In her long-awaited debut book, acclaimed chef Camille Becerra offers up her take on what she calls “bright cooking”—a call to arms for intentional, sensorially aware, and engaged preparation, with ingredients sourced responsibly. The results are flavor-forward recipes that are easy to assemble yet overflowing with vitality, with unexpected pairings that show Becerra flexing her cheffy impulses in the home kitchen. When someone with Becerra’s gifts encourages you to put lavender salt-cured salmon on avocado toast, to bathe roasted squash in a peanut-coconut curry, or to pair grilled squid with green tahini sauce and chile vinegar, you know you’re in good hands.

Luxury publisher Assouline is renowned for their stunning lifestyle and travel guides—oversized cloth-bound books rich with full-page color photography that transports the reader to far-flung destinations. In their latest volume, the editors take you to the twelve wine-growing regions of Italy, whose appellations, varietals, and soils make for distinctive and unforgettable wines. Written by Enrico Bernardo, who, in 2004, became the youngest person ever to be crowned best sommelier in the world, the volume not only goes deep into the wines, but also explores the cuisine, culture, and history of each region, giving valuable context to every recommended vintage. Pair this with your favorite Italian wine for a perfectly luxe holiday gift.

Anthony Bourdain needs no introduction to food lovers who learned so much from his years of journalism documenting food culture across the globe. Yet in revisiting his cookbook for the New York bistro Les Halles, readers gain a new appreciation for Bourdain’s mastery of French tradition and techniques. Bourdain insisted that Les Halles was “not a cookbook,” yet his recipes offered a master class to home cooks, encouraging them to attempt dishes such as cassoulet and blanquette de veau while cooking with passion and persistence. With a foreword from chef Gabrielle Hamilton, this 20th-anniversary edition is a welcome opportunity to revisit Bourdain’s incisive prose and detailed recipes with fresh and appreciative eyes.

For years, we at SAVEUR have been clamoring for a broader celebration of the many facets of African cuisine. Now in this marvelous compendium, chef Alexander Smalls curates recipes from chefs across all five regions of the continent. The book offers an opportunity not only to encounter soon-to-be-favorite dishes such as brik pastries from Tunisia, cocoyam dumplings from Cameroon, and vegetable curry from Angola, but to also hear directly from acclaimed and on-the-rise African chefs, including Pierre Thiam, Selassie Atadika, Anto Cocagne, Coco Reinarhz, and Michael Adé Elégbèdé. An appreciation of African cuisine, Smalls declares, is not a moment, but “a movement,” and this tome will be essential reading for home cooks hoping to come aboard.

In the holiday season, sometimes what you need is a cookbook that’s just overflowing with personality and joy, one that’s as much fun to read as it is to cook from. Thankfully, SAVEUR contributor Alyse Whitney’s debut cookbook offers just that—88 delicious, hilarious, and just-gotta-try-them recipes for dip-based dining. On every page, Whitney finds a new way to encourage cooks to “dipscover” what they’ve been missing, guiding readers on “dipscosity,” pairing dips with dippers, and how to serve and style a spread to prevent double-dipping. (She even brings in support from an illustrated pop-up sidekick named Chippy.) We suggest pairing this edition with a retro-style “chip and dip”—ideal for all your winter dip-based entertaining.

In-the-know Brooklynites have flocked to the Four Horsemen in Williamsburg for the last decade in search of great natural wines, locally sourced cuisine, and an atmosphere of conviviality and care. Its chef, Nick Curtola, now shares recipes for the dishes that New Yorkers have been clamoring to taste, including numerous fresh pastas, delicate nori fritters, and a killer fried chicken with maitake mushrooms and cipollini onions. In short, it’s elegant comfort food, perfect for pairing with a great glass of wine and an even-better soundtrack. Framed by essays from the restaurant’s co-founders, including general manager Amanda McMillan, wine director Justin Chearno (who passed away earlier this year), and co-owner James Murphy of (LCD Soundsystem), this cookbook is an ode to the challenging yet inventive work of the hospitality world.

This collection, compiled by the editors of Cook’s Country magazine, celebrates the women who have shaped the iconic foods of the American South. In addition to the impressive 300 recipes, historical scholarship and compelling writing enriches every page of the book, punctuated by insightful asides on Southern culinary traditions. (To add or not to add sugar to cornbread? What is Southern folk herbalism? Why were tea rooms so important to Southern food culture? No story is too big or small for the book’s 70 acclaimed contributors to tackle.) As Toni Tipton-Martin, Cook’s Country editor-in-chief, notes in her foreword, this book captures “authentic truths shared by women who are resisting marginalization with determination and supporting each other with tales of female perseverance.”

As readers of SAVEUR know well, Romy Gill is one of the great modern masters of Indian cooking (she was even formally recognized by Queen Elizabeth for her contributions). Gill’s vibrant, elegant recipes come into full view in her most personal cookbook yet, reflecting on her family’s move from Punjab to West Bengal, across the Indian subcontinent, and the culinary connections that ensued. Unexpected flavor combinations shape this cookbook, featuring dishes such as sweet potato chaat, paratha stuffed with white radishes, and steamed fish seasoned with mustard seed and shredded coconut. A new collection of recipes from Gill is always worth celebrating, and we’re excited to cook through this new book in the new year.

When Lisa Kyung Gross founded the League of Kitchens, a home-based cooking school in New York, she wanted to create a platform for talented immigrant women to share their recipes. “When you’re looking for people who are exceptional home cooks,” Gross writes, “you really want people who have a deep knowledge of their cuisine and culture, and the recipes and skills that are both passed down and well-earned.” The power of the League of Kitchens, which SAVEUR called “the multicultural cooking school you’ve been waiting for,” has now been translated into book form, offering around-the-world recipes from Gross and the fourteen League of Kitchens instructors with meticulous detail and guidance. It’s a master class in global home cooking via recipes from an extraordinary community of teachers.

Like the Persian cuisine she chronicles, writer and gallerist Leila Heller lives at the intersection of the art and food world. So it’s no surprise that her cookbook is itself a work of art, an exploration of the regional cuisines of Iran inspired by the recipes of Heller’s mother, Nahid Joon. The featured dishes represent iconic Persian flavors, as well as the relationships that shaped Heller’s family, including Joon’s favorite savory eggplant dip known as kashke bademjan, a chicken saffron frittata shared by Joon’s childhood friend, or a family favorite dish of lentils stewed in pomegranate juice. With elegant prose and gorgeous full-color photography, Persian Feasts stands out as a stunning tribute to culinary tradition and family ties.

Capturing the expansive cuisine of the Balkans—the region comprising former Yugoslavia, Albania, Bulgaria, and parts of Greece, Romania, Hungary, and Turkey—is a tremendous task for any single cookbook to address. Yet Irina Janakievska takes on the job as a tribute to her Balkan childhood, and the many recipes introduced to her by her maternal grandmother, Lepa. In the book, she refers to it as “cucina sopravvivenza—a cuisine that has, despite everything, survived.” Dish by dish, Janakievska offers a detailed portrait of the Balkans, featuring doughnut-like priganice from Montenegro, fish soup from Croatia, and boiled meat dumplings from Bosnia and Herzegovina, among many others. Beautifully photographed, this book offers a much-deserved spotlight on a region of many culinary delights and rich history.

Like all great food scientists, Arielle Johnson asks great questions about cooking. “If it’s exciting to know what you’re doing in the kitchen,” she suggests, “it’s positively elating to know why you’re doing what you’re doing—and how you can do it smarter.” Science that supports (rather than dictates) cooking is Johnson’s game, and she shows you how to taste the molecules in a tomato (separating the glutamate/umami from the sugar/sweet); how to see patterns in flavor composition and adjust them as desired; and how to release flavors through different heat treatments (toast them, grind them, cook them in fat). With an endorsement from René Redzepi, this is the rare science-of-cooking guide that puts flavor (and fun) first.

As Ukrainian chef Yevhen Klopotenko notes in his debut cookbook, imperialism and conflict have sent many elements of Ukraine’s culture and cuisine underground; its traditions are only found in “tucked-away villages,” with “recipes passed from one generation to another in secret.” In this timely volume, Klopotenko brings his classical training to Ukraine’s most beloved dishes, from rustic rye bread to sausage rolls, from sweet and savory porridges to flavorful stews and soups (including two recipes for vegetarian borshch, one laced with plum butter and another with tangy sorrel). Whether you start with a knish or end with Chicken Kyiv, this book is a testament to the resilience and vibrancy of Ukraine.

As a devotee of the martini—I take mine with ice-cold gin, a splash of vermouth, and a lemon twist—it didn’t take much for me to fall in love with Alice Lascelles’ ode to a drink she calls a “boozy cultural prism.” In this compendium of 60-odd recipes and stories, Lascelles unpacks the particular allure of the martini, the rituals of preparation that bind the drink-maker to the drinker, how martinis went from wet to dry, and what snacks tend to accompany the drink around the world. With an extensive guide on the martini method of assembly (shaken, stirred, direct pour, or thrown) and recipes classic, vintage, contemporary, and honorary, there’s something for every tippler in town.

One of my annual resolutions is to throw more dinner parties, ideally without losing my mind in the process. Luckily, Katherine Lewin has become a master of the art form—how to build a menu, design a table, and host a gathering in the pursuit of genuine community. As Lewin reminds us, “A Big Night is any night you choose to make a little more special.” Yet it’s Lewin’s little ideas, advice, and culinary tricks (see her “Crunchy, Roasty Glitter” garnish that’s good for just about everything) that make Big Night the rare entertaining book that feels as achievable as it is aspirational.  

If you’ve been looking for a crash course in the fundamentals of Chinese cooking, Betty Liu is the one to guide you. Liu distills her approach into eight chapters—four focused on cooking with different forms of heat, and four on putting different foods together—working to break down what she calls the “mental barriers to cooking Chinese.” She moves seamlessly between classic techniques and her own deliberately inauthentic recipes, juxtaposing illustrated guides to common chopping methods with innovative recipes for dishes such as stir-fried potato with lemongrass and jalapeño, and sticky rice risotto with crispy brussel sprouts. In this bright, inviting volume, Liu encourages all readers to lower their defenses and embrace the fun of Chinese cuisine.

The flavors of Southern Vietnam come alive in this terrific book from the husband-and-wife team behind Madame Vo in New York’s East Village. Jimmy Ly’s memories of traditional Vietnamese eats get filtered through a fine-dining lens in recipes such as beef wrapped in betel leaves, brown butter oxtail congee, and grilled corn basted with a green onion-infused oil. As the duo declares in essays throughout the book, their story of bringing Vietnamese food to new audiences is an only-in-N.Y.C. story, one that required a constant hustle to showcase the food they loved. It will undoubtedly resonate with any reader who longs for their favorite food to be given the spotlight it so richly deserves.

Melissa M. Martin’s knowledge of Louisiana foodways and the food culture of the Bayou is as thick and rich as the best gumbo (regardless of whether you opt to thicken it with filé or okra). In her new book, Martin shares 100 recipes that honor the vitality of Cajun cooking, where the landscape is populated by backyard crawfish boils, elegant dining rooms serving rabbit and dumplings and satsuma sorbet, and warm kitchens with bubbling pots of beans, peas, and steaming casseroles. In between the recipes, she offers gorgeous photographs of Cajun Country throughout the seasons, and elegiac essays on the region’s complex relationship with its waterways, heat waves, and its wild food supply.

Every home cook knows that baking sheets are the lifeblood of the kitchen, an essential tool to facilitate daily cooking, dinner parties, and even Thanksgiving feasts. Olga Massov and Sanaë Lemoine have written a love letter to this kitchen workhorse, with more than 100 recipes that can take you through any meal of the day. I’ve already bookmarked their recipes for giant buttermilk-cornmeal pancakes with blueberries; roast chicken with clementines, dates, and capers; and even a Cuban-style roast pork with mojo sauce. (As a bonus, they offer tips on how to shop for and maintain the condition of your baking sheets through countless cooking experiments.) Pair it with a brand new baking sheet for someone you love.

For Matay de Mayee, the dishes prepared by his mother, Smuni Turan, offer a direct link to the oldest recipes ever recorded, in cuneiform more than 4,000 years ago from the ancient Assyrian civilization of Mesopotamia. De Mayee’s translations of his mother’s recipes, from a dialect of Aramaic into English, offer a glimpse into the ancient and profound roots of Assyrian culture and cuisine. Alongside these recipes are eloquent essays exploring the history of the Assyrian community and Turan’s personal memories and stories from the diasporic experience. Though the elements and flavors of Turan’s recipes have ancient ties, these recipes—from cooling yogurt drinks to braised stuffed onions to a green bean and lamb stew—deserve a place at your 21st-century table.

If you’ve never tried preserving foods at home, chef Steve McHugh of San Antonio restaurant Cured is an ideal guide for your first foray. For McHugh, curing is not only a means of preservation (and a metaphor for his own battle against Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma), but a way of taking advantage of seasonal ingredients so that they can be later deployed to infuse any dish with joy, mitigating waste and maximizing flavor in the process. McHugh’s book allows you to shuffle its base ingredients—a vinaigrette, a mustard, oven-dried tomatoes—and apply them to recipes such as grilled eggplant, roast chicken, braised fennel, and beyond. In this smart structure, McHugh offers both a boost to your at-home pantry and a master class in how to upgrade your everyday cooking.

Author Kiano Moju brings her Kenyan, Nigerian, and American identities to the plate in her debut cookbook, a tribute to the bright flavors and fresh ingredients that shape her modern African kitchen. Moju’s chic yet approachable dishes reframe the many influences behind West and East African cooking, with zesty herbs, piquant chiles, and aromatic spices brightening up every dish. Moju isn’t afraid to put her own spin on iconic dishes, as seen when she converts mukimo, the Kenyan staple of greens and mashed potatoes, into party-ready croquettes, or throws ripe avocado into her version of the Ugandan street food known as rolex. In these 100 delicious dishes, Moju brings the flavors of African cuisine to your home kitchen—from Nairobi, Lagos, Oakland, and beyond.

After 60-plus years and 11 cookbooks documenting Jewish cuisine, it seems remarkable that Joan Nathan—historian, food writer, and recipe writer extraordinaire—had another book in her. Luckily, in My Life in Recipes, Nathan’s memoir-cookbook explores a new topic: Her own story of building a career in the study of food. Each of the book’s 35 chapters is paired with recipes, bringing to life Nathan’s childhood years in Rhode Island and New York, her transformative years in France and Israel, and her decades of research into global Jewish cuisine. Even in this latest volume, Nathan’s recipes and stories continue to expand our appreciation for food from all branches of the Jewish experience.

For Tu David Phu, food was a bridge between him and his parents, the one thing that connected his childhood in Oakland to their years living on the Vietnamese island of Phú Quốc. “Everything that I ate growing up was a piece of this huge puzzle that was my family,” Phu writes. While the recipes in this volume may not be the most traditional of Vietnamese cooking, they offer something just as meaningful: A story of cuisine anchored in two homelands, shaped by memory and relationships rather than by notions of authenticity. Phu presents recipes with fine dining flourishes, such as bánh canh Carbonara, alongside twists on iconic Vietnamese dishes like âu cơ trứng (crab beurre monté chawanmushi). Part memoir, part cookbook, it’s full of powerful writing and compelling flavors.

Sonoko Sakai argues that, while there are many things to praise about Japanese cooking, its adaptability is its greatest. That’s what “wafu” cooking (“wa” and “fu” meaning “Japanese” and “style”) is all about: finding ways to infuse dishes with Japanese ingredients, techniques, or sensibilities. This translates to dishes of subtle beauty and seasonal and sensory intention, such as dashi cheese grits seasoned with miso-honey butter; Caesar salad with aonori croutons and bonito flakes; and a white bean chili infused with sake, dashi, and soy sauce. Sakai’s masterful deployment of Japanese flavors is sure to enliven your everyday dishes, so pair this with a special bottle of sake for a perfect holiday gift.

From the chef and owner behind Brooklyn restaurant Agi’s Counter, this book offers a fresh take on your   up bubbe’s best dishes. Jeremy Salamon has a palpable love for old-school cooking, of the egg creams and palacsinta handed to him by his Jewish grandmothers, and of the many culinary traditions from Hungary, Czechoslovakia, and other parts of Eastern Europe that feel like home even when you’re a generation removed from the source. In Salamon’s hands, dishes such as pogácsa (dill and cheddar biscuits), buttermilk borscht, and fried pork cutlets (treif, but “feh” on that), don’t feel either old-world or old-school. Instead, every recipe offers a genuinely delicious dish that merits an attempt, whether or not it’s your grandmother’s recipe.

For the plant-based protein fiend in your life, gift them the guidance of Steve Sando, widely credited with starting the heirloom bean movement with his company Rancho Gordo. This is Sando’s ultimate guide to beans, dispelling longstanding bean mythology (see his guide on salting, soaking, and slow versus fast cooking), and explores more than 50 heirloom bean varieties, pairing each with at least one perfect recipe. These recipes are dense with nutritional power and abundant with flavor, and span the globe in their culinary influences. Whether making sopa tarasca from Mexico, a casserole of khoresh-e ghormeh sabzi from Iran, or a classic French cassoulet, Sando has the expertise and enthusiasm to give you a fresh appreciation of the humble bean.

Growing up as a diasporic kid, Khushbu Shah quickly learned that the main ingredient of cooking Indian food in America was “adaptation.” As a result, Shah’s debut book represents a glorious blend of influences as American dishes get an Indian tweak and Indian dishes get a boost from American ingredients, accompanied by smart and often hilarious prose (as well as an “Objects of the Indian Diaspora” bingo game). For lovers of Indian cuisine, this book will offer a chance to experiment with your favorite flavors, from a masala-spiced shakshuka to tortilla papdi chaat to jalapeño popper samosas. For those coming to Indian cooking for the first time, Shah welcomes you to experience America as spoken “with a desi accent.”

My first cooking “bible” was Mark Bittman’s How to Cook Everything, and for my daughter, it might well be Bittman’s newest edition, which speaks directly to kids—what they like to eat, what’s fun to cook, and what they should taste to learn from along the way. Even as some steps might require grown-up intervention (in the section on knives, Bittman advises children to “talk things through with an adult”), the text is as compelling as an early reader chapter book, with great descriptive language and clear sensory-based indicators to guide early cooks to delicious results. From A to Z, this cookbook was crafted with kids in mind, and I can’t wait until my child masters enough recipes to finally make me dinner.

In this doorstopper of a volume, the Washington Post’s Joe Yonan demonstrates the continued evolution of vegan home cooking, offering more than 300 recipes for the plant-based cook. As Yonan notes, plant-based eating is no longer defined as simply “meatless” meals, but as a way of celebrating plant foods for “their own outstanding qualities; love them for what they are, not for what they’re not.” That love flows through every one of Yonan’s recipes, each one extolling miracle ingredients for plant-based cooking (miso, vinegars, and nuts of all sorts) while giving readers endless guidance and ideas for making plant-based eating not an occasional experience, but an everyday expectation.

And don’t forget to revisit our Cookbook Club selections from 2024:

January: Dina Begum, Made in Bangladesh
February: Lelani Lewis, Code Noir
March: Sylvan Mishima Brackett, Rintaro
April: Austin Bush, The Food of Southern Thailand
May: Karla Tatiana Vasquez, The Salvisoul Cookbook
June: Von Diaz, Islas
July: Sara Kramer and Sarah Hymanson, Kismet
August: Su Scott, Pocha
September: Ursula Ferrigno, Cucina del Veneto
October: Michael Mina, My Egypt
November: Jody Eddy, Elysian Kitchens
December: Ben Mims, Crumbs

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