Lugma: Abundant Dishes & Stories from My Middle East
Noor Murad (Quadrille)
One of the greatest tests of a cookbook is not just whether the recipes appeal on first glance, but whether they have the power to weave themselves into your regular cooking life. By this measure, Lugma is my top food book this year. Its author, Noor Murad, is a young Bahraini-British food writer who has previously worked with Ottolenghi. It is a delight to find her writing here in her own voice about the Middle Eastern ingredients that mean so much to her (you’ll need black limes!). The recipes hit a sweet spot between ease and specialness. Even a simple side dish of greens becomes a feast, sauteed with fried onions and turmeric oil. Alongside a pantheon of rice dishes for celebrations, there are simpler midweek hits such as tuna jacket potatoes enlivened with a spicy tomato sauce and preserved lemons. Noor’s deeply fragrant Middle Eastern bolognese is now the recipe against which I judge all other ragus.
Baking and the Meaning of Life
Helen Goh (Murdoch)
The idea of baking as therapy is often bandied around, but Helen Goh knows whereof she speaks. Alongside her career as a baker, Goh (who was born in Malaysia to Chinese parents) was for a long time a practising psychologist. Whatever the theory behind the effect, every time I follow Goh’s wonderfully precise yet creative recipes, I feel a deep calm and happiness as well as a sense that she is teaching me new skills (“learning, growth and achievement” are among the psychological benefits of baking, according to Goh). The Shoo Fly buns are the currant buns of dreams (with a whole raw orange pureed into the dough) and I wanted to make the chocolate financiers with rosemary and hazelnuts so much that I bought a financier tin specially (no regrets there).
Indian Kitchens: Treasured Family Recipes from Across the Land
Roopa Gulati (Bloomsbury)This remarkable and highly original book takes us on a tour of home kitchens in six regions of India, from a vegetarian Jain kitchen in Gujarat to the domain of a cook in Delhi who prepares meat “in garlicky masala” in a pressure cooker. Roopa Gulati conjures up a world in which people think nothing of rolling their own flatbreads and making their own yoghurt and ghee, although electric “mixis” are now “the workhorses of many kitchens”. The book combines vivid descriptions and photos of the reality of everyday kitchen life in India – based on Gulati’s extensive travels – with superb recipes developed in her own home in England. The dal and vegetable recipes are varied and delicately spiced, but perhaps my favourite of all were two chicken recipes: a whole roast chicken with Keralan flavours and some vivid green kebabs marinated first in seasoned yoghurt, then in a herby spinach cream.
How I Cook: A Chef’s Guide to Really Good Home Cooking
Ben Lippett (HarperCollins)
When I first picked this up, I wasn’t sure if I was the target audience. Lippett – co-founder of Dr Sting’s Hot Honey – is a food influencer with more than 700,000 followers and a blokeish gen Z prose style. Then my 16-year-old got hold of it and made a decent French omelette on his first attempt and I became a true believer. What makes this book so special is that – as with last year’s Sift by Nicola Lamb – Lippett does not just provide recipes but explains the thinking and technique behind his decisions. Helpful tricks and tips abound and my copy is now covered with Post-it notes marking dishes to try, from Turkish spinach pide to smoked aubergine and nduja lasagne.
Boustany: A Celebration of Vegetables from My Palestine
Sami Tamimi (Ebury)
Yes, Tamimi is another Ottolenghi colleague, but I couldn’t fail to include this glorious and important cookbook. On the one hand, it’s a collection of refreshingly doable vegetarian recipes (fried aubergine m’tabbal with tomato and coriander salsa, egg dishes galore and a whole garden of different herb-rich salads such as “fridge-raid fattoush”). On the other hand, given the horrors in Gaza, it’s a timely and heartbreaking celebration of the beauty and rich culinary heritage of the Palestinians. Tamimi’s recipes – interspersed with excellent headnotes – stand as a reminder of that tradition’s exquisite variety, from spicy nutty dukkah to tender wild asparagus and green falafel made from broad beans.
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