The 10 best cookbooks of 2024

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This year’s best cookbooks go deep on single subjects as varied as cookies, pasta and candied fruit. They use shared ingredients to tell the story of Caribbean cuisine and teach techniques to break down barriers and lead to mastery. They bridge the big issues and uncover the flavour hiding in pantry staples. They’re also just for the fun of it. After all, who doesn’t like soup, salads and sandwiches?

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Anything’s Pastable

When Dan Pashman debuted his pasta shape cascatelli in 2021, Time magazine included it in its list of 100 best inventions. The concept for Pashman’s one-of-a-kind cookbook, Anything’s Pastable, came to him when fans started sending photos of what they were making with cascatelli. Rarely venturing beyond tomato or meat sauce, Pashman realized they could use some help expanding their repertoire. The result is 81 recipes featuring 34 pasta shapes, which Pashman developed with a team of recipe developers from different culinary backgrounds. Whether Ritz cracker and chive pangrattato, ssamjang aglio olio or Cajun crawfish carbonara with cascatelli, this is pasta without limits. Not to mention, to borrow Pashman’s criteria, extremely forkable, sauceable and toothsinkable.

Belly Full

Lesley Enston’s Belly Full is a trip to the Caribbean guided by 11 fundamental ingredients: beans, calabaza, cassava, chayote, coconut, cornmeal, okra, plantains, rice, salted cod and Scotch bonnet peppers. The ingredients are the thread Enston uses to connect the region’s food cultures and histories, touching on Haiti, Trinidad and Tobago, Puerto Rico, Dominican Republic, Aruba and many more. “‘Me belly full’ is a phrase you’ll hear throughout the English-speaking Caribbean,” writes the Toronto-born, Brooklyn-based author, recipe developer and food writer. “It has an obvious meaning — a full and satisfied stomach — but can also mean a full and satisfied heart and soul. My aim is that this book will have that effect on you.” Underpinned by years of cooking and research, Belly Full is a beautiful celebration of differences.

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The Chinese Way

“See one, do one, teach one.” This teaching mantra is how Betty Liu develops her skills as a surgeon-in-training, and it’s also the motto that guided the structure of her second cookbook, The Chinese Way. By focusing on eight core techniques — steam, fry, boil, braise, sauce, infuse, pickle and wrap — the cookbook author, recipe developer and photographer set out to remove the barriers to Chinese home cooking. “This book is about the way I cook Chinese food every day. It’s not traditional, but it is Chinese,” writes Liu. Using a mix of long-established and contemporary tools and ingredients, she shares her style of cooking in the book — from the foundational, such as beef and onion stir-fry, to her own creations, such as fried farro with lap cheong and cabbage. By highlighting classic techniques and sharing traditional and nontraditional recipes, Liu empowers readers to embrace the adaptability of Chinese home cooking — their way.

Crumbs

Crumbs isn’t just for cookie lovers. It’s for anyone who appreciates food history. Los Angeles-based food writer and editor Ben Mims surveyed the world for the 431-page tome, featuring 300 cookie recipes from 100 countries. What makes this book so delightful is that Mims treats them with the seriousness and reverence only a true cookie obsessive could. From the world’s oldest-known version, the almond “wedding” cookie of the former Persian Empire, to the colonial relics of Sub-Saharan Africa, Mims makes connections and shares origin stories unearthed during months at the library. If you’ve ever wondered how the snickerdoodle got its name or why molasses became an essential Atlantic Canadian ingredient — sweetening cookies, bread, baked beans and more — Crumbs is for you. Thanks to Mims’s diligent research, I can now place the lassy mogs I loved as a kid in their rightful place in the world’s cookie timeline.

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Flour Is Flavour

Dawn Woodward has long been one of my baking heroes. With Flour Is Flavour, now everyone can benefit from her whole-grain baking philosophy. Flour is all too often an afterthought. Woodward, owner of Evelyn’s Crackers, a whole-grain bakery in Toronto, reminds us what can happen when we give it the same consideration as other local ingredients. In her cookbook debut, Woodward champions seeking out local grains such as barley, rye and spelt. And, just as importantly, she makes the case for using every part, including the often-discarded bran and germ. Reading the book, I was reminded of something Woodward said in a 2020 interview about the rise of sourdough. “Perfection is not the goal. Just get your hands in the dough.” In just over 100 pages and 30 recipes, she inspired me to do just that — baking with intention, thinking about the flavour and connection that whole-grain flour can bring.

Good Food, Healthy Planet

Puneeta Chhitwal-Varma expands the definition of “good food” in her first cookbook, Good Food, Healthy Planet. Instead of focusing on the enormity of eating for people and the planet, the Toronto-based author drills down to the difference small changes can make using five guiding principles: Diversify Your Diet; Move Away from Meat; Pulses are Perfect; Reduce What You Throw Away; and Shop Local, Think Global. Decades of moving within India because of her dad’s job in the military and life in Dubai, Calgary and Toronto as an adult shaped Chhitwal-Varma’s cooking. The book’s more than 80 recipes are climate-conscious, low-waste, either meat-free or meat-reduced. They’re also delicious. Chhitwal-Varma’s Calcutta-style kathi rolls, “good mood” bolognese sauce and Delhi-style chickpea curry are just a few of her recipes on repeat in my house.

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Koreaworld

Korean cuisine has exploded in popularity over the past decades, with fermented foods such as kimchi and gochujang as the gateway. Who better to capture this “culinary revolution” than chef Deuki Hong and writer and editor Matt Rodbard? The pair co-wrote Koreatown in 2016, interviewing more than 100 Korean American chefs and business owners. The intervening years only confirmed they were onto something unprecedented, and Koreworld is their electric followup. With photographer Alex Lau by their side, the authors travelled to Korea several times over two years, capturing the evolution on the ground. They also looked closer to home, travelling across the United States to document the many shapes Korean dishes, ingredients and culinary practices can take. In essays and more than 75 recipes, Koreaworld showcases an ever-changing cuisine firmly rooted in tradition, capturing its energetic spirit.

Mastering the Art of Plant-Based Cooking

Joe Yonan‘s wide-ranging fourth book, Mastering the Art of Plant-Based Cooking, presents a world of vegan possibilities. The extensive building blocks chapter alone opens the door to “endlessly customizable” nut or seed milks, sauces and pastes, and much more. The rest of the book’s more than 300 recipes incorporate the varied experiences of 24 contributors. As interest in eating more plant-based foods has grown, the hype around meat alternatives has become part of the conversation. Yonan refreshingly takes it back to basics by explaining how to make time-honoured vegan proteins such as seitan, tempeh and tofu and sharing plenty of recipes that use them. In Mastering the Art of Plant-Based Cooking, Yonan celebrates vegan cuisine in its own right, building skills and featuring exciting recipes that would benefit any cook.

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Matty Matheson: Soup, Salads, Sandwiches

Matty Matheson’s star is undeniably rising. Since joining The Bear as an executive producer and food consultant in 2021, the Fort Erie, Ont.-based chef has added actor and screenwriter to his credits. The series made history as the most-nominated comedy at the 2024 Emmy Awards — due in no small part to Matheson’s portrayal of handyman-turned-server Neil Fak. A person of many talents, Matheson also writes a darn fine cookbook, and his third, Soups, Salads, Sandwiches, is my favourite yet. It delivers on its promise of the “iconic trinity” with plenty of range in the recipes, from a beautifully minimal broth of garden herbs and one chili to the “pure chaos” of a baked potato buffet vichyssoise they set up for Matheson’s three kids for the photoshoot. Bold and fun, there’s a lot to love.

Nature’s Candy

As a longtime baker and knitter, I was already convinced that making things with your hands has value. But Camilla Wynne‘s third cookbook, Nature’s Candy, added a sparkly, sugar-coated dimension to my belief. The Toronto-based author, recipe developer and cooking teacher is one of Canada’s few master food preservers, and during the pandemic, she went deep on candying fruit. To Wynne’s delight, as she learned from the demand for her online workshop, she was far from the only one drawn to the age-old craft. From the resurgence of tanghulu on TikTok to timeless holiday bakes such as fruitcake and stollen, candied fruit is both of the moment and everlasting. Wynne’s approach to making and baking with it proves that finding beauty in the process is reason enough.

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