11 New Spring Cookbooks We’re Swooning Over

When the weather gets warmer, there’s nothing we want more than Vietnamese food. Full of fresh veggies and bright flavors, it’s light, satisfying and great to eat with friends. But this year, thanks to Andrea Nguyen, we’re skipping the takeout and making our favorite dishes at home. (Warning: The chili garlic chicken wings are totally addictive.)

Mark Bittman has always been one of our most trusted resources, and we love the concept of his new book. Here, he presents 100 main dishes and gives three recipes for each one—an easy version, a vegan version and a fancy version ready for company. Someone give the man a Nobel Prize.

Chef Yasmin Khan’s ode to Palestine is more than a cookbook. It’s also a memoir, a travelogue and a love letter to a country she has spent years visiting. We’d be happy to curl up in an armchair with this one, but the recipes are too tantalizing (think: mezze spreads, warm pita with olive oil, and za'atar and slow-simmered chicken stews).

Olvera is chef and owner of a group of beloved fine dining restaurants in Mexico City and New York. But this is no chef’s cookbook, full of impossible ingredients and difficult techniques. Rather, Olvera wanted to share the food that he grew up with, and that he makes at home with his family. If we can’t have him standing at our stove making tortillas, this is the next best thing.

If you’ve made anything from Bon Appetit magazine over the last few years, you’re probably familiar with food director Carla Lalli Music’s style—laid-back, no-fuss recipes with huge flavor. In her first book, she goes a little beyond the recipe, sharing what she calls six essential cooking methods. If you loved Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat, this is the next book for you.

Grilling season is upon us, and no one knows beef better than famed Austin pitmaster Aaron Franklin.  Luckily, throwing some steaks on the BBQ is a little simpler than smoking brisket for 14 hours. Our arteries might not be happy, but our taste buds certainly will be! 

Michael Pollan famously wrote that the rules to healthy, responsible eating should be as follows: “Eat food, not too much, mostly plants.” Now, his sisters and mother are helping the cause, providing a recipe book for the last part of their brother/son’s mantra. Note: This is a flexitarian book, not a fully vegetarian one. They show how to use meat sparingly, always making veggies the star of the show.

The Portland, Oregon, ice cream shop Salt & Straw is known for two things—long lines and crazy (but delicious!) flavors. But, it turns out, making the base for their super-creamy cones is surprisingly quick and easy. Here, they share their secrets, and some of their most outrageous recipes (buttermilk mashed potato and gravy ice cream, anyone?).

Hosting a formal dinner party can be daunting. So take a page from the wise editors of Tasting Table and make it a group effort. In their first cookbook, Bartakovics and Coleman advocate for a style of entertaining we can really get behind—one where everyone pitches in. 

The Instant Pot is all the rage these days, but for Indian chefs, it’s old news—they’ve been using pressure cookers for years to make tender curries that taste like they’ve been simmering for hours. Madhur Jaffrey is basically the Julia Child of Indian cooking, so there’s no one we’d trust more to show us the ropes. Weeknight butter chicken, here we come.

It’s the most important meal of the day and arguably the most delicious. And in this comprehensive (and beautiful) volume, Emily Elyse Miller takes us on a world tour of the morning meal, sharing recipes for everything from Mexican chilaquiles (swoon) to Chinese pineapple buns. Don’t forget the coffee.