50 to try: Foodie books

From celebrity recipes to bargain dishes, we’ve found the top 50 cookbooks to try this winter Discuss this article

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'Rick Stein's Far Eastern Odyssey'

Rick Stein
There have been many other TV chefs who have brought Asian cooking to our screens, most notably Madhur Jaffrey, Ken Hom, and, er, Keith Floyd. But few can have done it as affably, as colourfully or with as much infectious enthusiasm as Rick Stein in his latest BBC TV series. As with the show, the accompanying book is a trip through Southeast Asia, taking in Thailand, Malaysia, Sri Lanka, and Vietnam, as well as the less well known culinary destinations of Cambodia, Bangladesh and Bali. As well as dishes we recognise from restaurant menus, such as pad thai noodles or satay skewers, there are many which will perhaps be unfamiliar to all but the seasoned traveller, such as the rich Bangladeshi beef shatkora or fragrant Cambodian steamed mussels.

'Economy Gastronomy: Eat Better and Spend Less'

Allegra McEvedy and Paul Merrett
As the world economy collapsed like a cooling soufflé, a wave of ‘economy’ cookery books cashed in. Economy Gastronomy ties in with the BBC TV series of the same name, but – surprisingly for a TV tie-in – it’s clear a lot of thought has gone into it. The text avoids the slightly hectoring tone the show takes by focusing solely on the dishes. If you start to feel guilty when reading this book, it can only be because you know you’d benefit from the cooking tips within. In the first section, the authors have developed an approach to meal planning which begins with one major ‘bedrock’ purchase (a whole chicken, for example) which is then made into three or four easy ‘tumbledown’ dishes (chicken pie with tarragon, hot and sour chicken broth), making full use of the freezer. In this respect, it mirrors the TV show. When followed rigorously, this system cuts down profligacy as well as, hopefully, the weekly shopping bill.

'The Modern Vegetarian: Food Adventures for the Contemporary Palate'

Maria Elia
Author Maria Elia is currently head chef at London’s Whitechapel Gallery Dining Room, and before that made her name as chef at the Delfina Studio Café in Bermondsey. She’s known for her creative, flavour-packed cooking style that pulls together gutsy flavours and ingredients from around the world. This book is a further expression of this vein, drawing on influences from Thailand, Italy, Japan, North Africa, India, Greece and elsewhere. Elia’s not afraid of a bit of culinary miscegenation, and that’s evident in recipes for watermelon curry with black beans and paneer, or miso-marinated kataifi-wrapped aubergines. The full title of the book pretty much sums it up: this is adventurous stuff, far removed from the usual clichés that are still too frequently served up as ‘the vegetarian option’ in restaurants.

'Vefa's Kitchen'

Vefa Alexiadou
Books on Greek cookery are never top-sellers. Not even landmark books such as Andy Harriss’s excellent ‘Taste of the Aegean’ (1992) or Theodore Kyriakou’s ‘Real Greek Food’ (2000) will shift as many copies as yet another book about Italian food to add the hundreds already out there. So this hefty text from Phaidon – publisher of the much-hyped older sibling volume ‘Silver Spoon’ (2005) – shows they’re confident that this book will be a winner internationally. And they’re not wrong. Author Vefa Alexiadou is a well-known food writer and TV chef in her native Greece, and this book is possibly the most authoritative written in the English language on contemporary Greek food. There are more than 700 recipes, collected, she claims, from all over Greece. It kicks off with an overview of the regionality of Greek food, then goes straight into the recipes. It’s all to the point, and for people who cook: there is no ‘lifestyle’ element of the author pouting, just lots of tested, clear recipes.

'My Cousin Rosa: Rosa Mitchell's Sicilian Kitchen'

Rosa Mitchell
This new book by cook and food writer Rosa Mitchell emanates Sicilian warmth. She was born in Catania, in eastern Sicily, migrated to Australia in 1962 and now runs the Journal Café in Melbourne. The book chronicles the recipes and food traditions that Mitchell and her extended Sicilian-Australian family and friends cook in their adopted home – recipes that keep Sicily alive on the plate. ‘Simple and tasty’ is how Mitchell describes Sicilian food, and the recipes are indeed simple to follow. Many of them are based on seasonal vegetables such as artichoke, cardoon, aubergine and fennel. There are deceptively straightforward recipes for classic Sicilian dishes such as tonno agro dolce (sweet and sour tuna) and the summery mixed vegetable dish caponata. Particularly interesting are the farmhouse-style recipes for the likes of home-made ricotta – the sorts of dishes that every rural Sicilian family would rely on, but which few city-dwellers have the time or skills to make. Pasta dishes, including bucatini with sardines flavoured with typically Sicilian ingredients such as saffron, pine nuts and currants, or the inventive ‘something from nothing’ dish of spaghetti with breadcrumbs and spring onions, are a high point too.