A fabulously cosmopolitan range of new cookbooks for 2022 is all the inspiration you’ll need for Mother’s Days gifts this year – check out my take on a few that have crossed my desk.
Mother’s Day is looming dear readers, so thank heavens for the publishing gods who have much to inspire our gift-giving. There’s a cracker selection of new cookbooks for 2022 on the shelves so far this year – here’s my take on just a few.
One of the most glam new cookbooks for 2022 has to be O Tama Carey’s Lanka Food (Hardie Grant Books $55). Lanka is Sanskrit for island, and in Tamil means “that which glitters”. This cookbook arrived in a glittering golden package, and follows the theme through with a lush gold cover and rich front and end pages.
The stuff in between is pretty lush too. Carey is an Adelaide girl of Sri Lankan heritage who learned her ancestral culinary traditions at her mother’s and grandmother’s side. After an accidental start in commercial kitchens, and a subsequent career in high end restaurants, she opened the popular Lankan Filling Station in Sydney in 2018. In Lanka Food she brings her knowledge of this complex cuisine together with recipes that demystify their veggie-forward curries, hoppers and the full range of spices and blends that enliven Sri Lankan dishes.
Buy it for the spicy food lovers in your life, for the fabulous spice blend recipes and for some divine street food and roti dishes!
Unlocking the tastes of Australian native flavours in everyday cooking, Mabu Mabu by First Nations chef Nornie Bero ((Hardie Grant Books $45) shares the secrets of Australian indigenous herbs, spices and vegetables in her simple, accessible and delicious cooking. Nornie is originally from the Torres Strait Islands, and is now Executive Chef, CEO and owner of Melbourne’s vibrant Mabu Mabu venues who has been creating dishes using Australian native ingredients for much of her career. She’s on a mission to make the indigenous herbs spices, vegetables and fruits of our own land an everyday part of our pantry, and shares a comprehensive glossary of native ingredients.
Buy this cookbook to broaden your knowledge and use of genuine Australian flavours, and to enjoy Pumpkin and Wattleseed damper, Kangaroo Tail Bourguignon, Saltbush butter and pulled wild boar!
Another absolutely stunning edition, replete with some glorious photography, is Taste Tibet by Julie Kleeman and Tibetan cook Yeshi Jampa (Murdoch Books $49.95). This UK couple met in India, after Yeshi walked across the Himalayas, and now own and run the Taste Tibet restaurant in Oxford. While simple seasonal food is hugely popular today, it’s a way of eating that has been traditional in Tibet for over 8,000 years. In this cookbook Yeshi and Julia share over 80 recipes from the Tibetan plateau written for today’s home cook, interweaved with personal stories from Yeshi’s childhood and their shared love of food.
Buy this book to explore nomadic Himalayan culinary traditions and mindful eating – and for the famous Taste Tibet chicken curry recipe.
Many of the new cookbooks for 2022 will whet our travelling tastebuds – and Saka Saka by Anto Cocagne and Aline Princet (Murdoch Books $45.00) aims to expand our culinary horizons and popularise African cooking. French trained Chef Cocagne hails from Gabon in Africa and is the artistic director of African Cooking magazine. With vibrant photographs from Princet, Anto showcases some of the best dishes from Gabon, Senegal,Ivory Coast, Cameroon, Congo and Ethiopia. This is bright joyful food that focuses on the rich diversity of the regions, interspersed with interviews from the artists and creatives of Africa who have shared the recipes and talk about what African food means to them.
Buy this cookbook to join in a celebration of lively and vital food traditions that just happen to be accessible and delicious too – like the mango tart, peanut friands and tasty Yassa chicken.
Katerina Nitsou’s Macedonia- The Cookbook (Kitchen Press $49.95) opens up the world of a culinary tradition noted for opulent family meals informed by a rich mosaic of influences from the Mediterranean, the Middle East and the Balkan Peninsula. Another of the more beautifully produced new cookbooks for 2022, this book captures the essence of a culture and cuisine deeply rooted in the land, with over 100 aromatic recipes, many rich in fragrant spice, recreated and adapted for modern western kitchens.
Nitsou grew up in a large Macedonia-Canadian community in Toronto, but now lives in Melbourne. Her delicious recipes are incredibly accessible, with easily obtainable ingredients. They are also are simply and clearly well-written – as you’d expect from a Le Cordon Bleu trained chef who cut her writing teeth in the Los Angeles Times test kitchen.
Buy this cookbook to get to know the authentic flavours of the mountainous region of Northern Macedonia, and to share deeply comforting family dishes.
Lambs’ Ears received review copies of these cookbooks.
YOU CAN BUY ANY OF THESE COOKBOOKS AT ALL GOOD BOOKSHOPS, OR ONLINE AT BOOKTOPIA USING THE LINKS IN THIS POST. (IF PURCHASED VIA THESE LINKS, YOU WILL GET A GREAT PRICE AND I WILL RECEIVE A SMALL PERCENTAGE OF THE COST.)
If you would like to join the Lambs’ Ears Cookbook Club, check out my original post here, or just click on the “Cookbook Club” link at the top of the page.
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Impressive collection. Thanks for introducing them.
goodness. What a lovely array of cookbooks!