Cultured Food for Life: How to Make and Serve Delicious Probiotic Foods for Better Health and Wellness


Donna Schwenk - 2013
    In this work, fermentation guru Donna Schwenk introduces readers to the healing properties of kefir, kombucha, cultured vegetables, sprouted flour, and sourdough. Fermentation has been used in food preparation for thousands of years, but in the past few decades it has moved from being a commonplace kitchen ritual to being something done only by a few health-conscious proponents. Most fermentation now is done at factories, whose processes strip away some of the abundant vitamins, minerals, and healthy bacteria that make this way of preparing foods so beneficial. But Donna Schwenk is working to bring this staple of food preparation back to readers by showing that these now-unfamiliar processes are actually easy and fun. And by doing this, she opens the door to a world of foods that can help rid readers of health problems including high blood pressure, diabetes, allergies, acne, hypertension, asthma, and irritable bowel syndrome. After telling the astonishing story of how she healed herself and her family with these probiotic foods, Schwenk walks readers, step by step, through the basic preparation techniques for kefir, kombucha, cultured vegetables, sprouted flour, and sourdough plus more than 120 recipes that use these foods to create dishes to please any palate. With recipes like Herbed Omelet with Kefir Hollandaise Sauce, Sprouted Ginger Scones with Peaches and Kefir Cream, Kefir Veggie Sprouted Pizza, Apple Sauerkraut, and Sprouted Brownies Kefir Cupcakes, along with inspirational stories from Donna’s family and friends, readers will enjoy a diet that’s as delicious as it is healthy. Schwenk originally self-published a portion of this book through Balboa Press. It garnered solid sales and positive reviews.

Taste of Beirut: 175+ Delicious Lebanese Recipes from Classics to Contemporary to Mezzes and More


Joumana Accad - 2014
    In her debut cookbook, The Taste of Beirut, she shares her heritage through exquisite food and anecdotes, teaching anyone from newbies to foodies how to master traditional Lebanese cuisine. With over 150 recipes inspired by her Teta (grandmother) in their family's kitchen, Accad captures the healthful and fabulous flavors of the Middle East and makes them completely accessible to home cooks. Each recipe features step-by-step instructions, Accad's warm teaching style and breathtaking color photographs that will make mouths water. Divided into sections including Breads, Breakfast, and Sandwiches; Soups; Mezze Delights; Main Dishes (Stews, Kibbeh, Stuffed Vegetables, and Rice Dishes); plus Pastries and Drinks, here is just a taste of the recipes featured: Spinach turnovers (Fatayer bel-sabanegh)Meat pies (Sfeeha)Kibbeh tartare (vegan)Red pepper and walnut dip (Muhammara)Lebanese couscous (Moghrabieh)Red lentils and rice purée (Mujaddara Safra)Eggplant casserole with tomato, meat and yogurt sauce topping (Fattet al-makdoos)Meat loaf with potato slices (Kafta bel-saniyeh)Zucchini or cauliflower frittersWings, Lebanese-styleFattoush saladBeet hummus (Mama dallou'a)Zaatar and tapénade breadWheat berry and milk pudding (Amhiyet bel-haleeb)Sesame and pistachio cookies (Barazek)Lebanese semolina cheesecake (Knafeh)Baklava in a speedy ten-minute version!While The Taste of Beirut brings to life the rich, complex, and delicious flavors of the Middle East, each recipe is refreshingly easy to make. The author's passionate, conversational style will make readers feel like they have a friend from Lebanon right in their kitchen, teaching them everything from cooking techniques to how to stock a kitchen with the best ingredients. Even more than a fabulous Lebanese cookbook, The Taste of Beirut is a proud celebration of people, culture, and cuisine.

The Fortune Cookie Chronicles: Adventures in the World of Chinese Food


Jennifer 8. Lee - 2008
    New York Times reporter and Chinese-American (or American-born Chinese), Jennifer 8 Lee, traces the history of Chinese-American experience through the lens of the food. In a compelling blend of sociology and history, Jenny Lee exposes the indentured servitude Chinese restaurants expect from illegal immigrant chefs, investigates the relationship between Jews and Chinese food, and weaves a personal narrative about her own relationship with Chinese food. The Fortune Cookie Chronicles speaks to the immigrant experience as a whole, and the way it has shaped our country.

The Illustrated Cook's Book of Ingredients


Norma MacMillan - 2010
    The ultimate comprehensive 'show and tell' reference to ingredients from around the globe, The Illustrated Cook's Book of Ingredients showcases fresh food and explains how to get the best out of it. Packed with annotated images and expert information that tells which varieties are best, and how to buy, store, and eat them, more than 250 "simple classic" recipes, and over 2,500 photographs, The Illustrated Cook's Book of Ingredients is an invaluable reference for food lovers and cooks intent on making the most of all the ingredients available today.

In the Small Kitchen: 100 Recipes from Our Year of Cooking in the Real World


Cara Eisenpress - 2010
    We can cook anywhere, anytime, with anything on any budget.”—Lynne Rossetto Kasper, host of Public Radio’s The Splendid Table® from American Public MediaCara Eisenpress and Phoebe Lapine, creators of the popular food blog biggirlssmallkitchen.com, share their kitchen prowess and tasty tips with In the Small Kitchen: 100 Recipes from Our Year of Cooking in the Real World. Filled with delicious and resourceful recipes for daily cooking and entertaining on a budget, In the Small Kitchen is required reading for anyone who wants to put an appetizing meal on the table. More than just a guide to quarter-life cooking, this cookbook is also a wonderful ode to the people we cook and eat with, who stick with us through breakups, birthdays, and myriad kitchen disasters.

Simple to Spectacular: How to Take One Basic Recipe to Four Levels of Sophistication


Jean-Georges Vongerichten - 2000
    Simple to Spectacular introduces a unique concept developed by one of the world's top chefs, Jean-Georges Vongerichten, and Mark Bittman, author of How to Cook Everything and the New York Times's hugely popular column "The Minimalist." Ever since their award-winning collaboration on Jean-Georges: Cooking at Home with a Four-Star Chef, the acclaimed duo has been cooking up a repertoire of new dishes that can be prepared in any of five progressively sophisticated ways.Simple to Spectacular features a total of 250 recipes in 50 groups. Each group begins with a simple, elegant recipe--a few ingredients combined for maximum effect--followed by fully detailed, increasingly elaborate variations. For example, a recipe for Grilled Shrimp with Thyme and Lemon leads to Grilled Shrimp and Zucchini on Rosemary Skewers, Grilled Shrimp with Apple Ketchup, Thai-style Grilled Shrimp on Lemongrass Skewers, and Grilled Shrimp Balls with Cucumber and Yogurt.Every aspect of the meal is covered, from superb soups and salads to unforgettable side dishes, entrees, and desserts. In Simple to Spectacular, everything--from the basics to innovations by a four-star chef--is tailored for a quick Tuesday night dinner or an elegant weekend party.  And in the now-classic Vongerichten-Bittman style, all of the recipes can be made in the kitchen of any home cook. With 80 full-color photographs giving a mouthwatering view of the Simple-to-Spectacular transformations, readers and cooks will eagerly explore the possibilities.Jean-Georges Vongerichten (right) won the 1998 James Beard Award for Outstanding Chef and Best New Restaurant. His Manhattan restaurants include Vong, Jo Jo, The Mercer Kitchen, and Jean Georges, which earned a rare four-star rating from the New York Times.  In Simple to Spectacular, two titans of the food world have created a truly groundbreaking cookbook.  Here are 250 superb recipes arranged in a uniquely useful way: a basic recipe and four increasingly sophisticated variations, with each group (there are 50 groups in all) based on a given technique.  This ingenious organization enables cooks of all levels of expertise to understand how a recipe is created and to re-create the brilliantly simple recipes and dazzling variations from one of our best food writers and home cooks teamed with one of America's greatest chefs.

Super Natural Every Day: Well-Loved Recipes from My Natural Foods Kitchen


Heidi Swanson - 2011
    From her Northern California kitchen, she introduced us to a less-processed world of cooking and eating through her award-winning blog, 101 Cookbooks, and in her James Beard Award–nominated cookbook, Super Natural Cooking, she taught us how to expand our pantries and integrate nutrient-rich superfoods into our diets. In Super Natural Every Day, Heidi helps us make nutritionally packed meals part of our daily repertoire by sharing a sumptuous collection of nearly 100 of her go-to recipes. These are the dishes that Heidi returns to again and again because they’re approachable, good for the body, and just plain delicious. This stylish cookbook is equal parts inspiration and instruction, showing us how to create a welcoming table filled with nourishing food for friends and family.  The seductively flavorful vegetarian recipes for breakfast, lunch, dinner, snacks, treats, and drinks are quick to the table but tasty enough to linger over. Grab a Millet Muffin or some flaky Yogurt Biscuits for breakfast on the go, or settle into a lazy Sunday morning with a stack of Multi-grain Pancakes and a steaming cup of Ginger Tea. A bowl of Summer Squash Soup or a couple of Chanterelle Tacos make for a light and healthy lunch, and for dinner, there’s Black Sesame Otsu, Pomegranate-Glazed Eggplant with Tempeh, or the aptly named Weeknight Curry. Heidi’s Rose Geranium Prosecco is the perfect start to a celebratory meal, and the Buttermilk Cake with fresh plums or Sweet Panzanella will satisfy even the most stubborn sweet tooth. Gorgeously illustrated with over 100 photos that showcase the engaging rhythms of Heidi’s culinary life and travels, Super Natural Every Day reveals the beauty of uncomplicated food prepared well and reflects a realistic yet gourmet approach to a healthy and sophisticated natural foods lifestyle.

The Splendid Table's How to Eat Supper


Lynne Rossetto Kasper - 2008
    As they do on their weekly show, host Lynne Rossetto Kasper and producer Sally Swift approach their topic with attitude and originality, making The Splendid Table’s How to Eat Supper one of the most engaging cookbooks of this or any other year.As loyal listeners know, Lynne and Sally share an unrelenting curiosity about everything to do with food. Their show, The Splendid Table, looks at the role food plays in our lives—inspiring us, making us laugh, nourishing us, and opening us up to the world around us. Now they have compiled all the most trenchant tips, never-fail recipes, and everyday culinary know-how from the program in How to Eat Supper, a kitchen companion unlike any other.This is no mere cookbook. Like the show, this book goes far beyond the recipe, introducing the people and stories that are shaping America’s changing sense of food. We don’t eat, shop, or cook as we used to. Our relationship with food has intensified, become more controversial, richer, more pleasurable, and sometimes more puzzling. How to Eat Supper gives voice to rarely heard perspectives on food—from the quirky to the political, from the grassroots to the scholarly, from the highbrow to the humble—and shows the essential role breaking bread together plays in our world.How to Eat Supper takes you through a plethora of inviting recipes simple enough to ensure success even if you’ve never cooked before. And if you are experienced in the kitchen, you’ll find challenging new concepts and dishes to spark your imagination.

Joy of Cooking


Irma S. Rombauer - 1931
    Rombauer self-published the first three thousand copies of Joy of Cooking in 1931, it has become the kitchen bible, with more than 20 million copies in print. This new edition of Joy has been thoroughly revised and expanded by Irma’s great-grandson John Becker and his wife, Megan Scott.John and Megan developed more than six hundred new recipes for this edition, tested and tweaked thousands of classic recipes, and updated every section of every chapter to reflect the latest ingredients and techniques available to today’s home cooks. Their strategy for revising this edition was the same one Irma and Marion employed: Vet, research, and improve Joy’s coverage of legacy recipes while introducing new dishes, modern cooking techniques, and comprehensive information on ingredients now available at farmers’ markets and grocery stores. You will find tried-and-true favorites like Banana Bread Cockaigne, Chocolate Chip Cookies, and Southern Corn Bread—all retested and faithfully improved—as well as new favorites like Chana Masala, Beef Rendang, Megan’s Seeded Olive Oil Granola, and Smoked Pork Shoulder. In addition to a thoroughly modernized vegetable chapter, there are many more vegan and vegetarian recipes, including Caramelized Tamarind Tempeh, Crispy Pan-Fried Tofu, Spicy Chickpea Soup, and Roasted Mushroom Burgers. Joy’s baking chapters now include gram weights for accuracy, along with a refreshed lineup of baked goods like Cannelés de Bordeaux, Rustic No-Knead Sourdough, Ciabatta, Chocolate-Walnut Babka, and Chicago-Style Deep-Dish Pizza, as well as gluten-free recipes for pizza dough and yeast breads. A new chapter on streamlined cooking explains how to economize time, money, and ingredients and avoid waste. You will learn how to use a diverse array of ingredients, from amaranth to za’atar. New techniques include low-temperature and sous vide cooking, fermentation, and cooking with both traditional and electric pressure cookers. Barbecuing, smoking, and other outdoor cooking methods are covered in even greater detail. This new edition of Joy is the perfect combination of classic recipes, new dishes, and indispensable reference information for today’s home cooks. Whether it is the only cookbook on your shelf or one of many, Joy is and has been the essential and trusted guide for home cooks for almost a century. This new edition continues that legacy.

Sweets and Treats with Six Sisters' Stuff: 100+ Desserts, Gift Ideas, and Traditions for the Whole Family


Six Sisters' Stuff - 2015
    Whether quick-and-easy, imaginative show-stoppers, special occasion, holiday-themed or adorably cute and kid-friendly, this new Six Sisters' Stuff cookbook features 110 scrumptious homemade dessert recipes, covering every sweet tooth craving. Step-by-step instructions make it easy to create delicious and imaginative confections using pantry staples including: Mississippi Mud Brownies, Homemade Twix Bars, Nutella Cheesecake, Key Lime Cupcakes, Samoas Popcorn and includes a chapter on super-fast no-bake treats like Mini Peanut Butter Cup Trifles.  Sweets & Treats with Six Sisters' Stuff  also features imaginative ways to share and showcase your homemade confections including: Ways to Package Treats, Dessert Traditions, Desserts Kids Can Make, and Companion Dessert Craft Projects.

Mourad: New Moroccan


Mourad Lahlou - 2011
    His book is anything but a dutifully “authentic” documentation of Moroccan home cooking. Yes, the great classics are all here—the basteeya, the couscous, the preserved lemons, and much more. But Mourad adapts them in stunningly creative ways that take a Moroccan idea to a whole new place. The 100-plus recipes, lavishly illustrated with food and location photography, and terrifically engaging text offer a rare blend of heat, heart, and palate.

50 Ways to Eat Cock: Healthy Chicken Recipes with Balls


Adrienne N. Hew - 2012
    Once revered for his virility and strength, the rooster has taken a back seat to the hen in more recent years. “Fifty Ways to Eat Cock” takes a revealing look at the folklore, history, culinary culture and nutritional benefits of this well-endowed ingredient. With tongue-in-cheek descriptions, these playful cock recipes are bulging with everything from the quintessential to the quick-and-easy to the downright quirky. You’ll learn how to tame this tough bird meat into succulent and finger-licking gourmet meals. Thanks to the ingenuity of author and Certified Nutritionist, Adrienne Hew, the noble cock retakes his rightful place at the head of the table.

Poilâne: The Secrets of the World-Famous Bread Bakery


Apollonia Poilâne - 2019
    Poilâne bakery and the Poilâne family have revolutionized the way we think about bread, and it is deeply important that we preserve and learn from their legacy." —Alice Waters, from the foreword To food lovers the world over, a trip to Paris is not complete without a visit to Poilâne. Ina Garten raves about the bread’s “extraordinary quality.” Martha Stewart says the P in Poilâne stands for “perfect.” For the first time, Poilâne provides detailed instructions so bakers can reproduce its unique “hug-sized” sourdough loaves at home, as well as the bakery’s other much-loved breads and pastries. It tells the story of how Apollonia Poilâne, the third-generation baker and owner, took over the global business at age eighteen and steered it into the future as a Harvard University freshman after her parents were killed in a helicopter crash. Beyond bread, Apollonia includes recipes for pastries such as the bakery’s exquisite but unfussy tarts and butter cookies. In recipes that use bread as an ingredient, she shows how to make the most from a loaf, from crust to crumb. In still other dishes, she explores the world of grains: rice, corn, barley, oats, and millet. From sunup to sundown, Poilâne traces the hours in a baker’s day, blending narrative, recipes, and Apollonia’s philosophy of bread.

Skinnytaste One and Done: 140 No-Fuss Dinners for Your Instant Pot®, Slow Cooker, Air Fryer, Sheet Pan, Skillet, Dutch Oven, and More


Gina Homolka - 2018
    #1 New York Times bestselling author Gina Homolka incorporates her healthy, flavor-forward recipes with everyone's favorite way to cook--in one vessel, whether a sheet pan or multi-cooker, and everything in-between. No matter if you'd like to lose weight or just eat a little healthier, this book will make your weeknight dinner routine even simpler with satisfying, all-in-one recipes. Cooking in a single vessel means streamlined dinners with minimal fuss and cleanup--a huge plus after a long day.      Skinnytaste One and Done is organized by vessels that include everyday cooking equipment such as an Instant Pot®, a sheet pan, a Dutch oven, a skillet, a slow cooker, and an air fryer. As always, the recipes are big on flavor and light on calories, and now more convenient than ever. With 140 healthy, family-friendly recipes, 120 full-color photos, nutritional information for every recipe, and Gina's signature cooking tips, Skinnytaste One and Done will be a weeknight game changer.(Please note that nutritional information is provided with every recipe, but the most up-to-date Weight Watchers points can be found online at skinnytaste.com.)

The Cooking Gene: A Journey Through African American Culinary History in the Old South


Michael W. Twitty - 2017
    In this unique memoir, culinary historian Michael W. Twitty takes listeners to the white-hot center of this fight, tracing the roots of his own family and the charged politics surrounding the origins of soul food, barbecue, and all Southern cuisine. Twitty travels from the tobacco and rice farms of colonial times to plantation kitchens and backbreaking cotton fields to tell of the struggles his family faced and how food enabled his ancestors' survival across three centuries. He sifts through stories, recipes, genetic tests, and historical documents, and visits Civil War battlefields in Virginia, synagogues in Alabama, and black-owned organic farms in Georgia. As he takes us through his ancestral culinary history, Twitty suggests that healing may come from embracing the discomfort of the South's past. Along the way, he reveals a truth that is more than skin deep-the power of food to bring the kin of the enslaved and their former slaveholders to the table, where they can discover the real America together.