But don't be fooled by its unassuming location—stumbling across the Bakery, as countless visitors have done on their way up and down the Pacific Coast, will make you feel as if you've discovered a secret: a gem of a restaurant where the food, people, and atmosphere meld together in a perfect embodiment of the spirit of Big Sur.The three restaurant owners, chef Philip Wojtowicz, baker Michelle Wojtowicz, and host Michael Gilson, escaped the Los Angeles food scene to create their version of the ideal restaurant, nestled in the heart of some of the most beautiful country in the world. This is simple, wood-fired American cooking at its best, executed in a way that lets the ingredients—seasonal and often locally produced—shine. Weekend brunches feature thick, nine-grain pancakes and savory breakfast pizza topped with crisp bacon, fresh herbs, and pasture-raised eggs. At night, Phil offers classics like Grilled Prime Rib Steak with Red Wine Sauce along with twists on traditional favorites like Venison Osso Buco or Rockfish Scampi. And every meal should end with one of Michelle's great desserts, whether it's a homemade Peppermint Ice Cream Sundae or Hazelnut Flan with Roasted Cherries.But this is more than a cookbook; it's a yearlong glimpse into what it's really like to live in Big Sur, introducing the people and places that make the restaurant's renowned food possible, including Wayne Hyland, hunter and forager, Jamie Collins, organic row cropper, and Gary Pisoni, the eccentric vintner who supplies some of the restaurant's most beloved wine. With its outstanding photography, lively profiles, and dozens of must-make recipes, this book helps bring the experience of Big Sur home.

    Everything the home chef needs to assemble an impressive meal and channel the energy of the Quickfire kitchen is collected here, including advice on hosting a Quickfire Cocktail Party and staging Quickfire Challengesat home. Best of all, this book is spilling over with sidebar material, including tips for home chefs, interviews with contestants, fabulous photos, and fun trivia related to the chefs, dishes, and ingredients that make Top Chef a favorite.

    Now, Anna turns her thoughts to that larger question. We are eating differently: your daughter is a vegan, or you are but your in-laws don’t think it’s dinner without meat, or you’re hosting Thanksgiving for a mixed group… In this timely and useful new book, Anna offers her solutions for reuniting our divided tables.“My idea is simple,” says Anna. “Start with the food everyone eats, design a meal or a dish around that, then expand and elaborate with just the right amounts of the right cheeses, meats, or fish for your omnivores. Everyone feels welcome, and we eat the same meal—but in variations.”Anna shows us how to cook for today’s table, with over 150 recipes for all tastes, and menus for every occasion. For a casual evening with friends, Farro with Lentils and Lavender served with Ratatouille from the Charcoal Grill makes a beautiful vegan supper—and also pairs wonderfully with garlic-and-herb rubbed lamb chops for the omnivores. Anna’s crowd-pleasing Easy Fish Soup begins as a robust vegetable soup, with seafood added five minutes before serving—an ideal two-way dish. A vegetarian Lemon Risotto with Sautéed Fresh Fava Beans is perfect on its own, and can easily take on tender shrimp. For dessert, have vegan Pumpkin Gingerbread and add vanilla ice cream, or serve a delectable Dark Chocolate Almond Bark studded with ginger and dried cherries.Anna’s festive “Thanksgiving for Everyone” menu centers on a sumptuous Polenta Torta with Roasted Squash and onion marmalade, surrounded by an array of seasonal vegetables—all pairing equally well with roast turkey for the traditionalists. “Taco Night at Home” allows everyone to design their perfect meal, mixing and matching from a spread of Spicy Black Beans, Poblano Peppers with Portobello Mushrooms, Carnitas, and Guajillo Chile Salsa. Anna’s exuberant Mediterranean mezze menu is a relaxed summer party, featuring vegan Roasted Eggplant and Poblano Chile Spread with flatbread, Tabbouleh with Chickpeas and Preserved Lemon, Charred Zucchini with Lemon and Mint, and Baked Lamb Kibbeh Wedges for the omnivores.With dishes inspired by the vibrant produce of farmers’ markets, Anna shares her love of cooking and of hospitality. Vegan Vegetarian Omnivore shows us how to navigate a world of change, and bring all our friends and family together at one big, generous table.

      Genius recipes surprise us and make us rethink the way we cook. They might involve an unexpectedly simple technique, debunk a kitchen myth, or apply a familiar ingredient in a new way. They’re handed down by luminaries of the food world and become their legacies. And, once we’ve folded them into our repertoires, they make us feel pretty genius too. In this collection are 100 of the smartest and most remarkable ones.   There isn’t yet a single cookbook where you can find Marcella Hazan’s Tomato Sauce with Onion and Butter, Jim Lahey’s No-Knead Bread, and Nigella Lawson’s Dense Chocolate Loaf Cake—plus dozens more of the most talked about, just-crazy-enough-to-work recipes of our time. Until now.   These are what Food52 Executive Editor Kristen Miglore calls genius recipes. Passed down from the cookbook authors, chefs, and bloggers who made them legendary, these foolproof recipes rethink cooking tropes, solve problems, get us talking, and make cooking more fun. Every week, Kristen features one such recipe and explains just what’s so brilliant about it in the James Beard Award-nominated Genius Recipes column on Food52. Here, in this book, she compiles 100 of the most essential ones—nearly half of which have never been featured in the column—with tips, riffs, mini-recipes, and stunning photographs from James Ransom, to create a cooking canon that will stand the test of time.   Once you try Michael Ruhlman’s fried chicken or Yotam Ottolenghi and Sami Tamimi’s hummus, you’ll never want to go back to other versions. But there’s also a surprising ginger juice you didn’t realize you were missing and will want to put on everything—and a way to cook white chocolate that (finally) exposes its hidden glory. Some of these recipes you’ll follow to a T, but others will be jumping-off points for you to experiment with and make your own. Either way, with Kristen at the helm, revealing and explaining the genius of each recipe, Genius Recipes is destined to become every home cook’s go-to resource for smart, memorable cooking—because no one cook could have taught us so much.