Culinary Memoir

Nine Lives is about blazing a way out from a rough childhood through talent and an unbridled passion for the craft of cooking. A story that's still being written as Brandon works with Crux, the pop-up culinary collective he founded, and plans for the opening of his own restaurant, Nine Lives serves up a raw and riveting memoir about food, rock-and-roll, and redemption.

An outsider within her Jersey Shore family, Chef Rossi finds a home for her punk sensibilities inside the kitchen. When their high-school-age, punk, runaway daughter is found hosting a Jersey Shore hotel party, Rossi's parents feel they have no other choice: They ship her off to live with a Hasidic rabbi in Crown Heights, Brooklyn. Within the confines of this restrictive culture, Rossi's big-city dreams take root.

With the lyrical precision of Annie Dillard and the exquisite food writing of M.F.K. Fisher, Gabrielle Myers takes us on a Northern California idyll - an internship at the Tip Top Farm and Produce in Vacaville. Here, the beauty of the land - light streaming through fig branches, carnelian tomatoes exploding in front of rows of sweet peas - is tended by the mysterious frenetic Farmer and her companion, Baker. Together with their intern, Gabrielle, the trio tends a landscape full with sustenance and life.

From the bestselling author of Alice Waters and Chez Panisse comes the first biography of the passionate gastronome and troubled genius who became the most powerful force in the history of American food - the founding father of the American food revolution.

Everyone has an opinion about Pino Luongo. To Tony Bourdain, he was the notorious Pino Noir, the shadowy kingpin of a restaurant empire. To Manhattanites, he was either the savior or the scourge of the city's dining scene. To the many fans of his cookbooks, he was the herald of Tuscan cuisine. In Dirty Dishes, Luongo emerges to tell his side of the story. And its quite a story: After an idyllic (and well-fed) childhood in Tuscany, Luongo came to New York as an actor, and, after quickly washing out, fell into the restaurant business....

Redwood is a gripping true story of a once successful and popular Baltimore restaurant known for its great cuisine, vivacious musical entertainment, radiant atmosphere, and lavish celebrity events. So what happened to the Redwood Grill? What caused its demise? The book dives into the incredible story of three young entrepreneurs who bought the business and worked tirelessly to make this restaurant the pinnacle dining experience.

Forever a girl obsessed with all things French, sweet freak Amy Thomas landed a gig as rich as the purest dark chocolate: leave Manhattan for Paris to write ad copy for Louis Vuitton. Working on the Champs-Élysées, strolling the charming streets, and exploring the best patisseries and boulangeries, Amy marveled at the magnificence of the City of Light. But does falling in love with one city mean turning your back on another? As much as Amy adored Paris, there was part of her that felt like a humble chocolate chip cookie....

During a 30-year boom period in France between the end of World War II and the 1974 oil crisis, Paris was not only the world's most delicious, stylish, and exciting tourist destination; it was also the world capital of gastronomic genius and innovation. The Gourmands' Way explores the lives and writings of six Americans who chronicled the food and wine of this era, paying particular attention to their individual struggles as writers, to their life circumstances, and to their particular genius at sharing awareness of French food with mainstream American audiences.

The communal family table bears witness to our lives. The way we approach each meal speaks volumes about who we are and what we are going through in that very moment. It’s where the spirits of those who left too soon can be conjured back to mind through taste and smell. Still, we underestimate its pull and often miss the soulful nourishment and magic that happens at sobremesa—the time spent talking after a meal—due to our increasingly busy lives.

Chocolate Covered Money is for anyone who eats chocolate, has shopped for chocolate as a gift, or has wondered what really goes on at the chocolate store "in a mall near you." Chocolate is a big business, and makes a lot of money. This book "pulls the curtain back" for a behind-the-scenes look at the people who own chocolate companies, how they make chocolate, and their celebrity friends.

A is for Aronia, berry member of the apple family, clothes-stainer, super-fruit with reputed healing power. D is for Durian, endowed with a dramatic rind and a shifting odor - peaches, old garlic. M is for Medlar, name-checked by Shakespeare for its crude shape, beloved by gardeners for its flowers. In this work of unique invention, these and other difficult fruits serve as the central ingredients of 26 lyrical essays that range from deeply personal to botanical, from culinary to medical, from humorous to philosophical.

Lo que cuenta el caldero reúne el legado gastronómico Leonor Espinosa a través de paisajes sonoros y humeantes y sus experiencias en territorios de Colombia en los que la cocina es protagonista. Acompañados de recetas cuidadosamente seleccionadas, cada uno de los relatos aquí agrupados transmite los sabores y aromas que marcaron la infancia de la autora y revela las preparaciones que hoy son esenciales en su fogón: el plátano maduro, el suero costeño, el mote de queso y la yuca "sancochá", entre otras.

A collection of hilarious essays about how food became one man’s obsession and coping mechanism, and how it came to rule—and sometimes ruin—his relationships, from the Cobra Kai actor, stand-up comic, and host of Food Network’s Raid the Fridge “When most people say they have an...

A razor-sharp look at one woman’s nearly two decades in the New York City restaurant, including her time working with Joe Bastianich, and what happens when your job consumes your life. ​ By day, Kim Reed was a social worker to the homebound elderly in Brooklyn Heights. By night, she...

A disquieting and meditative look at the issue that started the biggest food fight of our time--GMOs. From a journalist and mother who learned that genetically modified corn was the culprit behind what was making her and her child sick, a must-read book for anyone trying to parse the incendiary...

With the wit and pace of Anthony Bourdain, Italian chef and anthropologist Leonardo Lucarelli sketches the exhilarating life behind the closed doors of restaurants, and the unlikely work ethics of the kitchen. In Italy, five-star restaurants and celebrity chefs may seem, on the surface, a...

A funny, moving memoir about a son’s discovery that his mother has a genius for understanding the intimate connections between cooking, people and love Peter Gethers wants to give his aging mother a very personal and perhaps final gift: a spectacular feast featuring all her favorite dishes...

No Lucks Given, by Chef Brother Luck, is a powerful reflection on the most vital parts of the human experience: identity, community, and work. Packed with pain, passion, honor, and hope, No Lucks Given is an encouragement to everyone who has ever doubted themselves or God, whether they grew up on the streets or not—life is hard, but there is hope.

I’ve had more burns, long nights, and impossible clients than I can count in my thirty years as a chef. A few thought that a “private chef” meant personal therapist — they weren’t wrong. This isn’t a cookbook; it’s a confession — the unfiltered truth about what really happens behind those perfect families. From kitchens with too many egos to estates with too much money, from whispered chaos to dinners for people who don’t actually eat — it’s all held together with sarcasm, salt, and a stubborn refusal to quit.

This is not a typical kitchen story. It’s about what happens when the fire, pressure, and chaos of the culinary world meet the search for discipline, purpose, and truth. Told by a former Michelin-starred chef who walked away from the chaos to rebuild his life, this memoir takes you from the heat of elite kitchens to the stillness of Muay Thai gyms in Thailand. It’s a story of breaking down and rebuilding stronger — not just as a chef, but as a human being.