 How to Cook Everything Vegetarian: Tenth Anniversary Edition by Mark Bittman (2017) - It seems like we are all trying to eat more fruits and vegetables. With this cookbook, Mr. Bittman truly helps. Told in a style that assumes the reader is an amateur, without being at all patronizing, this ode to vegetable dishes is a great gift for graduates starting their cookbook library and fathers who may wish to add a few more vegetarian meals to their lives. For omnivores, Mr. Bittman's How to Cook Everything is also a perfect gift. ~ Lisa Cadow and Lisa Christie  Good Husbandry: Growing Food, Love, and Family on Essex Farm by Kristin Kimball (2019) - If you’re in the (farmer’s) market for a mid-winter read that inspires you to start thinking about the greener days ahead and picking up your farm share come summer, then this is the book for you. Kristin Kimball’s second memoir (which is as good if not even better than her first The Dirty Life - see a Book Jam review here from the days when we had a podcast) is a compulsively readable and an incredibly beautifully written account of her time growing a marriage, a family, and a CSA farm that feeds 250 people in New York State. When we initially met the author in 2011 with the publication of her first book, Kimball, then a city dweller and travel writer in her thirties, had unexpectedly embraced the rural life after meeting and falling in love with both farming and with Mark. Now almost a decade has passed and both she and the story have matured. She doesn’t shy away from sharing the challenges faced raising two young girls while trying to manage the increasing debt and the risky odds that come with farming. Nor does she ignore the building tension in her marriage as she and her husband adjust to parenthood and the never ending work of a diversified farm that leaves little time for their relationship. Instead, Kimball thoroughly explores these difficult topics with grace and wisdom, growing a story -and a life - full of awareness and insight. At certain points, Kimball’s prose and perspective on the natural world reminded me of the poetry of Mary Oliver. Her stewardship and environmental ethic called to mind Rachel Carson or Terry Tempest Williams. And at others, her food sense and the descriptions of heavenly meals around her farm table made me think of a rustic Ruth Reichl. But she is a brilliant voice in her own right. Don’t miss this book. Read it and Eat (local). ~Lisa Cadow  Cooking From Scratch: 120 recipes for colorful seasonal food from PCC Community Markets by PCC Community Markets (2018) - This new cookbook makes a great gift for any gift giving occasion this summer. We had to look up PCC Community Markets - turns out it is the nation’s largest community-owned food market. Despite our initial ignorance, we love what we have seen in their cookbook. This Seattle based market organized this cookbook with recipes for every meal of the day, including many of their most popular dishes, such as Emerald City Salad. ~ Lisa Christie  Maple: 100 Sweet and Savory Recipes Featuring Pure Maple Syrup by Katie Webster (2015). One of the many perks of living in Vermont is being lucky enough to stash away a gallon or two of maple syrup after the annual February/March sugaring season. And mind you, we don’t just drizzle this sweet stuff over pancakes – we find ways to add it to everything including morning coffee, a cold glass of milk, spicy chili, savory soups, crisps, cobblers, and even salad dressings. This lovely book will add to the myriad of ways cooks know to use the nectar of the woods. Webster includes delicious, original recipes for delicacies such as Kale Skillet Salad with Walnuts and Maple, Sugar Season Hot Cocoa, Sap Baked Beans, Layered Beet and Carrot Salad, and Dutch Baby Pancakes with Maple and Rhubarb Compote. The only downside of adding this cookbook to a collection is that readers may run out of their syrup supply before being able to resupply in the spring. ~ Lisa Cadow  The Art of Gathering: How We Meet and Why It Mattersby Priya Parker (2018). Have you ever wondered what’s in that special sauce, the one that makes one get-together meaningful or even transformative while another can fall flat and lack energy, even if the guests are A-List? If so, this is the book for you. Author Priya Parker is a professional facilitator who writes from a vantage point of over thirty years of experience of bringing people together for wide-ranging events, from meetings, to conferences, to dinner parties, and even funerals. Not only does she understand how to create this special “sauce” but her prose is elegant and lucid, her insights about group dynamics illuminating while also fascinating. Each chapter is important, and not to be skipped over. Parker’s writing encourage us would-be gatherers to consider the purpose of our parties, the goal of our gatherings, the size of our meetings, the role of the host (don’t slack on this one), and the architecture of our space. This is the kind of work that compels readers to underline its energy-filled sentences with offerings like the following: “We gather to solve problems we can’t solve on our own. We gather to celebrate, to mourn, and to mark transitions. We gather to make decisions. We gather because we need one another. We gather to show strength. “ If you are looking to elevate your gatherings to an art in 2019 – something that I think we all need and even crave very much right now – look no further than this extremely important work. ~Lisa Cadow  Ottolenghi Simple by Yotam Ottolenghi (2018). This new book helps home cooks to live a flavorful kitchen dream! Believe it or not, these are Ottolenghi recipes with ten ingredients or less, most of which can be made in under a 45 minutes. From spending time with Ottolenghi’s newest brilliant book I’ve learned that: one can lightly grill grapes on skewers (in a stovetop grill pan!) to accompany a silky burrata hors d’oeuvre plate, that zucchini loves to be served with peas (in a soup, on a platter sprinkled with oregano), and that butternut soup can come alive with curry and harrissa, and sprinkled with toasted pumpkin seeds. Believes me, the list goes on and on and on with enough new exciting dishes to try for throughout next year. Roasted Whole Cauliflower with Green Tahini Dip? Wow. So many of of his 300 pages of recipes are plant-based, verdantly vibrant, and infused with flavorful vegetables that meat actually takes a backseat – though, don’t despair, there are still two juicy chapters full of succulent fish, lamb, and chicken dishes. Please note that “Papardelle with Rose Harissa, Black Olives and Capers” just many eek out our family’s go-to, classic Marcella Hazan Spaghetti Bolognese recipe. ~Lisa Cadow  Aperitif: Cocktail Hour the French Way by Rebekah Peppler (2018): If you’ve ever had the pleasure of dining chez les francais, the first thing you will notice is the elegant simplicity of their appetizers. They favor small, salty bites that please the palette and interesting, bubbly drinks which don’t fill up guests before the main course arrives. This book is bursting with observations and ideas that author Rebekah Peppler collected during her time living and dining in France. It features fresh simple recipes low-alcohol drinks and high-taste appetizers that anyone who entertains should have in their repertoire such as simply fried potato chips, zippy marinated olives, cheese puffs. This book makes for the perfect, sophisticated hostess gift this season – and the next. ~Lisa Cadow  Comfort Food Diaries: My quest for the perfect dish to mend a broken heart by Emily Nunn (2017) – Part cook book, part memoir, part recipe for regaining one’s equilibrium, this book by former New Yorker editor Emily Nunn, won some diverse recognition: NPR’s Best Books of 2017, Best Books on Food of 2017, The Guardian, Best Food-Focused Memoirs, Eater, Top 10 Narrative Food & Drink Books, Booklist, 20 Best Cookbooks, The Telegraph. And while I saw these reviews and was intrigued, it was not until a former roommate (who went to college with Ms. Nunn) put this in my hands that I managed to read this tale. In it, Ms. Nunn describes how during one life-changing, alcohol-enhanced night, she takes to Facebook for help with managing her brother’s death, a devastating breakup with her fiance, and her subsequent eviction from the home that they shared. The next morning, she discovers many of her friends want to help and offer their couches, guest rooms, and kitchens to her to use while she puts her life back together. Thus, her “Comfort Food Tour” begins. Luckily for us readers, she chronicled her journey across America searching for what food comforts others in the hopes one of these dishes will unlock something for herself. Ms. Nunn manages to make her descent into the depths of personal angst and depression funny, insightful, and delicious – with recipes sprinkled throughout. As the indie-booksellers state in their review, Ms. Nunn “delivers a moving account of her descent into darkness and her gradual, hard-won return to the living”. I am glad my friend sent this to me. I hope you will be glad this found its way to you as well. ~ Lisa Christie  The Wine Lover’s Daughter by Anne Fadiman (2017) – This would be the perfect gift to hand a hostess along with, of course, a thoughtfully chosen bottle of wine. Ms. Fadiman is a graceful writer who has the ability, much like a serious oenophile can identify from a mere sip the vineyard from which a wine originates, to pick the precise and exacting words to tell this moving, intimate story about her relationship with her once-famous father Clifton Fadiman. Though she never shared his love of wine (not for want of trying!), she shares his adoration of and skill with words. Why read this book? For its beautiful prose, a little lesson on wine, for a privileged view into a special father-daughter relationship, and for a glimpse into a past era of literary and immigrant America. Readers may recognize Ms. Fadiman as the 1997 National Book Critics Circle Award winner who wrote The Spirit Catches You And You Fall Down. She proves again with this memoir that she is a master storyteller, as well as an astute social anthropologist. ~Lisa Cadow and Lisa Christie  Food52: A New Way to Dinner. A Playbook of Recipes and Strategies for the Week Ahead by Amanda Hesserand Merrill Stubbs. (2016). What sets this book apart is its approach, encouraging readers to plan out their food a week ahead and to get most of work done in advance, shopping lists included. The authors offer prep advice and also easy, seasonal, and truly sophisticated recipes. Take winter for example: Stubbs offers the reader a week of menus for the colder weather that play with Brussels sprouts, coconut bars and roast turbo. She and co-author Hesser take turns sharing their take on how to perfectly dish up dinner during the different months of the year. This book promises to make you feel like you’re eating at the chic bistro in NYC when, with a little bit of prep work, you’re actually just sitting at your own kitchen table on a weeknight. Thank you, Amanda and Merrill! ~ Lisa Cadow  Everything I Want to Eat: Sqirl and the New California Cooking by Jessica Koslow (2016) – Jessica Koslow’s book has made it onto practically every “best of list” in 2016. Think of it as the healthy hipsters guide to cooking NOW. Opening it up is like taking a trip to her celebrated restaurant in LA, elevated avocado toast and creative grain bowls included. I am most enamored of her use of luscious, thick toasted slices of brioche and drizzles of homemade jam to invite the reader into her kitchen and make them wish they were being served one of her breakfast creations (they have a cult following). She’s got a strong savory palette as well. I will definitely be trying her recipe for beet-cured salmon whose jewel tones are stunning and the technique very doable. Perfect for that Brooklynite or west coast cook who is inspired by cutting edge cookery. ~ Lisa Cadow  Small Victories: Recipes, Advice + Hundreds of Ideas for Home Cooking Triumphs by Julia Turshen (2016) – This is a cozy cookbook. The cover photo gives this away, as it features an enticing bowl of chicken soup that makes you wish you had a spoon to dive right in. Turshen’s author photo shows her standing by her sunny kitchen window wearing a comfy pair of slippers. She had me at “Roasted Radishes with Kalamata Dressing” and her “Seven Things to Do with Leftover Roast Chicken.” Sophisticated but entirely without pretense, this is another book I am sure to give my dear ones this year. ~ Lisa Cadow
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