Squeezing the best from this year's books
Ideas for the lemon lovers in your life
Hello Lemonistas,
Welcome to the latest edition of The Lemon Grove newsletter.
Just a quick reminder. Many thanks for the messages I have received so far, but I would love it if I could receive a few more of your suggestions for your favourite food and drink books of the year. ? Click the box below and let us know your recommendations, and we’ll publish a list of some of your ‘must reads’. Thank you!
Books are the nourishment our souls need
'Tis the time of year when lists of best books, best gifts, best menus for Christmas Day and the seasonal gatherings of friends and family. So here at The Lemon Grove, we've compiled a few short lists of some of the books and gifts that might have slipped your attention in the blizzard of food-centric books published each year. Some editions sell hundreds of thousands of copies while others struggle to reach 100 copies that line cooks shelves. Self-publishing is now an essential part of the industry. It is a route increasingly used by but not backed up with, albeit with slim budgets and marketing contacts of established publishing houses. So here, in the first of five specials leading up to 2025, looking back at 2024 and then into the new year – which promises to be exciting for so many reasons.
I expect some of these books will become classics in your cookbook collection, splattered with gravy, butter or sponge mix, and others will be stacked and quietly forgotten. Others will be dipped into and read in random chapter order. Others might renew your connection with the ingredients, stories, and pleasures of creating nutritious, welcoming meals for yourself or for sharing. They might be part of a stack piled by your bed, by your favourite reading chair, or on a free space in the kitchen to dip in and out of whilst your coffee brews.
This year, we have seen a clutch of exquisitely researched food and travel books that transport us to the culinary traditions of places such as the Balkans and the Levant. Others offer practical advice, verging on the scholarly, offering wisdom and techniques to set you on the road to replicating those ephemeral pleasures of cooking and sharing food with family, friends and strangers. Recording techniques in precise detail of recipes handed down through generations are recorded lovingly. Seasons are filleted and have become genres in their own right, something our parents, grandparents, and those who cooked before them already knew.
Citrus-focussed & literary food books
A special edition for paid subscribers on the first two books, Lemon, and Citrus, with free subscribers getting access to the reviews six weeks later. Both are published by esteemed publishers Taschen and Thames & Hudson, respectively.
Lemon
Gourmand X Taschen
This collection of stories and recipes combines history with flavour, genetics with geography and fine art and photography to create a deliciously curated biography of the lemon. Published by Taschen in partnership with Gourmand magazine, Lemon is an in-depth exploration of lemons' literary, linguistic, historical, and gastronomic legacy, where the line between food and art is happily blurred.
The volume is the second in a series where and follows The Gourmand's book on the Egg. Lemon features a foreword by celebrated cook and author Simon Hopkinson, an in-depth introduction by writer and author Jennifer Higgie, twenty-four compelling and unexpected stories illustrated with acclaimed artworks and photography - plus over fifty zesty recipes including Poached lemon salmon, Lemon rasam (a spicy Indian soup), Sgroppino (a Venetian cocktail with sorbet and Prosecco and/or vodka. Photography by Bobby Doherty.
Buy the book here.
Citrus
By David J Mabberley
Written by an Oxford University academic, this could be a dry tome with many worthy historical facts and travelways. However, in the hands of David J Mabberley and his publishers Thames & Hudson, it is a masterpiece of high-brow information and intriguing pub quiz tidbits that are beautifully packaged and presented.
From oranges, lemons and limes to mandarins, citrons and pomelos, citrus fruits occupy a unique place in global cultural history. Associations of health and wealth, adventure and exploration appear in the art, literature, religion, cuisine and science of societies worldwide and across many centuries diligently recorded in this book.
Citrus traces the history of these fruits through the works of ancient thinkers, Chinese historians, Arab geographers, European royal collectors, artists, physicians and botanists. Richly illustrated with medieval manuscripts and Renaissance paintings, archival photography and modern advertising, this invigorating cultural history reveals how these extraordinary, life-giving fruits have flavoured, scented, healed and coloured our world.
The book is richly illustrated with contemporary photography, fine art still lifes, and prints sourced from botanical journals published hundreds of years ago. In common with Gourmand's Lemon book, I find Citrus a pleasure to read, and I find myself dipping in and out for recipes, creative inspiration and appreciation of the work put into both volumes.
Buy the book here.
While the following four books are not strictly concerned with citrus fruit, they all focus on cuisines around the Mediterranean and include many recipes requiring various citrus fruits. As a Lebanese chef once told me, "I add a squeeze of lemon to everything I cook. It brings the flavour alive".
Le Sud: Recipes from Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur
by Rebekah Peppler
Rebekah Peppler is a James Beard Book Award finalist in the US and has written an aspiration guide to southeastern France's food, drink, and lifestyle, featuring recipes that reflect the simple, seasonal, and multicultural French table from a modern perspective. It is photographed using the sensual, sublime light of the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region in the far southeast of France.
Buy the book here.
Greekish
by Georgina Hayden
Recipes from this light and airy cookbook include a twist of some classics you may already have tried: Fried sesame cheese bites, Tuna, egg and caper salad, Sticky aubergine and pomegranate tart, Spanakopita jacket potatoes, Meat, fish and veggie kebabs, and Baklava cheesecake. There are easy breakfasts, small dishes and snacks, salads, desserts and sections of recipes inspired by the iconic spanakopita and baklava.
Whether you are a seasoned visitor to Greece or a newcomer to this cuisine, Greekish will act as a delicious guide.
Buy the book here.
Zaytinya: Delicious Mediterranean Dishes From Greece, Turkey, and Lebanon
By José Andrés with Michael Costa
José Andrés is best known in the US for his many restaurants, TV appearances and humanitarian work, having set up World Central Kitchen. Zaytinya is the name of three of his restaurants in Washington DC, New York City and Florida's South Beach. Born in Spain but based for many years in the US, José draws culinary inspiration from across the Mediterranean, focusing on Greece, Turkey, and Lebanon. Some of the recipes are titled in multiple languages, providing cross-cultural context. Speaking to the LA Times earlier this year, José said, "The meaning, to me, of culture is not something exclusive, but something inclusive.
"It's not something that only belongs to you, but belongs to everybody. Culture, to me, is the perfect synonym for longer tables, for sharing."
Buy the book here.
And finally, I like the look of Nature's Candy: Timeless and Inventive Recipes for Creating and Baking with Candied Fruit, by Camilla Wynne. A baking book about preserving fruits such as orange and lemon peel and whole fruits such as cherries. It's full of techniques and has a chart to guide you on which candied methods are best for each type of fruit. Interestingly, Camilla offers baking ideas for those of us who'd rather buy our candied fruit from the deli.
Non-fiction
There is no shortage of great books in this category. It's also a ripe space for exploring and creative non-fiction, narrative, and true stories, often relying on hard facts and memory. Here are five
From Japan, we get Butter, by Asaka Yuzuki, the Waterstones book of the year for 2024. Based on a true story, the book's promotional blurb says, 'gourmet cook Manako Kajii sits in Tokyo Detention House convicted of the serial murders of lonely businessmen, who she is said to have seduced with her delicious home cooking…" Translated by Polly Barton, The book offers a vividly unsettling exploration of misogyny, obsession, romance and the transgressive pleasures of food in Japan.
Then we have The Kamogawa Food Detectives, another altogether different literary offering from Japan. Written by Hisashi Kashiwai and translated by Jesse Kirkwood, this book boils down to a heartwarming celebration of good company and the power of a delicious meal. With a bit of detective work, a father and daughter duo in a quiet backstreet restaurant in Kyoto recreate dishes from their customers' pasts – dishes that may well hold the keys to unlocking forgotten memories and future happiness.
Then we have US-based and TV cookery show superstar Ina Garten, aka The Barefoot Contessa, and her much-awaited autobiography, Be Ready When the Luck Happens. This is part memoir, part life lessons and insights into a life spent teaching people to cook and entertain.
The cocktail-shaking, hugely versatile actor/ director Stanley Tucci has scored more literary success with his 'What I Ate in One Year'. This is his fourth book and is as much about with whom he dined (Isabella Rossellini, Ralph Fiennes, Jamie Dornan, Saoirse Ronan and Harry Styles … ) as it is about what they ate.
Buyers note: some of the books listed above are linked to The Lemon Grove’s Bookshop account and if you buy a book here, then I’ll get a very small commission. Other books are linked to the online shop for The Kitchen Table bookshop in Shaftesbury, Dorset, while one or two are linked to another online retailer.
Culinary Diplomacy at the Palace
This week, King Charles and Queen Camilla rolled out the diplomatic carpet for the Emir of Qatar and guests such as the UK's Prime Minister Keir Starmer, ex-footballer David Beckham and others behind the 2022 Qatari football World Cup. The crowd sat behind elaborate table settings, including a 4,000-piece dinner service in Buckingham Palace, central London.
On the menu was a tartlet of Cornish lobster and quails eggs for a starter, with pheasant wrapped in Savoy cabbage, roasted celeriac puree and potato gratin with cheese from Suffolk, truffle sauce and winter vegetables as a main course. This was followed by an iced bombe with organic Samoan vanilla ice cream and a Balmoral plum sorbet.
Each guest had a setting of five different glasses - and for those wanting an alcoholic drink, the wine list included Chapel Down Grand Reserve 2018, Puligny-Montrachet Les Nosroyes, Domaine Genot-Boulanger 2019, Chateau Lynch-Bages, Pauillac 2000 and a Chateau La Tour Blanche, noted the BBC news report.
Expect more on culinary diplomacy from The Lemon Grove in future issues, from menus designed to impress royalty, presidents and prime ministers to making a well-thought-out and timed Christmas dinner with all the trimmings to smooth over strained family relations.
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Bruce McMichael
Writer, Podcaster, Event Host & Cook, Lemonista
Email: hello@thelemongrove.net
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