From fried chicken to ice-cream sandwiches and the future of the American diet, here are five May books we’re hungry for now.
Fried & True: 50 Recipes for America’s Best Fried Chicken and Sides by Lee Brian Schrager with Adeena Sussman (Clarkson Potter)
Schrager is the founder of the Food Network South Beach and New York City Wine & Food Festivals; in his first cookbook, written with Adeena Sussman, he offers dozens of recipes for one of America’s favorite entrees from top-tier chefs that include Wylie Dufresne, Thomas Keller, and Yotam Ottolenghi. In a starred review of Fried & True, PW wrote, “Even veterans will likely appreciate Schrager’s attention to detail, such as the suggestion to chill the bird before frying to ensure maximum crispness and the hedonistic suggestion of adding bacon grease to the frying oil for smoky goodness. While it might not be the healthiest cookbook, it’s certainly one of the most mouth-watering.”
The Third Plate: Field Notes on the Future of Food by Dan Barber (Penguin Press)
“Barber’s work is a deeply thoughtful and... even visionary work for a sustainable food chain,” reads PW’s review of the first book from Barber, the acclaimed chef behind Blue Hill and Blue Hill at Stone Barns. In it, he outlines a “proposes a new definition for ethical and delicious eating destined to refashion Americans’ deepest beliefs about food,” as the publisher puts it. A national tour is planned, including a June 11 event at the 92nd St Y, which will feature Barber in conversation with This American Life’s Ira Glass.
Delancey: A Memoir. A Man, a Woman, a Restaurant, a Marriage by Molly Wizenberg (Simon & Schuster)
Wizenberg, Orangette blogger and author of 2009’s A Homemade Life (which earned a starred review from PW), returns with a memoir recounting the making of Delancey, a pizza restaurant she and her husband, Brandon Pettit, opened in Seattle in 2009. Wrote PW of Delancey the book, “Her fun and engaging narrative encompasses recipes, an odd assortment of the familiar (meatloaf) and the earnest (ricotta), undergirding... an industrious, youthful effort at keeping marital harmony.” Wizenberg outlines details of her book tour for Delancey on her widely read blog.
The Meat Hook Meat Book: Buy, Butcher, and Cook Your Way to Better Meat by Tom Mylan (Artisan)
This is the first book from butcher Mylan, co-owner of The Meat Hook in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. The Meat Hook is about local, sustainable meat, and the book, one of PW’s top 10 cookbooks for spring, will take readers through the basics of buying, breaking down, and cooking chicken, pigs, lamb, and more. (In other meat news, Mylan also contributed to the free Better Bacon Book app along with Zingerman’s Ari Weinzweig.) An eight-city book tour is planned, and Eater has a preview of the book for those who can’t wait until May.
Coolhaus Ice Cream Book: Custom-Built Sandwiches with Crazy-Good Combos of Cookies, Ice Creams, Gelatos, and Sorbets by Natasha Case and Freya Estreller with Kathleen Squires (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt/Rux Martin)
Coolhaus’s brand of “architecturally inspired” ice-cream sandwiches have taken the U.S. by storm, racking up praise from national media outlets and ordinary dessert lovers alike. Founded in 2008 by Case and Estreller, Coolhaus offers sandwiches like the Louis Ba-Kahn (chocolate chip cookies with brown butter candied bacon ice cream) and the Renzo Apple Pie-ano (oatmeal raisin cookies with baked apple ice cream); these and many other creations are available at the company’s two California storefronts; food trucks in Los Angeles, New York, Austin, Miami, and Dallas; and freezer cases across the nation. With the Coolhaus Ice Cream Book, readers get access to more than 100 of the company’s recipes for both ice cream and cookies.
