The 21 Best Cookbooks of 2015
Photo by Danny Kim1/21The Broad Fork
By Hugh Acheson
Georgia chef Hugh Acheson’s modern, comprehensive vegetable cookbook is without a doubt my favorite cookbook this year. The book seeks to answer a neighbor’s off-handed question: “What the hell do I do with kohlrabi?” Who hasn’t had a similar thought standing in the grocery store or at the farmers’ market? Acheson goes from there, offering suggestions from the simple to restaurant-level for vegetables from tomatoes to fava beans to endive to bok choy to, yes, kohlrabi. And every recipe I’ve tried is a gem. For more, read my review.
Photo by Danny Kim2/21101 Easy Asian Recipes
By Peter Meehan and the Editors of Lucky Peach
If you are a busy home cook with an inclination towards Asian flavors, you need this cookbook. Because Peter Meehan and the editors of Lucky Peach magazine? They’re not messing around when it comes to easy recipes. That on its own would be enough, but the recipes are written with such a joy and sense of humor that it’s actually fun to cook from, too. For more, read my review.
Photo by Danny Kim3/21Franklin Barbecue
By Aaron Franklin and Jordan Mackay
Barbecue books have always been a mystery to me. How do you condense the magic of smoke into a recipe of just a couple pages? Answer: you don’t. Texas pitmaster Aaron Franklin takes his time here explaining how to smoke the proper way, and the result is a wholly less-frustrating and more successful barbecue experience.
Photo by Danny Kim4/21Cookie Love
By Mindy Segal with Kate Leahy
I will always have a soft spot for this book: the first book I reviewed for Epicurious. Lucky for me, it turned out to be a great one, a compact volume full of classic recipes and modern, creative riffs, all of which work beautifully. Your cookie game will never be the same.
Photo by Danny Kim5/21Gjelina
By Travis Lett
Every home cook’s bookshelf needs a restaurant cookbook. Use it for inspiration, for technique, for showoff recipes when company is over. This year, the essential restaurant book is Gjelina, a vegetable- and pasta-focused book from the Venice, California restaurant of the same name. For every recipe with four sub-recipes in Gjelina, there’s a super simple pasta or salad dish as well. For more, read my review.
Photo by Danny Kim6/21Lidia's Mastering the Art of Italian Cuisine
By Lidia Matticchio Bastianich and Tanya Bastianich Manuali
Inside this huge, plain volume—the title of which ambitiously name checks one of the greatest cookbooks of all time—lies a deeply personal book. If you’re expecting a comprehensive guide to classic Italian cuisine, look elsewhere: there are over 400 recipes here, and they're more classic Lidia than classic Lidia. (And that’s a good thing.) For more, read my review.
Photo by Danny Kim7/21Essential Emeril
By Emeril Lagasse
My love for Emeril is well-documented, largely because his recipes for amped-up classics always (always!) work. Here Lagasse explores his absolute favorite recipes and the lessons he’s learned over decades of celebrity chefdom. If you still think of him as the bam! guy, this book will change your mind.
Photo by Danny Kim8/21The Picnic
By Marnie Hanel, Andrea Slonecker, and Jen Stevenson
Why don’t we all go on more picnics? It seems like such a nice thing to do, but once you start thinking of logistics—food safety and park regulations and what will you even cook, anyway?—it can get overwhelming. Thankfully, this book is full of practical advice and tasty recipes that will get you on the fast track to picnicking. And if a prettier book came out this year, I didn’t see it. Read more.
Photo by Danny Kim9/21Tacos
By Alex Stupak and Jordana Rothman
Everyone loves tacos. But how many of us really, truly know tacos? New York chef Alex Stupak dives deep into the Mexican (and American!) traditions surrounding this dubiously simple handheld food, and offers recipes from the super simple to the intricate.
Photo by Danny Kim10/21The Homemade Kitchen
By Alana Chernila
There is something so satisfying about this book. It’s the kind of book you flip through and think “Oh, I should make that!”…for every single recipe. Alana Chernila explores a super realistic but still elegant style of home cooking, sort of like you’ve enviously peeked into someone else’s grocery cart and they happily begin explaining their entire week’s menu plan. Great for beginners, or if you’re just stuck in a cooking rut and need a nudge. Read more.
Photo by Danny Kim11/21Near & Far
By Heidi Swanson
Of course this book is gorgeous: it’s what we’ve come to expect from blogger Heidi Swanson, whose 101 Cookbooks has practically defined the dreamy, sunlit, health-conscious cooking aesthetic. Here, Swanson takes her show on the road, taking recipe inspiration from her travels to Morocco, Japan, Italy, France, India, and her home of San Francisco. Read more.
Photo by Danny Kim12/21Mi Comida Latina
By Marcella Kriebel
Part travel journal, part cookbook, this illustrated exploration of Latin American home cooking is beautiful, easy to use, and fun to cook from. The proceeds go to Adelante Mujeres, a social services nonprofit for women in Kriebel’s hometown of Forest Grove, Oregon. Read more.
Photo by Danny Kim13/21The Violet Bakery Cookbook
By Claire Ptak
What happens when an American pastry chef moves to London? In Claire Ptak’s case, you end up with a bakery—and a cookbook—that combines the best of both worlds. The former Chez Panisse pastry chef bakes everything from classic cream scones to American-style butterscotch blondies in the Violet Bakery—and now you can, too. Read more.
Photo by Danny Kim14/21Mamushka
By Olia Hercules
Think Eastern European cooking means brown food and borscht? The ridiculously charming Olia Hercules will demolish your preconceptions (while still providing some mean dumpling recipes). Hercules’ book is full of bright, bold dishes and stories of her large Ukrainian family. Read more.
Photo by Danny Kim15/21The Food Lab
By J. Kenji Lopez-Alt
J. Kenji Lopez-Alt goes big here, drawing from his Food Lab column for Serious Eats to create a mega-tome on the whys and hows behind cooking. Turn here for everything from the best way to boil an egg to the best way to glaze carrots to fundamentals of sous vide.
Photo by Danny Kim16/21Bien Cuit: The Art of Bread
By Zachary Golper and Peter Kaminsky
Bien Cuit means well done, and the Brooklyn bread bakery is known for its crispy, crusty, almost-but-not-quite overbaked bread. In this stunner of a first volume, baker Zachary Golper explores his methods (and offers some quick breads, biscuits, and scones, too). The design is rare for a cookbook—black pages, no spine—but it works. The whole package makes me excited to get baking. Regan Arts
Photo by Danny Kim17/21Root to Leaf
By Steven Satterfield
Another vegetable cookbook from another Southern chef. Here, Atlanta’s Steven Satterfield focuses on what he calls root-to-leaf cooking, a plant-based riff on the nose-to-tail phenomenon. There are recipes here—great ones—but perhaps the most valuable sections are the introduction to each vegetable, which shares advice on preparation, storage and more. Think of it as a guide to how you think about vegetables. Read more.
Photo by Danny Kim18/21The Chili Cookbook
By Robb Walsh
Other than barbecue, chili preferences are probably the most likely food to start a fight. Thankfully, Texas cookbook author Robb Walsh goes above and beyond, offering recipes for everything from a Texas bowl of red to Ohio-style 5-way chili to New Mexico green chili to goulash to a Berber tagine to vegetarian chilis. In other words, you’re guaranteed to find at least one chili recipe that will please all the chiliheads in your life. Read more.
Photo by Danny Kim19/21The Mission Chinese Food Cookbook
By Danny Bowien and Chris Ying
The recipes here are a bit more complicated than most of the books on this list, but you’re mostly here for the story anyway. How did Danny Bowien, a Korean-American kid from Oklahoma, end up cooking critically acclaimed, insanely popular Chinese food in San Francisco and New York? More scrapbook than cookbook, the recipes here illuminate the story. (And make some pretty killer dishes, too.) Read more.
Photo by Danny Kim20/21Zahav
By Michael Solomonov and Steven Cook
Philladelphia chef Michael Solomonov’s take on the foods of Israel is the kind of food you can’t get out of your head: this book is worth its cover price for the hummus recipe alone. Thankfully, there’s so much more in here, from mezze to dessert, with many traditional recipes as well as riffs from Solomonov’s restaurant. For more, read my review.
Photo by Danny Kim21/21The Southerner's Cookbook
The editors of Garden & Gun magazine have put together a beautiful cookbook that explores the breadth of Southern cooking, with contributions from chefs all over the region. This book is perfect for the person who loves their grandmother’s old beat up southern church cookbook, but prefers a modern (but still classic!) style of cooking. Read more.
