Photograph courtesy of America’s Test Kitchen, All Rights Reserved, Steve Klise
’Tis the season for gathering, cooking, and gifting a memorable book to that special someone who seems most at home in the kitchen. We’ve got suggestions for must-have new titles and a revamp of a winning classic. All have an Atlanta connection and a Southern slant, and their stories and recipes will appeal to any hungry reader.
Photograph © 2024 by Rinne Allen, Used by permission of Harper Celebrate
Baking in the American South: 200 Recipes and Their Untold Stories
(Harper Celebrate, 2024) by Anne Byrn, with photography by Rinne Allen
This nearly 500-page tome, complete with artful food photos and archival images, is perfect for the baker on your holiday list. Byrn, a New York Times bestselling food writer and cookbook author based in Nashville, is a familiar and trusted name in these parts. For 15 years, the fifth-generation Southerner held the post of food editor at The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
As Byrn told a capacity crowd at the Margaret Mitchell House back in September, the impetus for the book came when, on a book tour three years earlier, a woman from Ohio asked her, “What makes Southern baking so special?” At that moment, she says, she was at a loss for words. Now, not so much. With this cookbook, she’s gone to great lengths to answer that loaded question, including a treasure trove of recipes, an inventory of her Southern pantry (with notes on ingredients and equipment), a deep dive into flours and cornbread (including a recipe by Civil War historian Shelby Foote), and plenty of baking tips and tricks.
But what makes this cookbook even richer are the stories shared of farmers, food producers, family cooks, social justice leaders, and other vital contributors to the foodways and culture of the South. The blend of recipes, journalistic sidebars, and storytelling makes this part cookbook, part history lesson, part kitchen-table reminiscence.
From Carter White House Cornbread and Scott Peacock’s Crusty Buttermilk Biscuits to Eddie’s (as in Taqueria del Sol chef Eddie Hernandez) Crying-Stopper Pudding and Sonya Jones’s Sweet Potato Cheesecake, there are several Atlanta ties.
When Southern Women Cook: History, Lore, and 300 Recipes with Contributions from 70 Women Writers
(America’s Test Kitchen/Penguin Random House, 2024); foreword by Toni Tipton-Martin, edited by Morgan Bolling
Here’s one for your mother, your daughter, your abuelita. The nearly 300-page book, from the editors of Cook’s Country, is a history-filled appreciation of the often-overlooked challenges that women, past and present, have overcome to make an impact on the cuisine and culture of the South—it speak volumes about how food is a tool for empowerment.
The work includes a curated collection of recipes and stories compiled by an all-woman editorial and design team, plus more than 70 diverse contributors, including journalists, historians, chefs, and assorted culture critics.
Atlanta represents with recipes and stories from Erika Council (Bomb Biscuit), Teresa Finney (At Heart Panaderia), and longtime AJC contributor and cookbook author Virginia Willis. Nods are here, too, to women winemakers, distillers, and sommeliers, and a seafaring tale of one Prohibition-era female rumrunner is worth dog-earing. Throughout, you’ll find stunning food photos and an array of primers on everything from peanuts and seed companies to pimento cheese and layer cakes. And, as you would expect from a publication produced by America’s Test Kitchen, each recipe intro offers a backstory of the dish, followed by authoritative tips for preparation.
Still We Rise: A Love Letter to the Southern Biscuit with Over 70 Sweet and Savory Recipes
(Clarkson Potter/Publishers, 2023) by Erika Council, photography by Andrew Thomas Lee
And speaking of Erika Council, if you have not yet been to her cheery Bomb Biscuit Co. on Highland Avenue or purchased her cookbook, what are you waiting for? Maybe you missed news of her recent milestones: In 2023, the restaurant won a Michelin Bib Gourmand designation, and this year, Council was a James Beard Award semifinalist, nominated for Best Chef: Southeast. Also in 2024, her cookbook was nominated for the Julia Child First Book Award from the International Association of Culinary Professionals. Lawd!
Flitting between the dining room and the kitchen, minding her biscuits and her guests, the critically acclaimed baker still takes time to greet newcomers and sign copies of her book, which can be purchased on-site. The memoir-style cookbook sheds light not only on her own backstory, but on those of the unseen Black women who have made monumental contributions—in home and restaurant kitchens, and to social change as well.
Council, who grew up in Goldsboro, North Carolina, recalls racial tensions in her hometown, her mother’s struggle for equity in the workplace, and building community at Sunday church dinners (see the “Gospel of Fried Chicken” entry), alongside lighter musings on her first childhood attempts at baking. Throughout, Council offers tributes to her mother, grandmothers, and the matriarch they called Big Mama.
In between the short essays are tips and recipes for Rosemary Orange Cream Biscuits, Cinnamon Sugar and Pecan Biscuits, Chocolate Chip Biscuits, and Afternoon Tea Biscuits with Honey Bourbon Butter, to name but a few. For Council, who revealed the sting of being erased from a photograph featuring her dishes and, later, demeaned by a snooty Atlanta restaurant owner, recognition comes when you rise above.
Roots, Heart, Soul: The Story, Celebration, and Recipes of Afro Cuisine in
America
(HarperCollins Harvest, 2024) by Todd Richards with Amy Paige Condon
Chef Todd Richards, a native of Chicago, made his mark in Atlanta heading up the kitchens at The Shed at Glenwood, The Pig and the Pearl, and Rolling Bones Barbecue, not to mention piloting One Flew South at Hartsfield-Jackson. With his most recent cookbook, which features more than 100 recipes, he explores Afro culture and all its many variations, including African, Afro-Caribbean, Afro-Latino, and African American.
Richards’s tone is joyful and inclusive on the opening page: “It matters not whether we call it barbecue or barbacoa, sofrito or the Holy Trinity, whether we put buttermilk or sugar in our cornbread, or sip hibiscus tea or drink red Kool-Aid . . . all are welcome to join this celebration.”
The book’s sections track a global journey, one that starts in West Africa, moves through the Caribbean, lands in North America, and spreads from the South to the West. Finally, “The Great Migration (1910–1970)” documents the flight toward New York and Chicago and the tastes imprinted there.
Several servings of historical context and insightful commentary from food scholars are swirled into the recipe presentation. Gorgeous photography by James Beard Award winner Clay Williams brings life to ingredients—from okra and chile peppers to crawfish—and finished dishes. Among them: Crispy Rice (made with yogurt and curry); Bistec Encebollado (Puerto Rican steak, onions, and salsa); Grilled Whole Snapper with Mango Slaw; Four-Cheese Baked Mac ’n’ Cheese with Lobster Variation; Sweet Potato Pie with Sorghum Ice Cream; and Fried Apple Hand Pies with Cinnamon Sugar and Jamaican Rum Crème.
Photograph by Virginia Willis
Bon Appétit, Y’all: Recipes and Stories from Three Generations of Southern Cooking
(University of Georgia Press, 2024) by Virginia Willis
The book begins with a foreword by Nathalie Dupree, one of Willis’s first teachers, who remembers her as a young apprentice. Dupree, who notes that Willis has also worked with Anne Willan and Martha Stewart and been influenced by both American and French cooks, writes: “And she has done what every teacher wants of a student—she exceeded my capabilities. (I’m afraid she won’t brag on herself, so I must.)”
The original edition of the cookbook, which came out 16 years ago (hard to believe), is no doubt by now grease-smudged and dotted with Duke’s in more than a few kitchens. But the new release reflects the literal transformation of Willis in recent years. Anyone who follows her on social media or has watched her on television has seen her svelter self. Willis took things slow on her weight-loss journey, focusing more on health and strength-building than pounds lost, though she managed to shed some 65 pounds and keep them off.
With her new book, she’s lightened up some of the recipes when it comes to fat, sodium, and other not-so-swell ingredients. She leans into vegetables and whole grains, and while she keeps the fried in the repertoire, it’s not always front and center. But don’t worry: For some Southern favorites, Willis just left well enough alone, knowing there’s room for Heirloom Tomato-and-Olive Tartines and Coca-Cola-Glazed Wings. There are new recipes, too, and the book includes fresh photography, with contributions from Atlantan Angie Mosier.
This article appears in our December 2024 issue.
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