Books & Bites
7 Cuisines, 28 Delicious Reads
From simmering secrets to slow-cooked love stories, these are the books that feed the soul and your appetite.
Food has always been more than just fuel. It’s memory, it’s connection, it’s comfort. And in these stories, it’s everything. We’ve gathered a selection of fiction where food isn’t just in the background, it’s at the heart of the narrative. These are books where recipes are passed down through generations, where romance is baked into every chapter, and where kitchens hold more secrets than you might expect.
Some are about family recipes or restaurants. One is a historical tale about the woman who revolutionized an entire cuisine. Others are contemporary romances kindled over cooking, baking, and sharing something delicious. There are even a couple that might have you questioning what’s really on your plate.
Whether you’re in the mood for something rich and romantic or dark and unexpected, there’s a story here to satisfy every craving. So grab your favorite snack (or pour a glass of wine), and dig in.
This is reading you can taste.
Japanese
The Convenience Store by the Sea
by Sonoko Machida - Bruno Navasky
The international bestseller with over half a million copies sold, for fans of Convenience Store Woman and The Kamogawa Food Detectives.
Welcome to Tenderness!
A quaint seaside town in Kitakyushu, Mojiko is full of hidden delights. And one unexpected treasure is the 24/7 convenience store, Tenderness.
Sure, it's a bit odd that the incredibly handsome manager has his own fan club. And perhaps the customers are somewhat eccentric, if not entertaining. But there's a warmth about the store that draws you in.
The Curious Kitten at the Chibineko Kitchen
by Yuta Takahashi - Cat Anderson
Your table awaits at the Chibineko Kitchen, where a soul-nourishing meal in the company of the resident kitten will transport you back in time to reunite with departed loved ones--for fans of Before the Coffee Gets Cold, The Midnight Library, and Studio Ghibli films like Spirited Away.
Menu
Namero-don: Seasoned minced fish served on rice
Easy omelette sandwich
Umebishio: Pickled-plum jam
Sukiyaki-don: Beef hotpot, served over rice
In a remote seaside town outside of Tokyo, Kotoko makes her way along a seashell path, lured by whispers of an enigmatic restaurant whose kagezen, or traditional meals offered in remembrance of loved ones, promise a reunion with the departed. When a gust of wind lifts off her hat, she sees running after it a young man who looks like her recently deceased brother. But it's not her brother; it's Kai, the restaurant's young chef, who returns her hat and brings her to the tiny establishment.
I Leave It Up to You
by Jinwoo Chong
From the award-winning author of Flux
A coma can change a man, but the world Jack Jr. awakens to is one he barely recognizes. His advertising job is history, his Manhattan apartment is gone, and the love of his life has left him behind. He's been asleep for two years; with no one to turn to, he realizes it's been ten years since he last saw his family.
Lost and disoriented, he makes a reluctant homecoming back to the bustling Korean American enclave of Fort Lee, New Jersey; back into the waiting arms of his parents, who are operating under the illusion that he never left; and back to Joja, their ever-struggling sushi restaurant that he was set to inherit before he ran away from it all.
The Complete Illustrated Guide to Japanese Cooking: Techniques, Ingredients & Recipes
by Sachiyo Harada
100 classic Japanese recipes broken down step by step. This beautiful and comprehensive book demystifies ingredients and techniques to inspire home cooks of all levels.
Japanese cuisine is one of the world's most beloved, but cooking Japanese food at home can still feel daunting to many. Broken down into three parts--Essentials, Recipes, and an Illustrated Glossary-- The Complete Illustrated Guide to Japanese Cooking teaches essential techniques, such as how to cut fish and chicken, and make favorite dishes.
American Midwest
The Funeral Ladies of Ellerie County
by Claire Swinarski
Armed with a Crock-Pot and a pile of recipes, a grandmother, her granddaughter, and a mysterious young man work to bring a community together in this uplifting novel for readers of The Chicken Sisters.
Esther Larson has been cooking for funerals in the Northwoods of Wisconsin for seventy years. Known locally as the "funeral ladies," she and her cohort have worked hard to keep the mourners of Ellerie County fed--it is her firm belief that there is very little a warm casserole and a piece of cherry pie can't fix. But, after falling for an internet scam that puts her home at risk, the proud Larson family matriarch is the one in need of help these days.
Iris, Esther's whip-smart Gen Z granddaughter, would do anything for her family and her community. As she watches her friends and family move out of their lakeside town onto bigger and better things, Iris wonders why she feels so left behind in the place she is desperate to make her home.
The Problem with Dating
by Brittainy Cherry
If I had to choose a person to hate, Alex Ramírez would've been first on the list...
Welcome to Honey Creek, Illinois, where life was as sweet as the town's name suggested. That was, until Mr. Fine Dining himself, Alex Ramírez, rolled into town with a permanent scowl. Even worse, he decided to park his snooty five-star restaurant across from my cozy dog daycare. He was tall, dark, and about as warm as a frozen entrée.
After one too many unpleasant interactions, I was determined to stay out of his way and to keep him out of mine.
The Lager Queen of Minnesota
by J Ryan Stradal
A National Bestseller!
Two sisters, one farm. A family is split when their father leaves their shared inheritance entirely to Helen, his younger daughter. Despite baking award-winning pies at the local nursing home, her older sister, Edith, struggles to make what most people would call a living. So she can't help wondering what her life would have been like with even a portion of the farm money her sister kept for herself.
With the proceeds from the farm, Helen builds one of the most successful light breweries in the country, and makes their company motto ubiquitous: "Drink lots. It's Blotz." Where Edith has a heart as big as Minnesota, Helen's is as rigid as a steel keg.
Midwest Made: Big, Bold Baking from the Heartland
by Shauna Sever
A Love Letter to America's Heartland, the Great Midwest
When it comes to defining what we know as all-American baking, everything from Bundt cakes to brownies have roots that can be traced to the great Midwest. German, Scandinavian, Polish, French, and Italian immigrant families baked their way to the American Midwest, instilling in it pies, breads, cookies, and pastries that manage to feel distinctly home-grown.
Vietnamese
The Family Recipe
by Carolyn Huynh
From the author of the "sharp, smart, and gloriously extra" (Nancy Jooyoun Kim, New York Times bestselling author) Good Morning America Book Club Pick The Fortunes of Jaded Women, a stunning family dramedy about estranged siblings competing to inherit their father's Vietnamese sandwich franchise and unravel family mysteries.
Duc Tran, the eccentric founder of the Vietnamese sandwich chain Duc's Sandwiches, has decided to retire. No one has heard from his wife, Evelyn, in two decades. She abandoned the family without a trace, and clearly doesn't want anything to do with Duc, the business, or their kids. But the money has to go to someone. With the help of the shady family lawyer, Duc informs his five estranged adult children that to receive their inheritance, his four daughters must revitalize run-down shops in old-school Little Saigon locations across America: Houston, San Jose, New Orleans, and Philadelphia--within a year. But if the first-born (and only) son, Jude, gets married first, everything will go to him.
Mãn
by Kim Thúy
A triumph of poetic beauty and a moving meditation on how love and food are inextricably entwined, Mãn is a seductive and luminous work of literature from Kim Thúy, whose first book, Ru, was shortlisted for the Scotiabank Giller Prize, received a Governor General's Literary Award and won the nationwide book competition Canada Reads.
Mãn has three mothers: the one who gives birth to her in wartime, the nun who plucks her from a vegetable garden, and her beloved Maman, who becomes a spy to survive. Seeking security for her grown daughter, Maman finds Mãn a husband--a lonely Vietnamese restaurateur who lives in Montreal. Thrown into a new world, Mãn discovers her natural talent as a chef. Gracefully she practices her art, with food as her medium. She creates dishes that are much more than sustenance for the body: they evoke memory and emotion, time and place, and even bring her customers to tears.
What Hunger
by Catherine Dang
A haunting coming-of-age tale following the daughter of Vietnamese immigrants, Ronny Nguyen, as she grapples with the weight of generational trauma while navigating the violent power of teenage girlhood, for fans of Jennifer's Body and Little Fires Everywhere.
It's the summer before high school, and Ronny Nguyen finds herself too young for work, too old for cartoons. Her days are spent in a small backyard, dozing off to trashy magazines on a plastic lawn chair. In stark contrast stands her brother Tommy, the pride and joy of their immigrant parents: a popular honor student destined to be the first in the family to attend college. The thought of Tommy leaving for college fills Ronny with dread, as she contemplates the quiet house she will be left alone in with her parents, Me and Ba.
Their parents rarely speak of their past in Vietnam, except through the lens of food. The family's meals are a tapestry of cultural memory: thick spring rolls with slim and salty nem chua, and steaming bowls of pho tái with thin, delicate slices of blood-red beef.
Di an: The Salty, Sour, Sweet and Spicy Flavors of Vietnamese Cooking with Twaydabae (a Cookbook)
by Tue Nguyen
NAMED ONE OF THE BEST COOKBOOKS OF 2024: The New York Times, Esquire, and Los Angeles Times * ONE OF THE BEST COOKBOOKS OF FALL: Delish
Popular social media super-chef Tue Nguyen (better known to many as @TwayDaBae) moved to the US with her family from Vietnam at the age of eight. When she realized she wanted to pursue a career in food, her parents didn't support her choice, despite her mother being a wonderful cook and the inspiration behind many of Tue's recipes. Still, Tue went to culinary school to pursue her dreams. Since then, she's been featured in major publications like People, and her new restaurant, Didi in West Hollywood, has been covered by the Los Angeles Times, LA Weekly, The Infatuation, Eater, and more.
English/British
Good Taste: A Novel in Search of Great Food
by Caroline Scott
With delectable prose, a sharp heroine ahead of her time, and an adventure across the English countryside in search of great food, Good Taste is the perfect historical novel for fans of Dear Mrs. Bird and The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society.
You can tell a lot about a person from what they like to eat...
England in 1932 is in the grip of the Great Depression. Stella Douglas, author of a much-loved but not very successful biography, is a bit depressed herself. When she's summoned to see her editor in London, she expects her writing career is over before it's even started.
Miss Eliza's English Kitchen: A Novel of Victorian Cookery and Friendship
by Annabel Abbs
INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER
Good Housekeeping Book Club Pick * A Country Living Best Book of Fall * A Washington Post Best Feel-Good Book of the Year * One of the New York Times's Best Historical Fiction Novels of Fall
England, 1835. London is awash with thrilling new ingredients, from rare spices to exotic fruits. But no one knows how to use them. When Eliza Acton is told by her publisher to write a cookery book instead of the poetry she loves, she refuses--until her bankrupt father is forced to flee the country. As a woman, Eliza has few options. Although she's never set foot in a kitchen, she begins collecting recipes and teaching herself to cook. Much to her surprise she discovers a talent - and a passion - for the culinary arts.
Piglet
by Lottie Hazell
A New York Times Notable Book
A Belletrist Book Club Pick
An elegant, razor-sharp debut about women's ambitions and appetites--and the truth about having it all
Outside of a childhood nickname she can't shake, Piglet's rather pleased with how her life's turned out. An up-and-coming cookbook editor at a London publishing house, she's got lovely, loyal friends and a handsome fiancé, Kit, whose rarefied family she actually, most of the time, likes, despite their upper-class eccentricities. One of the many, many things Kit loves about Piglet is the delicious, unfathomably elaborate meals she's always cooking.
But when Kit confesses a horrible betrayal two weeks before they're set to be married, Piglet finds herself suddenly...hungry.
Cooking and the Crown: Royal Recipes from Queen Victoria to King Charles III [A Cookbook]
by Tom Parker Bowles
An intimate cookbook exploring 200 years of British royal food, studded with anecdotes, delectable tidbits, and nuggets of history, featuring 100 accessible recipes from award-winning food writer Tom Parker Bowles.
In Cooking and the Crown Royal Recipes from Queen Victoria to King Charles III, Tom Parker Bowles, award-winning food writer, restaurant critic, and son of Queen Camilla, blends history, monarchy, and gastronomy to provide a fascinating window into the world of royal tastes and traditions as far back as Victorian times.
American South
Gothictown
by Emily Carpenter
*A Publishers Marketplace BUZZ BOOKS Selection*
Welcome to gentle Juliana, where you can have it all...if you pay the price.
The email that lands in Billie Hope's inbox seems like a gift from the universe. For $100, she can purchase a spacious Victorian home in Juliana, Georgia, a small town eager to boost its economy in the wake of the pandemic. She can leave behind her cramped New York City rental and the painful memories of shuttering her once thriving restaurant and start over with her husband and her daughter. Plus, she'll get a business grant to open a new restaurant in a charming riverside community laden with opportunity. It seems like a dream come true...or a devil's bargain.
Midnight at the Blackbird Cafe
by Heather Webber
THE USA TODAY BESTSELLER
Nestled in the mountain shadows of Alabama lies the little town of Wicklow. It is here that Anna Kate has returned to bury her beloved Granny Zee, owner of the Blackbird Café.
It was supposed to be a quick trip to close the café and settle her grandmother's estate, but despite her best intentions to avoid forming ties or even getting to know her father's side of the family, Anna Kate finds herself inexplicably drawn to the quirky Southern town her mother ran away from so many years ago, and the mysterious blackbird pie everybody can't stop talking about.
Love and Hot Chicken: A Delicious Southern Novel
by Mary Liza Hartong
The debut of a dynamite new voice from the South, Love and Hot Chicken is a spicy and hilarious Tennessee story about family, friendship, fried chicken, and two girls in love.
The Chickie Shak is something of a historical landmark. Red clapboard walls, thriving wasp population, yard-toilets resplendent with sunflowers. My best friend Lee Ray and I used to come after our softball games and snag a picnic table while our mammas ordered the home team special. Truth is, most people around here order the same thing until the day somebody throws their ashes off a roller coaster at Dollywood.
When PJ Spoon returns home for her beloved daddy's funeral, she doesn't expect to stick around. Why abandon her PhD program at Vanderbilt for the humble charms of her hometown, Pennywhistle, Tennessee? Mamma's broken heart, that's why.
Good Lookin' Cookin': A Year of Meals - A Lifetime of Family, Friends, and Food [A Cookbook]
by Dolly Parton - Rachel Parton George
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER - You're invited to pull up a chair to a year of meals, friends, and fun with the Partons, as Dolly and her sister (and favorite cook) Rachel share beloved, crowd-pleasing recipes and family stories.
"Hey, good lookin'--what ya got cookin'?"
This is what Dolly Parton sings to her sister Rachel Parton George whenever she walks into her kitchen. It's what you do when a love for good music and good food runs in the family.
In Good Lookin' Cookin' Dolly and Rachel share tips for hosting events all year long, including twelve multi-course menus of cherished recipes for New Year's Day, Easter, Mother's Day, Thanksgiving, Christmas, and more.
French
The Paris Novel
by Ruth Reichl
A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR: Saveur, Food & Wine, Bookreporter, The Charlotte Observer
Stella reached for an oyster, tipped her head, and tossed it back. It was cool and slippery, the flavor so briny it was like diving into the ocean. Oysters, she thought. Where have they been all my life?
When her estranged mother dies, Stella is left with an unusual inheritance: a one-way plane ticket and a note reading "Go to Paris." Stella is hardly cut out for adventure; a traumatic childhood has kept her confined to the strict routines of her comfort zone. But when her boss encourages her to take time off, Stella resigns herself to honoring her mother's last wishes.
The Pairing
by Casey McQuiston
In #1 New York Times bestselling author Casey McQuiston's latest romantic comedy, two bisexual exes accidentally book the same European food and wine tour and challenge each other to a hookup competition to prove they're over each other--except they're definitely not.
Theo and Kit have been a lot of things: childhood best friends, crushes, in love, and now estranged exes. After a brutal breakup on the transatlantic flight to their dream European food and wine tour, they exited each other's lives once and for all.
Time apart has done them good. Theo has found confidence as a hustling bartender by night and aspiring sommelier by day, with a long roster of casual lovers. Kit, who never returned to America, graduated as the reigning sex god of his pastry school class and now bakes at one of the finest restaurants in Paris. Sure, nothing really compares to what they had, and life stretches out long and lonely ahead of them, but--yeah. It's in the past.
All that remains is the unused voucher for the European tour that never happened, good for 48 months after its original date and about to expire. Four years later, it seems like a great idea to finally take the trip. Solo. Separately.
The Cook
by Maylis De Kerangal - Sam Taylor
One of BBC Culture's Ten Books to Read this March and The Rumpus Book Club Pick for March
Maylis de Kerangal follows up her acclaimed novel The Heart with a dissection of the world of a young Parisian chef
More like a poetic biographical essay on a fictional person than a novel, The Cook is a coming-of-age journey centered on Mauro, a young self-taught cook.
Mostly French: Recipes from a Kitchen in Provence (a Cookbook)
by Makenna Held
From the young American woman who bought Julia Child's home in the South of France sight-unseen, Mostly French is a love letter to the food and place; it is lushly photographed, filled with more than 100 modern recipes, and for anyone who loves France and Julia Child.
Mostly French is a stunningly beautiful cookbook developed and photographed at La Pitchoune, Julia Child's home in Provence. Inspired by the olive trees and hills of lavender, thyme, and wild asparagus, author and cooking instructor Makenna Held shares 150 recipes that pay homage to the serenity of Southern France. Through dishes such as Roasted Chicken with Lemon and Sumac, Caprese with Peaches and Strawberries, and Lavender Salted Caramels, among dozens of others that lean into France and ease, she channels the best of French cooking: simple ingredients, technique, and balanced flavors.
Italian
A Certain Hunger
by Chelsea G Summers
One of Vanity Fair's Books That Will Get You Through The Season
Food critic Dorothy Daniels loves what she does. Discerning, meticulous, and very, very smart, Dorothy's clear mastery of the culinary arts make it likely that she could, on any given night, whip up a more inspired dish than any one of the chefs she writes about. Dorothy loves sex as much as she loves food, and while she has struggled to find a long-term partner that can keep up with her, she makes the best of her single life, frequently traveling from Manhattan to Italy for a taste of both.
Varina Palladino's Jersey Italian Love Story
by Terri-Lynne Defino
An utterly delightful and surprising family drama--think Moonstruck and My Big Fat Greek Wedding set in New Jersey--about a boisterous, complicated Italian family determined to help their widowed mother find a new boyfriend.
Lively widow Varina Palladino has lived in the same house in Wyldale, New Jersey, her entire life. The town might be slightly stuck in the 1960s, when small businesses thrived and most residents were Italian, but its population is getting younger and the Palladinos are embracing the change. What Varina's not embracing, much to her ninety-two-year-old mother's dismay, is dating. Running Palladino's Italian Specialties grocery, caring for her mother, and keeping her large, loud Jersey Italian family from killing one another takes up all of Varina's energy anyway.
Recipe for Second Chances
by Ali Rosen
The ones that got away reunite at a big Italian wedding in this second-chance romance from debut author Ali Rosen, the James Beard Award-nominated writer and host of Potluck with Ali Rosen.
Stella Park is elated to celebrate her best friend's wedding in the Italian countryside--and maybe she also needs this escape from her personal and her professional life. Writing recipes for a living isn't all it's cooked up to be.
But the revelry is short lived when she runs into the ex she hasn't seen since she broke his heart ten years ago, Samuel Gordon. As her past gets propelled to the forefront, Stella tries not to question the choices she made a decade ago.
The Pasta Queen: The Art of Italian Cooking
by Nadia Caterina Munno - Anna Francese Gass
INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER
NOW AN ORIGINAL SERIES ON PRIME VIDEO
Culinary virtuoso and New York Times bestselling author Nadia Caterina Munno expands beyond pasta and into the art of traditional Italian cooking with this vibrant and accessible cookbook--featuring seasonal dishes, healthy entrees, and so much more.
Go beyond the first course of pasta with this brand-new cookbook from The Pasta Queen herself. From aperitivi to awaken your appetite to desserts that end meals on a sweet note--and all the courses in between--Nadia will help you create an Italian dinner party fit for royalty.