Sara Foster's Southern Kitchen


Sara Foster - 2011
    There, the combination of down-home comfort, fresh-from-the-farm ingredients, and dedicated preparation hooked her for life. Now the award-winning cookbook author and restaurateur serves up nearly two hundred contemporary interpretations of classic dishes—Shrimp Jambalaya, Slow-Roasted Pulled Pork Butt, Cheesy Grits Casserole; refreshing drinks, including Mint Juleps and Sweet Tea; and such satisfying breakfasts as Country Ham and Hominy Hash. And a table wouldn’t be Southern without the sides—Skillet-Fried Corn, Creamy Potato Salad, and Arugula Pesto Snap Beans. Be sure, too, to save room for Molasses-Bourbon Pecan Pie and Freestyle Lemon Blackberry Tart.From revealing the secret to fluffy buttermilk biscuits to giving us ideas for swapping out ingredients to accommodate any season, from providing tips for frying up chicken like a true Southerner to detailing barbecue fundamentals that put you on par with any pitmaster, Foster’s helpful sidebars ensure that your dishes will turn out perfect every time. You’ll also get expert tips on the essential equipment (cast-iron skillets, griddles, casserole dishes) and the ingredients no Southern pantry should be without (from stone-ground grits to Carolina Gold rice). As a bonus, Foster offers her “Sidetracked” feature, profiles of tried-and-true roadtrip destinations throughout the South where you can find the best fried catfish, barbecued brisket, big breakfast plates, and more. And finally, Foster’s lessons in pickling and canning guarantee that you can enjoy your favorite flavors all year round.With its handy list of resources and Southern pantry essentials, and entertaining stories, Sara Foster’s Southern Kitchen is an all-inclusive collection of Southern cooking in which simple feasts meet artisanal ingredients, traditional tastes meet modern methods, and fantastic flavors make every bite a succulent mouthful of Southern comfort.

Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking


Marcella Hazan - 1992
    Designed as a basic manual for cooks of all levels of expertise—from beginners to accomplished professionals—it offers both an accessible and comprehensive guide to techniques and ingredients and a collection of the most delicious recipes from the Italian repertoire. As home cooks who have used Marcella’s classic books for years (and whose copies are now splattered and worn) know, there is no one more gifted at teaching us just what we need to know about the taste and texture of a dish and how to achieve it, and there is no one more passionate and inspiring about authentic Italian food.

Mexican Ice Cream: Beloved Recipes and Stories


Fany Gerson - 2017
    This new offering from the incredibly popular baker and sweets maker Fany Gerson, the powerhouse behind Brooklyn's La Newyorkina and Dough, showcases the incredibly diverse flavors of Mexican ice cream while exploring the cultural aspects of preparing and consuming ice cream in Mexico. Gerson uses unique ingredients to create exciting and fresh flavors like Red Prickly Pear Ice Cream, Oaxacan-style Lime Sorbet, Avocado-Chocolate Ice Cream, and Rice-Almond Ice Cream with Cinnamon. All recipes are created with the home cook in mind, and written in Fany's knowledgeable but accessible voice. Mexican Ice Cream features vibrant location photography and captures the authentic Mexican heladerias that Gerson has been visiting for decades. For anyone looking to up their summer ice cream game, this is the book.

Cooking with Scraps: Turn Your Peels, Cores, Rinds, and Stems into Delicious Meals


Lindsay-Jean Hard - 2018
    Lindsay-Jean is a master of efficiency and we’re inspired to follow her lead!”  —Amanda Hesser and Merrill Stubbs, cofounders of Food52  In 85 innovative recipes, Lindsay-Jean Hard—who writes the “Cooking with Scraps” column for Food52—shows just how delicious and surprising the all-too-often-discarded parts of food can be, transforming what might be considered trash into culinary treasure.  Here’s how to put those seeds, stems, tops, rinds to good use for more delicious (and more frugal) cooking: Carrot greens—bright, fresh, and packed with flavor—make a zesty pesto. Water from canned beans behaves just like egg whites, perfect for vegan mayonnaise that even non-vegans will love. And serve broccoli stems olive-oil poached on lemony ricotta toast. It’s pure food genius, all the while critically reducing waste one dish at a time. “I love this book because the recipes matter...show[ing] us how to utilize the whole plant, to the betterment of our palate, our pocketbook, and our place.” —Eugenia Bone, author of The Kitchen Ecosystem  “Packed with smart, approachable recipes for beautiful food made with ingredients that you used to throw in the compost bin!” —Cara Mangini, author of The Vegetable Butcher

Gordon Ramsay's Great Escape: 100 Of My Favourite Indian Recipes


Gordon Ramsay - 2010
    His new cookbook is packed with the best recipes from his travels, showing you how to cook authentic dishes that are bursting with flavour. As you'd expect from a Michelin-starred chef, Gordon brings his eye for perfection and ability to judge flavours perfectly to his exploration of Indian food and shows us how to cook authentic, mouth-watering dishes from all over this huge and varied country. He visits Kerala deep in the South of India to bring us spicy, coconut-based curries and travels to colourful Rajasthan to learn about the creamy, flavourful dishes of the North. Along the way Gordon experiences the hugely different flavours and spices from the different regions and absorbs local cooking styles and traditions. Throughout his culinary journey, Gordon selects the best of the vast array of Indian spices, now readily available in British supermarkets. He shows us how to use these authentically to produce a beautifully flavoured Indian dish. Gordon Ramsay's Great Escape includes over 100 recipes in the following sections: Everyday, Entertaining, Quick Lunches and Healthy Dishes. Once Gordon shows you how easy it is to put together authentic Indian dishes, you'll never look back.

The Barefoot Contessa Cookbook


Ina Garten - 1999
    For many of those years, people have tried to get the exuberant owner, Ina Garten, to share the secrets of her store. Finally, the energy and style that make Barefoot Contessa such a special place are shown here, with dozens of recipes and more than 160 breathtaking photographs, in The Barefoot Contessa Cookbook. Ina's most popular recipes use familiar ingredients, but they taste even better than you would expect. Her Pan-Fried Onion Dip is the real thing, with slowly car-amelized onions and fresh sour cream. Tomato soup is created from oven-roasted tomatoes and fresh basil to intensify the flavors. Meat loaf is as good as your grandmother's, but it's healthier because it's made with ground turkey and fresh herbs. The light and flaky Maple-Oatmeal Scones are baked with rolled oats, whole wheat, and real maple syrup. Now these and other famous Barefoot Contessa recipes can be prepared at home. Ina says that before she owned a specialty food store she often spent a week making dinner for six friends. Her experience at Barefoot Contessa has given her hundreds of ideas for creating wonderful parties in a few hours. And they're all in this book. Crab Cakes with Rémoulade Sauce can be stored overnight in the refrigerator and sautéed just before the guests arrive. Cheddar Corn Chowder can be made days ahead, reheated, and served with a salad and bread for a delicious autumn lunch. The ingredients for Grilled Salmon Salad can all be prepared ahead and tossed together before serving. The batter for the Raspberry Corn Muffins can be mixed a day before and popped into the oven just before breakfast. Ina Garten teaches us how to entertain with style, simplicity, and a relaxed sense of fun. There are notes throughout the book for giving cocktail parties, lunches, and dinner parties where everything is done before the guests arrive. And there are easy instructions for creating gorgeous party platters that don't even require you to cook! With Ina Garten and The Barefoot Contessa Cookbook, you have the perfect recipe for hosting parties that are easy and fun for everyone--including the cook.

Cook Beautiful


Athena Calderone - 2017
    As the voice and curator behind EyeSwoon, an online lifestyle destination for food, entertaining, fashion, and interior design, Athena cooks with top chefs, hosts incredible dinners, and designs stunning tablescapes, while emphasizing the importance of balancing the visual elements of each dish with incredible flavors. In her debut cookbook, she’s finally showing the rest of us how to achieve her impeccable yet approachable cooking style. Included are 100 recipes with step-by-step advice on everything from prep to presentation—from artfully layering a peach and burrata salad to searing a perfect steak. Recipes include Grilled Zucchini Flatbread with Ramp-Pistachio Pesto, Charred Eggplant with Zaatar and Yogurt Tahini, Mezzi Rigatoni with Radicchio and Guanciale, Stewed Pork with Squash and Walnut Gremolata, Blood Orange Bundt Cake with Orange Bitters Glaze, and more. Organized by season, each section closes with a tablescape inspired by nature, along with specific table décor and entertaining tips.   Cook Beautiful is where design meets food, where culinary tradition marries food styling, where home chefs become experts. These are luscious dishes to make for friends and family, with advice that will inspire you to create visually stunning, and still wholly delicious, culinary masterpieces.

Mastering Pizza: The Art and Practice of Handmade Pizza, Focaccia, and Calzone [A Cookbook]


Marc Vetri - 2018
    In Mastering Pizza, award-winning chef Marc Vetri tackles the topic with his trademark precision, making perfect pizza available to anyone. The recipes--gleaned from years spent researching recipes in Italy and perfecting them in America--have a variety of base doughs of different hydration levels, which allow home cooks to achieve the same results with a regular kitchen oven as they would with a professional pizza oven. The book covers popular standards like Margherita and Carbonara while also featuring unexpected toppings such as mussels and truffles--and even a dessert pizza made with Nutella. With transporting imagery from Italy and hardworking step-by-step photos to demystify the process, Mastering Pizza will help you make pizza as delicious as you find in Italy.

La Cucina: The Regional Cooking of Italy


The Italian Academy of Cuisine - 2009
    They formed the Italian Academy of Cuisine to document classic recipes from every region. The academy’s more than seven thousand associates spread out to villages everywhere, interviewing grandmothers and farmers at their stoves, transcribing their recipes—many of which had never been documented before. This is the culmination of that research, an astounding feat—2,000 recipes that represent the patrimony of Italian country cooking. Each recipe is labeled with its region of origin, and it’s not just the ingredients but also the techniques that change with the geography. Sprinkled throughout are historical recipes that provide fascinating views into the folk culture of the past. There are no fancy flourishes here, and no shortcuts; this is true salt-of-the-earth cooking. The book is an excellent everyday source for easily achievable recipes, with such simple dishes as White Bean and Escarole Soup, Polenta with Tomato Sauce, and Chicken with Lemon and Capers. For ease of use there are four different indexes. La Cucina is an essential reference for every cook’s library.

Back to Baking: 200 Timeless Recipes to Bake, Share, and Enjoy


Anna Olson - 2011
    With a section on baking troubleshooting or tips on accurate measuring, Anna helps novice bakers bypass any kitchen disaster and move right on to produce perfect baked goods every time.Back to Baking is about enjoying the process of baking itself, (making those extras that can have a place in a balanced diet), in modest portions. Making something from scratch gives you control. You know what you're making, what's going into the dish, and how it's being prepared. Because these delights are homemade, the recipes can suit those with food intolerances and allergies. With entire chapters on dairy-free, egg-free, gluten-free, and low-fat/low-sugar baking, this book has recipes for everyone you love.

Nigella Express: Good Food, Fast


Nigella Lawson - 2007
    Nigella's ratings are through the roof, and she was recently featured in In Style. The cookbook is all of the delicious foods Nigella is known for but the emphasis is on fast, really fast! This is for everyone who loves good food, but just doesn't have time or patience at the end of the day for a long, drawn-out cooking session. More than 130 recipes!

Near & Far: Recipes Inspired by Home and Travel


Heidi Swanson - 2015
    In this deeply personal collection drawn from her well-worn recipe journals, Heidi describes the fragrance of flatbreads hot off a Marrakech griddle, soba noodles and feather-light tempura in Tokyo, and the taste of wild-picked greens from the Puglian coast. Recipes such as Fennel Stew, Carrot & Sake Salad, Watermelon Radish Soup, Brown Butter Tortelli, and Saffron Tagine use healthy, whole foods ingredients and approachable techniques, and photographs taken in Morocco, Japan, Italy, France, and India, as well as back home in Heidi’s kitchen, reveal the places both near and far that inspire her warm, nourishing cooking.From the Hardcover edition.

Vegan Chocolate: Unapologetically Luscious and Decadent Dairy-Free Desserts


Fran Costigan - 2013
    But for the first time, chocolate cakes, brownies, truffles, puddings, ice creams, and more are within reach: dairy-free, organic, fair-trade, and sublime. Author, baking instructor, and vegan powerhouse Fran Costigan has dedicated years to satisfying her sweet tooth while keeping it vegan. Through experimentation and long hours in the kitchen, she's recreated some of her favorite chocolate desserts as better-for-you interpretations that pass the taste test: Bittersweet Chocolate Truffles (with a variety of flavor variations), a Brooklyn Blackout Layer Cake, a Sacher Torte, even chocolate Moon Pies! Her detailed instructions make for professional-quality outcomes every time: it's like a personal baking class, right in your kitchen. The perfect gift for anyone with a sweet tooth, Vegan Chocolate is sure to become an instant classic.

The Bread Bible


Rose Levy Beranbaum - 2003
    The accessibility of Beranbaum's recipes and the incomparable taste of her creations make this book invaluable for home cooks and professional bakers alike. Easy-to-use ingredient tables provide both volume and weight, for surefire recipes that work perfectly every time.

Milk Street: Tuesday Nights Mediterranean: 125 Simple Weeknight Recipes from the World's Healthiest Cuisine


Christopher Kimball - 2021
    It is a diverse cuisine that encompasses the cultures and traditions of Southern Europe, North Africa, and the Middle East. The food is direct, simple, and honest. It is proud to be served without disguise or embellishment. Every Tuesday Nights recipe delivers big flavor, but the cooking is quick and easy. Each of these 125 Mediterranean dinners is ready in under 45 minutes, and many take just 20 minutes start to finish. Dishes include:Green ShakshukaSpicy Egyptian Eggplant with Chickpeas and HerbsBulgur Salad with Summer Vegetables and Pomegranate MolassesHarissa-Spiced Pasta and Chicken with Green BeansGreek Spanakorizo with ShrimpSpanish Ribeye with Green Olives and White Wine. The recipes are organized by how you cook, with some chapters focused on time—Fast (45 minutes), Faster (35 minutes), and Fastest (under 25 minutes)—while others dive into themes such as Hearty Vegetable Mains, Supper Soups, and Flat and Folded—including pizza, flatbreads, pita sandwiches, and panini. Many of the recipes require only one piece of cookware, and they all are built from pantry staples. Dinner? Solved—every night of the week.