Essential Emeril: Favorite Recipes and Hard-Won Wisdom From My Life in the Kitchen
By Emeril Lagasse
I've been making Emeril Lagasse recipes since college. This feels like a confession: at the time, me and my restaurant buddies had all just read Anthony Bourdain'sKitchen Confidential, and mocking Food Network stars was standard bar talk after work. Not to mention, it was towards the tail end of the Bam! era, and Lagasse was kickin' it up a notch all over the place like a walking, talking dad joke.
In other words, it wasn't cool to like Emeril.
And yet, every time I wanted to try making a new dish, I turned to Lagasse. You know why? His recipeswork. Every time. No guess work, no substitutions necessary. And there's always a little something extra. These are not just simple recipes, there's always a small twist or addition. In other words, if you do what he says, you will end up with delicious things to eat. There's a reason the guy was maddeningly popular.
So when I heard he was coming out with a new cookbook calledEssential Emeril, I was excited. 130 recipes that shaped his career? I'm so in. And not only are the recipes here great—and foolproof!—it's also a sweet meditation on his career, with essays about the late great Charlie Trotter, an ode to Roy Choi's tacos, and much more.
The Takeaway:Fans of Emeril will love this so-called "ultimate collection." The rest of you? You have some catching up to do.
The Homemade Kitchen: Recipes for Cooking with Pleasure
By Alana Chernila
The subtitle for this book breaks my heart. Cooking with pleasure! Remember cooking with pleasure? Remember cooking that's not a chore, but a delight? Have you ever spent an afternoon in a sunny kitchen, just listening to music and cooking away? I hope so.
Alana Chernila takes a realistic approach to cooking with pleasure.The Homemade Kitchenis divided into chapters based on a list of phrases she has taped to her fridge at home, that she says "help me remember I really can create the life I want." To get cooking more creatively, to get cooking better. They're phrases like: "Be a beginner." "Feed yourself." "Slow down." "Eat outside." These are such reasonable requests, it's almost a relief to read through her cooking advice. The fact that the photography is stunning, the layout elegant, and the recipes themselves somehow modern and rustic at the same time doesn't hurt.
Chernila's first book,The Homemade Pantry, was a little fussy for me, but I found no shortage of intriguing recipes in this book. Miso soup packed with greens. Giant platter salads for dinner parties. Freeform vegetable tarts that prioritize flavor over perfection. A savory bread pudding with broccoli rabe, sausage and sharp cheddar that was such a hit at my house that it immediately went on the easy go-to recipe list.
The Takeaway:Hearty, flavorful, and occasionally healthy recipes in gorgeous packaging that will put some pleasure back in your kitchen.
Mamushka: Recipes from Ukraine & Beyond
By Olia Hercules
Before you ask, the word "Mamushka" is not what you think. Or, actually, maybe it'sexactlywhat you think. Olia Hercules writes that it's an inside family joke: after seeing the originalAddams Familymovie, she and her siblings started calling their mom Mamushka after a made upEastern European dancefrom the film.
That story is typical of the sense of humor, the lightness, that runs throughMamushkathe cookbook. The recipes are authentic, sure, but they're authentic to Hercules' seemingly large, eccentric (her word), geographically-scattered family, not some sort of unrealistic Official Ukrainian Cuisine. The book lacks the self-serious piety to tradition that bogs down so many regional cuisine cookbooks: these recipes are the foods from Hercules' life.
So, here we have foods that are not just Ukrainian but Azerbaijani and Armenian, Russian and Greek. It's dumplings and stuffed breads and salads and, yes, borscht. But, as Hercules writes, "I realize how inextricably bound the Western vision of Ukraine is with that of Russia—vast, gray, and bleak. Yet [where she grew up], winters are mild, our summers long and hot, and our food a cornucopia of color and flavor."
The Takeaway:Forget what you think you know about Ukrainian food; with OIia Hercules, it's fun and colorful.
The Four Seasons of Pasta
By Nancy Harmon Jenkins and Sara Jenkins
Maybe you're familiar with Nancy Harmon Jenkins, author of several cookbooks that look at Mediterranean cuisine likeFlavors of TuscanyorThe New Mediterranean Diet Cookbook. Or maybe you know about Sara Jenkins, chef at New York City restaurants Porsena and Porchetta. But did you know Nancy is Sara's mother? And that they've come together like some sort of cookbook supergroup to write a new book on seasonal pastas?
The Four Seasons of Pastatakes a good, hard look at the best ways to pack flavor into your pasta dishes by season. The recipes get a little complicated at times—good things come to those who make incredibly complex mushroom bechamel for lasagna—but they can also be ludicrously, mind-blowingly simple. It just kind of depends on what's at the market.
I wouldn't sayFour Seasonsis for beginners, although beginners might find a few good recipes here and there. But for those looking to seriously up their pasta game, you can't beat the combined knowledge of Jenkins and Jenkins.
The Takeaway:A mother and daughter duo dive deep into a year's worth of pasta dishes.
