Lifestyle

Inventory: Flip through the latest cookbooks from some of B.C.’s best chefs

Cooking the books is fine—so long as you’re referring to following recipes. Pick up some kitchen lingo from The Bear and you’re set

By Alyssa Hirose /

  Okanagan Eats Cover

1. Off the Vine

The Okanagan Valley’s greatest chefs all pitched in to this new cookbook: think folks from the Naramata Inn, Row Fourteen, Phantom Creek, Mission Hill, Cannery Brewing and more. Vancouver-Island based authors Dawn Postnikoff and Joanne Sasvari penned Okanagan Eats, including tales from each participating restaurant—it’s recipes and origin stories rolled into one.

figure1publishing.com

Bred Cover

2. Plant-Baked

Vegans, take note: Whistler bakery Bred just released its eponymous cookbook in November, and co-owners Ed and Natasha Tatton are sharing all of their sourdough secrets (plus recipes for pizza, cinnamon buns, English muffins and babka). No eggs, no milk, no problem… you’ll be maintaining that sourdough starter like a mother.

edsbred.com

Chocolate All Day cover

3. Hot Cocoa

Steven Hodge, owner of Vancouver’s Temper Chocolate and Pastry, dipped into the world of cookbooks last fall: Chocolate All Day just launched last October. The super-sweet book covers essential skills like mirror glazes and buttercream, plus recipes for dark chocolate cheesecake, chocolate raspberry brownies and chocolate sticky buns.

temperpastry.com

Earls the Cookbook cover

4. Chain Reaction

Local hospitality legend Earls recently celebrated its 40th anniversary and marked the milestone with—you guessed it—an anniversary edition of their cookbook. Earls: The Cookbook, edited by Vancouver writer Jim Sutherland, contains 16 “new classics,” including the salmon zen bowl and scallop risotto, in addition to old faves like Jack sticks, Hunan kung pao and vindaloo curry.

indigo.ca

Sabai cover

5. Weeknight Hero

Vancouver chef (and YouTube star—she has 1.84 million subscribers) Pailin Chongchitnant is serving up her second book. Sabai: 100 Simple Thai Recipes for Any Day of the Week contains, well, 100 Thai recipes. Look for favourites like red curry chicken, garlic shrimp and mapo tofu.

hot-thai-kitchen.com

Buzzworthy cover

6. Shaking It Up

Okay, maybe you didn’t know you needed a cocktail inspired by Virginia Woolf or Octavia Butler, but you do. Buzzworthy: Cocktails Inspired by Female Literary Greats by Vancouver-based Jennifer Croll takes some of history’s raddest women writers and stirs up fantastic literary libations. For example, the Mary Shelley uses parts of a Manhattan and a margarita… a Frankenstein’s monster of a cocktail.

massybooks.com