VP Kamala Harris Wants to Write a Cookbook
Plus: there was a cookbooks category on Jeopardy!
Howdy cookbook fans!
And welcome your Tuesday cookbook news digest! Before we get into all that, though, I wanted to (cautiously, quietly) remind you that I do take pitches. $300/article, 1000-1400 words, must be about cookbooks (cookbooks are books with recipes in them)(you’d be surprised) but NOT a review, at this time I can’t take pitches from writers outside the US but I am working on it, please don’t share this with the big freelancer listservs because then all I get are pitches from people who don’t actually have any interest in cookbooks. Okay! Email me!
There’s a pressure on people writing food books — especially women writing food books, and people of color writing food books — to perform joy, to perform ceaseless energy, and to be pleasing at all times. You’re visually pleasing, your body is visually pleasing, the food is visually pleasing, and the text is visually pleasing. There’s nothing to disturb or distress. That’s also something that holds back thinking about cooking from getting very complex.
—I ordered Small Fires: An Epic in the Kitchen by Rebecca May Johnson immediately upon reading this in the introduction to this NYT interview: “The book regards recipes as sites of dynamic, creative engagement across generations — and notes that most bragging about not following a recipe is simply a defensive response to anxiety about originality.” I mean!!!!! PHEW! [NYT]
Kamala Harris Wants to Write A Cookbook
In an appearance on the The Jennifer Hudson Show (TIL Jennifer Hudson has a show), Vice President Kamala Harris said that one day she would like to write a cookbook. (You know, when she is done being Vice President, I assume.) “I am a very good cook!” she declares in the video above. “One day, I’m going to write a cookbook. I’ve started to write my recipes down.” Acquisitions editors, start your engines.
BESTSELLERS As predicted Johanna Gaines, Waco’s queen of moody biscuits, has shot to the top of the bestsellers list. Or, well, almost the top: it is graduation season, after all, so Dr. Seuss’s Oh, The Places You’ll Go! is in the top slot. But after a May 2 release, Magnolia Table, Volume 3 is at number 2. Don’t worry, Jo, I’m sure you’ll be #1 next month. [NPD]
Coming Attractions: Somebody Feed Phil, Nite Yun, H Mart, CHOCOLATE, Itty Bitty Cocktails, MORE!
(The above image has nothing to do with the book, it’s just a photo of Phil Rosenthal in an elevator with some cakes.) Phil Rosenthal, famously the creator of Everybody Loves Raymond but also the host of Netflix’s Somebody Feed Phil and the author last year’s Somebody Feed Phil cookbook, to write an untitled book “featuring recipes from chefs, friends, and family aimed at getting people into the kitchen to cook more.” Okiedokie! Simon Element, pub date TBA.
Oakland chef Nite Yun to write Nyum Bai, with recipes sourced from her Cambodian restaurant of the same name as well as the food she cooks at home. Written with Tien Nguyen. 4 Color Books, pub date TBA.
Cooking With H Mart will not be written by Crying in H Mart author Michelle Zauner but rather the president of the grocery chain, Stacey Kwon. The recipes will teach readers how to cook with stuff from H Mart, duh. Artisan, pub date TBA.
Aleksandra Crapanzano to follow up 2022’s Gateau with Chocolat, “a guide to baking the world's favorite desserts with over 100 chocolate-focused, French-inspired recipes.” Scribner, fall 2025.
TikToker (1.1 million followers) and Instagrammer (358k followers) BenGingi (real name: Ben Simon Tov) to write 100 Small Plates, which combines Israeli cuisine and Arabic influences. Avery, pub date TBA.
“Pie without the fuss” is the premise of Rebecca Firsker’s upcoming Galette, which boasts 50 recipes, both sweet and savory. Workman, pub date TBA.
Nights & Weekends is two cookbooks in one: the first is a “a solution to that nightly dilemma of what to eat” and the second a “focuses on recipes to carry you through the weekend.” From Alexis deBoschnek, who elaborates on the Instagram above. Union Square & Co, pub date TBA.
Cocktails and Consoles is a book pairing drinks (both NA and A) with video game hangs. Running Press, 2024.
And Tiny Cocktails is a book about, you guessed it, lil cocktails by Tyler Zielinski. Clarkson Potter, pub date TBA.
Caroline Pardilla to write MARGARITAS NOW! (I can’t tell if the all-caps are real or Publishers Marketplace but that is how I feel when it is margarita time so they remain), which “explores the margarita through its classic recipes to creative variations from today's bartenders.” Ten Speed, Spring 2025.
As always, book deals are via Publishers Marketplace1 unless otherwise mentioned.
KICKSTARTIN’ This one’s close to (my) home: Bob and Rachel Pineda, owners of Otto’s Cheese Shop in New Braunfels, Texas have launched a Kickstarter to publish The Texas Cheese Travel Book, which will highlight the artisanal cheesemakers of Texas. $75 gets you a signed copy. [Kickstarter via the Statesman]
Above: Jeopardy had a cookbook category! [YouTube]
Aw, I liked Jamie Oliver’s TV show The Great Cookbook Challenge, but I guess they cancelled it. Womp. [Metro]
Inside the very 80s San Francisco’s Celebrity Chefs. [SFGate]
The first cookbooks of the Hungarian Jews. [Marginalia]
Clementine Paddleford’s How American Eats chronicled the tastes of a nation. [Eater]
The sumptuous culinary literature of Goa. [Mint Lounge]
BTW, y’all see PM’s glow up?! Wowza.
How did you watch the Jamie cookbook challenge in the US? Please share.