Celebrations, and Ros.

Good Eats: The Early Years


Alton Brown - 2009
    (Well, almost.) Here, finally, are the books that Brown’s legion of fans have been salivating for—two volumes that together will provide an unexpurgated record of his long-running, award-winning Food Network TV series, Good Eats.  From “Pork Fiction” (on baby back ribs), to “Citizen Cane” (on caramel sauce), to “Oat Cuisine” (on oatmeal), every hilarious episode is represented. Each book—the second will be published in fall 2010—is illustrated with behind-the-scenes photos taken on the Good Eats set. Each contains more than 140 recipes and more than 1,000 photographs and illustrations, along with explanations of techniques, lots of food-science information (of course!), and more food puns, food jokes, and food trivia than you can shake a wooden spoon at.