Best Cookbooks of 2023

1. Start Here: Instructions for Becoming a Better Cook by Sohla El-Waylly is practical, information-packed, and transformative guide to becoming a better cook and conquering the kitchen, Start Here is a must-have master class in leveling up your cooking. 656 pages of the brilliance that is Sohla. Across a dozen technique-themed chapters – from “Temperature Management 101” and “Break it Down & Get Saucy” to “Go to Brown Town,” “All About Butter,” and “Getting to Know Dough” – Sohla explains the hows and whys of cooking, introducing the fundamental skills that you need to become a more intuitive, inventive cook.

=2. More Is More: Get Loose in the Kitchen by Molly Baz: In her bestselling debut cookbook, Cook This Book, Molly Baz taught her readers cooking essentials and here in her second title, she’s teaching us how to level up our cooking, ditch measuring spoons and discover that more is more. With recipes like Stuffed focaccia with spicy greens and cheese, Crispy salmon with coconut rice and crackle sauce, and Drunken cacio e pepe – she doesn’t disappoint. 

=2. Tenderheart: A Book About Vegetables and Unbreakable Family Bonds by Hetty McKinnon is a book about vegetables. It is also a story of unbreakable family bonds, love and loss, and the legacy of food as a way to stay connected to loved ones, including those who have passed. This masterwork, from Australia’s most respected vegetable-loving food writer, takes readers on a vegetable-by-vegetable journey, packed with clever and inventive ways to combine ingredients, flavors and texture. With practicality, accessibility and economy in mind, Hetty devotes one chapter to each of her 22 favorite everyday vegetables, from Asian greens to zucchini. As is Hetty’s signature, the flavors are globally inspired, with an emphasis on simple yet inventive weeknight cooking.

4. Veg-table: Recipes, Techniques, and Plant Science for Big-Flavored, Vegetable-Centered Meals by Nik Sharma, bestselling author of The Flavor Equation and Season, is a fascinating exploration of the unique wonders of more than fifty vegetables through captivating research, stunning photography, and technique-focused recipes. This book is everything we have grown to expect from Nik!

5.  Snacking Bakes: Simple Recipes for Cookies, Bars, Brownies, Cakes, and More by Yossy Arefi contains 60 accessible, anytime recipes for delectable cookies, cakes, brownies, and bars that need only one bowl and easy-to-find ingredients, from the award-winning author of Snacking Cakes. Yossy covers all the baked-good bases with recipes that feature a wide range of enticing flavors (even savory!) and are each accompanied by gorgeous photography shot by Yossy herself.

6. Ever-Green Vietnamese: Super-Fresh Recipes, Starring Plants from Land and Sea by Andrea Nguyen, the James Beard Award winning author, has written a book that focuses on plant based dishes. The book shares rice transformations, snack sensations, Banh Mi possibilities, soup celebrations, salads, side dish gems, mains without meat, veggie packed mains and tempting sweets and sips.

7. The Secret of Cooking: Recipes for an Easier Life in the Kitchen by Bee Wilson shows us how to get a meal on the table when we’re tired and stretched for time, how to season properly, cook onions (or not) and what equipment really helps. The 140 recipes are doable and delicious, filled with ideas for cooking ahead or cooking alone and the kind of unfussy food that makes everyday life taste better.

8. The World Central Kitchen Cookbook: Feeding Humanity, Feeding Hope by José Andrés and World Central Kitchen shares recipes inspired by the many places the team has cooked following disasters as well as inspiring narratives from the chefs and volunteers on the front lines. Photographs captured throughout the world highlight community and hope while stunning food photography showcases the mouthwatering recipes.

9. Sweet Enough by Alison Roman is beautifully done. The bakes are simple, yet elegant, and approachable for every level of baker. The tart chapter is filled with recipes such as the Creamy maple tart. In addition to sweet bakes such as Sugar plum galette with halva, Citrusy cheesecake, and Chocolate sour cream pound cake; there is a delicious sampling of savory bakes. 

10. Company: The Radically Casual Art of Cooking for Others by Amy Thielen is a beautiful guide to ease our worries with regard to entertaining and provides us with 125 well-tested, no fail recipes – arranged in menu form. From small dinner parties to larger holiday feasts that serve up to twenty (and even a section on holiday baking!), everything is laid out for the cook whether said cook be a novice or experienced player in the kitchen. Packed with stunning photography, Company encourages us to return to the joy of cooking for family and friends without all the fuss and muss.