My wife is the foodie between us, and I have traditionally gotten her various books over the years. I’m looking for something to give her (among other things) for Xmas. Any suggestions are welcome.
South
The Sean Brock book?
What types of food are her favorites? Does she like any cooking shows in particular?
I mostly reach for Marcella Hazan’s Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking, Ruth Reichl’s Gourmet cookbook, and Heston Blumenthal at Home.
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For classic French/Alsatian dishes without as much fuss as you’d think, I love The Lutece Cookbook. It is one of the most frequently used cookbooks in our embarrassingly large collection. I believe it is, sadly, out of print, but it can be found online used. I have found that tracking down an out of print book makes a gift even more meaningful.
This year, the cookbooks I reach for most are:
Shaya, Alon Shaya
Jubilee, Toni Triptent-Martin
Bravetart, Stella Parks
Midwest Made, Shauna Sever
All About Cake, Christina Tosi
Flour Water Salt Yeast, Ken Forkish
Perennial Favorites:
The Cooking of Southwest France Paula Wolfert
Momofuku, David Chang
Thanks everyone! Some of those we don’t have so I definitely have some options. Appreciate it.
The Food Lab - Kenji Lopez Alt
Bread Alone - Daniel Leader
Any of the America’s Test Kitchen cookbooks
I received Rick Bayless’ Mexican Everyday as a gift earlier this year and really like it. Not fancy, and not always wine friendly, but the zucchini-mushroom tacos with chorizo are an epic flavor combination.
I have way too many cookbooks, but I most often reach for anything put out by the America’s Test Kitchen line. Got an online membership that covers all of their websites and now use that almost exclusively.
Marc Vetri Mastering Pasta if she likes to make her own
Vivian Howard’s Deep Run Roots is a really beautiful book on North Carolina cooking. The only thing is that the recipes are rather complicated (for me anyway) and use some ingredients that aren’t that easy to find here in South OC.
I really enjoy her PBS show. Her cooking looks great and I’d love to visit her restaurant. Having said that, I know I’ve never made anything I saw on her show and doubt I ever would. I could say the same about a show like Top Chef. Most of the stuff they make looks great but maybe outside my ability? Contrast that with a guy like Jacques Pepin. I make stuff I see on his videos on a regular basis.
Mustard Seed Market & Cafe Natural Foods Cookbook by Bev Shaffer.
Mustard Seed is a NE Ohio organic specialty grocer. It is worth the price of admission just for the Chilled Blueberry Soup recipe.
Not a cookbook but if she has not read Ruth Reichl’s autobiographic books, she might enjoy them … they are fascinating and take you inside the food world in a very special way.
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I love the Mustard Seed Market stores. I sell to them and know the family (owners) quite well.
This is a great suggestion; I’ve really enjoyed her books recently.
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I really love Dorie Greenspan’s book “Around my French Table.” I regularly turn to that book for ideas on all kids of stuff.
I am fortunate to have been gifted the entire Time-Life The Good Cook book series one Christmas. It’s food porn at its best, IMHO.