Cookbooks: Plenty by Yotam Ottolenghi

It’s possible that the reason Yotam Ottolenghi’s Plenty (Chronicle Books) was such a huge and instant hit when it was published in the UK last year is because, in many ways, it is the sort of book that can define an age. Chef and food writer, Israeli-born Yotam Ottolenghi, seems absolutely of his moment.

More than a decade ago Donna Hay introduced food so minimalist it seemed almost to prepare itself. By comparison, Ottolenghi seems the anti-Hay. It’s not that his food is complicated, exactly, as much as it is involved. Many recipes include multiple processes and long lists of ingredients. The food is healthful, flavorful and beautiful, but even just reading the book, you don’t get the idea that any of this will make itself.

That said, don’t think you need to be an expert level chef in order to take a run at Plenty. It would be helpful to know your way around a kitchen and to not be intimidated by semi-exotic ingredients. And if you are a vegetarian, so much the better because Plenty is a vegetarian cookbook, even if the chef himself is not.

The book comes partly from “The New Vegetarian” column Ottolenghi has been writing for the Guardian since 2006. Ottolenghi says the newspaper asked him because his London restaurant, Ottolenghi, had “become famous for what we did with vegetables and grains, for the freshness and originality of our salads, and it only made sense to ask me to share this with vegetarian readers.”

The 120 recipes in Plenty are organized by ingredients: Roots, Funny Onions, Mushrooms, Brassicas and so on. This makes for a surprisingly coherent cookbook. And it seems especially sensible in a book based on vegetable matter.

In the growing season, I find myself regularly faced with a surplus of wonderful things from my friends who garden and who know I enjoy the challenge of doing something interesting with the things they produce. Boxes of organic chard, zucchinis, beans and other things too lovely to consider wasting. At those times, Ottolenghi’s organization will make the most sense. With an armload of leeks and Ottolenghi’s book, I might make Leek Fritters, or Fried Leeks or I might even be inspired to toss some into a stunning Caramelized Garlic Tart.

Eggplant gets a complete examination and tomatoes have probably never had it so good, especially in Ottolenghi’s Tomato Party, a stunning salad designed to “make use of as many as possible of the infinite types of tomatoes that are available now.” Some are cooked a little, some a lot and some are raw and all are tossed with fregola and couscous. It’s actually quite a simple dish but mind-blowingly good.

Plenty is just as good as everyone has been saying it is. This is vegetarian food as you always dreamed you’d find it. But do prepare to roll up your sleeves.

Cookbooks: The Geometry of Pasta by Caz Hildebrand and Jacob Kennedy

I was absolutely astonished to discover that The Geometry of Pasta (Quirk Books) is not some obliquely named self-help book, but that it is actually about... pasta. Not only that, it takes a sober, educational -- and even a little art school -- approach to the subject. The end result is the kind of cookbook that seems likely to find resting spots on chef’s bookshelves for a long time to come. It’s just very, very good.

The Geometry of Pasta is a collaboration between designer Caz Hildebrand (who has, among other things, designed the tastiest of Nigella Lawson’s rich and lovely cookbooks) and Chef Jacob Kennedy, co-owner of London’s very successful Bocca di Lupo.

The resulting book is, I think, probably one of the definitive works on pasta of all time. It is, as I said, low-key and considered. It is as much discussion about food as it is creation of it as Kennedy walks us through the history and evolution of hundreds of pasta shapes and recipes. And so we learn that corzetti are “large coins of pasta from Liguria,” and that fusilli “are an industrial semolina pasta, a triple helix, like an elongated propeller or fan blade.” There are tips for making pasta, for choosing it and for plumbing it for maximum enjoyment.

Many of the pasta entries are accompanied by Hildebrand’s gorgeous black and white illustrations. In her introduction to the book, she writes that the duo here offer “a guide to the geometry of pasta; pasta at its simplest and best, to be enjoyed as the Italians do.”

Looking at Cookbooks: Sips & Apps by Kathy Casey

Author, chef and expert mixologist Kathy Casey had me at Zen Turkey Dumplings. With peanut sauce. They are, in a way, typical of the type of food she’s opted to include in Sips & Apps: Classic and Contemporary Recipes for Cocktails and Appetizers (Chronicle Books). They are easy to make -- can, in fact, be made by a group, preparing to party together. And they represent interesting flavor and texture combinations and will please a wide swath of your potential party going public.

Sips and Apps is more about the Sips than the Apps -- sips win 69 to 35 in the number of recipes included. (Though variations bring the numbers up on both sides.) But the number included might also speak to the type of recipes chosen for both sides. The apps here are solid, basic, crowd-pleasing favorites. For the most part, you won’t have seen these recipes before -- Casey’s flavor choices and presentations are interesting and original -- but they are the sort of backbone recipes frequent hosts may very well come to treasure.

The Sips, though, are a different matter. Very good bar basics sections get things going in the right direction and by the time you’re ready to make a drink, you’ll know just what everything is. (And if you’ve skipped ahead, you can go back and look for whatever it was you missed.) So if you decide to make, for instance, a Strawberry Shag or a Rouge Pulp, you’ll know how to do it. There’s even a section called Clear-Headed Cocktails: gorgeous drinks with fruit and finish, but no alcohol.

Sips and Apps is excellent. Those who enjoy entertaining at home will find this to be a useful and interesting book.