Baking
There's some debate about cupcakes' continued domination. Ryland, Peters & Small says the trend is "far from over" and is rolling out Holiday Cupcakes and A Zombie Ate My Cupcake this month. But hot on cupcakes' heels are Cake Pops (Chronicle, Sept.), Mini-Cakes: Tiny Treats to Surprise & Delight (Sterling, Aug.), and Macarons: Authentic French Cookie Recipes That You Can Make at Home (Ulysses, Oct.). Subcategories of baking range from chick lit (The Happy Baker: A Girl's Guide to Emotional Baking, Harlequin, Oct., and Sweet Chic: Stylish Treats to Dress Up for Any Occasion, Ballantine, Oct.) to tomes from A-list bakeries like Boston's Flour (Flour: A Baker's Collection of Spectacular Recipes, Chronicle, Oct.) San Francisco's Tartine (Tartine Bread, Chronicle, Sept.), and New York City's Fat Witch (Fat Witch Brownies: Brownies, Blondies, and Bars from New York's Legendary Fat Witch Bakery, Rodale, Sept.). Finally, cookie exchanges are enjoying a resurgence, with multiple books on the topic coming this fall. Best of the bunch? Workman's Cookie Swap (Oct.).

Vegan

Numerous publishers have reported strong sales of vegan titles. This fall, vegan powerhouse Da Capo Lifelong has Fresh and Fast Vegan: Quick, Delicious, and Creative Recipes to Nourish Aspiring and Devoted Vegans, Second Edition (Sept.), Appetite for Reduction: 100 Fast & Filling Low-Fat Vegan Meals (Dec.), and Veganize This!: From Surf & Turf to Ice Cream Pie—200 Animal-Free Recipes for People Who Love to Eat (Jan. 2011). On Wiley's list are Vegetarian Times Everything Vegan and Party Vegan (Sept.). And some publishers aren't billing their cookbooks as specifically vegan, even though they are (to wit, Skinny Bitch: Ultimate Everyday Cookbook, Running Press, Oct., and Clean Start: Inspiring You to Eat Clean and Live Well with 100 New Clean Food Recipes, Sterling, Nov.). Vegan titles extend beyond cookbooks, too (The Vegan Girl's Guide to Life: Cruelty-Free Crafts, Recipes, Beauty Secrets, and More, Skyhorse, Nov.). And closely tied to vegan books are the raw food tomes. Once a fringe movement, it's now clear that there is Raw Food for Everyone (Avery, Oct.).

Canning and Preserving

"Ancient folkways" have again become popular in modern American life. Storey's Put 'em Up! (June) is about to go into a third printing. On the docket for fall are The Blue Chair Jam Cookbook (Andrews McMeel, Sept.), The Joy of Keeping a Root Cellar: Canning, Freezing, Drying, Smoking and Preserving the Harvest (Skyhorse, Aug.), and Canning for a New Generation: Bold, Fresh Flavors for the Modern Pantry (Stewart, Tabori & Chang, Aug.). There is an intimidation factor with canning and preserving, but books like The Fresh Girl's Guide to Easy Canning and Preserving (Voyageur, Aug.) and How to Store Your Home-Grown Produce: Canning, Pickling, Jamming, and So Much More (Skyhorse, Oct.) promise you really, um, can do it.

Geek Chic
Before there was Alton Brown, there was Harold McGee. The award-winning author of On Food and Cooking is back with Keys to Good Cooking: A Guide to Making the Best of Foods and Recipes (Penguin Press, Oct.). This fall, McGee will be joined by Ideas in Food: Great Recipes and Why They Work (Clarkson Potter, Oct.) and How Baking Works: Exploring the Fundamentals of Baking Science, Third Edition (Wiley, Nov.). We're also psyched for Kenji Alt's The Food Lab: Better Home Cooking Through Science, though Norton's not publishing it until fall 2011.

Next: still more trends in fall cookbooks: seasonal focus, more and less meat, Americana appeal, Italian grandmothers, and more. Click here to continue...