Lidia's Commonsense Italian Cooking: 150 Delicious and Simple Recipes Anyone Can Master


Lidia Matticchio Bastianich - 2013
    Channeling the instructive elements from her TV show, she teaches us that a good dose of common sense is the key ingredient to a stellar meal. As storyteller and chef, she draws on anecdotes to educate and illustrate. Recalling lessons learned from her mother, Erminia, and her grandmother Nonna Rosa, Lidia pays homage to the kitchen sages who inspired her.Whether it's Citrus Roasted Veal, or Rustic Ricotta Tart, each recipe is a tangible feast. We learn to look at ingredients as both geographic and cultural indicators. In Campania, the region where mozzarella is king, we discover it best eaten three hours after preparation. In Genova we are taught that while focaccia had its basil origins in the Ligurain culinary tradition, the herbs and flavorings will change from region to region; as home chefs, we can experiment with rosemary or oregano or olives or onions! When it's time for dessert, Lidia draws on the scared customs of nuns in Italian monasteries and convents and reveals the secret to rice pudding with a blessing. Lidia's Commonsense Guide to Italian Cooking is a collection of 150 delectable recipes, told with commonsense cooking wisdom, that teaches us how create simple, seasonal Italian dishes with grace, confidence and love.

Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day: The Discovery That Revolutionizes Home Baking


Jeff Hertzberg - 2007
    With more than half a million copies of their books in print, Jeff Hertzberg and Zoe Francois have proven that people want to bake their own bread, so long as they can do it easily and quickly.Crusty baguettes, mouth-watering pizzas, hearty sandwich loaves, and even buttery pastries can easily become part of your own personal menu, Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day will teach you everything you need to know, opening the eyes of any potential baker."

Roots: The Definitive Compendium with more than 225 Recipes


Diane Morgan - 2012
    Discover the fascinating history and lore of 29 major roots, their nutritional content, how to buy and store them, and much more, from the familiar (beets, carrots, potatoes) to the unfamiliar (jicama, salsify, malanga) to the practically unheard of (cassava, galangal, crosnes). The best part? More than 225 recipes—salads, soups, side dishes, main courses, drinks, and desserts—that bring out the earthy goodness of each and every one of these intriguing vegetables. From Andean tubers and burdock to yams and yuca, this essential culinary encyclopedia lets dedicated home cooks achieve a new level of taste and sophistication in their everyday cooking.

Rick Stein's Far Eastern Odyssey


Rick Stein - 2009
    In this accompanying book to the major BBC series, Rick shares his favourite recipes and some well-known classic dishes inspired by the fragrant ingredients and recipes he sampled from local chefs, family-run restaurants, street vendors and market stalls.In Cambodia, Rick learns how to make a national dish Samlor kako, a stir-fried pork and vegetable soup flavoured with an array of spices; in Vietnam he is shown the best recipe for Pho Bo, a Vietnamese beef noodle soup; and in Thailand, Rick tries Geng Leuong Sai Gung Lai Sai Bua, a yellow curry made with prawns and lotus shoots that you won't find outside the country.Rick Stein's Far Eastern Odyssey includes over 150 new recipes from Cambodia, Vietnam, Thailand, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Malaysia and Bali each complemented by Rick's colourful anecdotes from the trip and beautiful on-location photography. This is a visually-stunning culinary tribute to Southeast Asian cooking that evokes the magic of bustling markets, the sizzle of oil and the aromatic steam from a Far Eastern kitchen.

Eight Flavors: The Untold Story of American Cuisine


Sarah Lohman - 2016
    But a young historical gastronomist named Sarah Lohman discovered that American food is united by eight flavors: black pepper, vanilla, curry powder, chili powder, soy sauce, garlic, MSG, and Sriracha. Lohman sets out to explore how these influential ingredients made their way to the American table. Eight Flavors introduces the explorers, merchants, botanists, farmers, writers, and chefs whose choices came to define the American palate.

What Einstein Told His Cook: Kitchen Science Explained


Robert L. Wolke - 2002
    Chemistry professor and syndicated Washington Post food columnist Robert L. Wolke provides over 100 reliable and witty explanations, while debunking misconceptions and helping you to see through confusing advertising and labeling.

BraveTart: Iconic American Desserts


Stella Parks - 2017
    Whether down-home delights like Blueberry Muffins and Glossy Fudge Brownies or supermarket mainstays such as Vanilla Wafers and Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Ice Cream, your favorites are all here. These meticulously tested recipes bring an award-winning pastry chef’s expertise into your kitchen, along with advice on how to “mix it up” with over 200 customizable variations—in short, exactly what you’d expect from a cookbook penned by a senior editor at Serious Eats. Yet BraveTart is much more than a cookbook, as Stella Parks delves into the surprising stories of how our favorite desserts came to be, from chocolate chip cookies that predate the Tollhouse Inn to the prohibition-era origins of ice cream sodas and floats. With a foreword by The Food Lab’s J. Kenji López-Alt, vintage advertisements for these historical desserts, and breathtaking photography from Penny De Los Santos, BraveTart is sure to become an American classic.

The Berry Bible: With 175 Recipes Using Cultivated and Wild, Fresh and Frozen Berries


Janie Hibler - 2004
    Now berry lovers can maximize their enjoyment with The Berry Bible, the new offering from James Beard Book Award-winning author Janie Hibler.Part encyclopedia, part cookbook, The Berry Bible begins with an explanation of the health benefits of nutrient-rich berries and goes on to profile dozens of important culinary berries and berrylike fruits in the vibrantly illustrated "A-to-Z Berry Encyclopedia." Tips on how to remove berry stains and freeze for the off-season pave the way for 175 delectable recipes that use cultivated, wild, fresh, and frozen berries.From Blackberry-Blueberry Cardamom Muffins, Mango-Raspberry Summer Soup, and Boysenberry Applesauce to Blackberry-Port Lamb Shanks, Almond-Gooseberry Cream Pie, and The Perfect Strawberry Shortcake, these succulent dishes are sure to garner The Berry Bible a permanent spot in any kitchen.

Lucky Peach: Issue 1


Chris Ying - 2011
    It is a creation of David Chang, the James Beard Award–winning chef behind the Momofuku restaurants in New York, Momofuku cookbook cowriter Peter Meehan, and Zero Point Zero Productions—producers of the Travel Channel’s Emmy Award–winning Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations.The result of this collaboration is a mélange of travelogue, essays, art, photography, and rants in a full-color, meticulously designed format. Recipes will defy the tired ingredients-and-numbered-steps formula. They’ll be laid out sensibly, inspired by the thought process that went into developing them.Each issue will focus on a theme (Issue One’s theme is “Ramen”), with contributions from Harold McGee, Ruth Reichl, John T. Edge, Todd Kliman and a cavalcade of other writers and artists. The reader will meander through arguments about the superiority of yellow alkaline noodles over Italian egg pasta; a taxonomy of ramen-package characters; an eating tour of Japan helmed by an over-stuffed and nauseated, but nevertheless intrepid, David Chang; and a booze-fueled rant on mediocrity in American cuisine with chefs Chang, Bourdain, and Wylie Dufresne set in the Spanish Basque country.The aim of Lucky Peach is to give a platform to a brand of food writing that began with unorthodox authors like Bourdain, resulting in a publication that appeals to diehard foodies as well as fans of good writing and art in general.

The French Laundry Cookbook


Thomas Keller - 1999
    The most transformative cookbook of the century celebrates this milestone by showcasing the genius of chef/proprietor Thomas Keller himself. Keller is a wizard, a purist, a man obsessed with getting it right. And this, his first cookbook, is every bit as satisfying as a French Laundry meal itself: a series of small, impeccable, highly refined, intensely focused courses. Most dazzling is how simple Keller's methods are: squeegeeing the moisture from the skin on fish so it sautées beautifully; poaching eggs in a deep pot of water for perfect shape; the initial steeping in the shell that makes cooking raw lobster out of the shell a cinch; using vinegar as a flavor enhancer; the repeated washing of bones for stock for the cleanest, clearest tastes. From innovative soup techniques, to the proper way to cook green vegetables, to secrets of great fish cookery, to the creation of breathtaking desserts; from beurre monté to foie gras au torchon, to a wild and thoroughly unexpected take on coffee and doughnuts, The French Laundry Cookbook captures, through recipes, essays, profiles, and extraordinary photography, one of America's great restaurants, its great chef, and the food that makes both unique. One hundred and fifty superlative recipes are exact recipes from the French Laundry kitchen—no shortcuts have been taken, no critical steps ignored, all have been thoroughly tested in home kitchens. If you can't get to the French Laundry, you can now re-create at home the very experience Wine Spectator described as “as close to dining perfection as it gets.”

Confections of a Closet Master Baker: One Woman's Sweet Journey from Unhappy Hollywood Executive to Contented Country Baker


Gesine Bullock-Prado - 2009
    The only solace she found was in her secret hobby: baking. With every sugary, buttery confection to emerge from her oven, Gesine took one step away from her glittery, empty existence—and one step closer to her true destiny. Before long, she and her husband left the trappings of their Hollywood lifestyle behind, ending up in Vermont, where they started the gem known as Gesine Confectionary. And they never looked back. Confections of a Closet Master Baker follows Gesine's journey from sugar-obsessed child to miserable, awkward Hollywood insider to reluctant master baker. Chock-full of eccentric characters, beautifully detailed descriptions of her baking process, ceaselessly funny renditions of Hollywood nonsense, and recipes, the ingredients of her story will appeal to anyone who has ever considered leaving the life they know and completely starting over.

Small Victories: Recipes, Advice + Hundreds of Ideas for Home Cooking Triumphs


Julia Turshen - 2016
    The process of truly great home cooking is demystified via more than a hundred lessons called out as "small victories" in the funny, encouraging headnotes; these are lessons learned by Julia through a lifetime of cooking thousands of meals. This beautifully curated, deeply personal collection of what Chef April Bloomfield calls "simple, achievable recipes" emphasizes bold-flavored, honest food for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and dessert. More than 160 mouth-watering photographs from acclaimed photographers Gentl + Hyers provide beautiful instruction and inspiration elevate this entertaining and essential kitchen resource for both beginners and accomplished home cooks.

The Low-FODMAP Diet Cookbook: 150 Simple, Flavorful, Gut-Friendly Recipes to Ease the Symptoms of IBS, Celiac Disease, Crohn's Disease, Ulcerative Colitis, and Other Digestive Disorders


Sue Shepherd - 2014
    If you suffer from the pain and discomfort of a digestive condition such as IBS, Crohn’s disease, ulcerative colitis, or nonresponsive celiac disease, it just might change yours.The Complete Low-FODMAP Diet (cowritten by Sue Shepherd) introduced this revolutionary treatment, which is rapidly becoming the first-line recommendation by doctors and dietitians worldwide. FODMAP is an acronym that stands for a group of difficult-to-digest carbohydrates found in foods such as wheat, milk, beans, soy, and some fruits, vegetables, nuts, and sweeteners. More than three quarters of adults with IBS who reduce their intake of these foods gain relief. Now, this follow-up cookbook brings you 150 simple, delicious, and brand-new recipes that are full of flavor but low in FODMAPs. The mix includes:breakfasts to start the day off right (Blueberry Pancakes; Banana-Chocolate Chip Muffins)starters and sides for every occasion (Spring Rolls; Chicken, Bacon, and Pesto Mini Pizzas; Stuffed Roasted Bell Peppers)soups and salads full of flavor (Vietnamese Beef Noodle Salad; Creamy Seafood Soup)entrées that make you feel good (Chicken and Vegetable Curry; Speedy Spaghetti Bolognese; Beef Satay Stir-Fry with Peanut Sauce)desserts that satisfy (Flourless Chocolate Cake; Almond Cookies; Baked Blueberry Cheesecakes).The low-FODMAP diet puts an end to suffering in silence, fearing the possible consequences of every meal, or confining yourself to a handful of bland, “safe” foods. The only thing missing from this comprehensive collection is the FODMAPs—and you’d never know it!

The New Indian Slow Cooker: Recipes for Curries, Dals, Chutneys, Masalas, Biryani, and More


Neela Paniz - 2014
    In The New Indian Slow Cooker, veteran cooking teacher and chef Neela Paniz revolutionizes the long, slow approach to making Indian cuisine by rethinking its traditional recipes for the slow cooker. She showcases the best regional curries, dals made with lentils and beans, vegetable and rice sides, as well as key accompaniments like chutneys, flatbreads, raita, and fresh Indian cheese.

The Art of Eating


M.F.K. Fisher - 1954
    Fisher, whose wit and fulsome opinions on food and those who produce it, comment upon it, and consume it are as apt today as they were several decades ago, when she composed them. Why did she choose food and hunger she was asked, and she replied, 'When I write about hunger, I am really writing about love and the hunger for it, and warmth, and the love of it . . . and then the warmth and richness and fine reality of hunger satisfied.