Perhaps one of the most interesting cookbooks I've read this year. So many recipes in this book I want to make, but it was really the author's approach to combining unexpected flavors and spices that hooked me. ( )

Good for source ideas.

This collection is beautiful and the recipes I have tried are really good! Really enjoying this book.

includes a useful FLAVORS glossary!

It took me quite a long time to review this one, because it's so hard to categorize this cookbook. I mean that in the best way possible. Nik Sharma’s culinary voice is quite unique – I don’t think I’ve ever read a book quite like this one. Sharma is a blogger and former researcher in the field of molecular genetics, and beyond that opens his book by describing himself as a gay immigrant.

He notes that some of his touchpoints are India, Appalachia, and the US Midwest, but the ingredients and flavors that he pulls into his dishes are astonishingly diverse, and include southwestern flavors, umami Japanese ingredients like nori, Mediterranean ingredients like olives, and Middle Eastern spices and ingredients like kefir, sumac and pomegranate. To give you a few examples of his utterly original flavor combinations – the appetizer section includes a recipe for Chile-Sumac-Pomegranate nuts, and the comfort and very Midwest-sounding small plate of “Sweet Potato Fries with Basil Yogurt.”

In their simplicity and sophistication, and in the global nature of his flavor combinations, I would most comfortably situate Sharma’s book next to Yotam Ottolenghi's cookbooks, and the Bar Tartine cookbook—the latter also published by Chronicle Books—and an indispensable favorite is a favorite of mine. In terms of personal narrative, I think it also sits quite comfortably next to David Lebovitz’s My Paris Kitchen.

Now, let’s talk about the visual look and feel of this cookbook. Sharma not only wrote the recipes, but took the photographs. This is a dead sophisticated, lavishly photographed, book with food presentation sometimes rivaling food I’ve seen and eaten at places like ALINEA. If anything the photographs, which are uniformly shot in a dark and masculine voice, aren’t really my style – I love the warm of Bar Tartine’s images for example. But the right person would fall madly in love with these images, and I would only fault this book for not including larger versions of Sharma’s arresting images of spices, seeds, and salts. I can’t even really fault the book in this regard as this content is truly secondary to the main content of the book, which are the images. But I find myself lingering on those photos at length.

The only other critique I’d offer up of this book, is that Sharma notes that his husband grew up in the Appalachians, and that he’s experimented in his recipes with substituting ghee for lard for example. Having grown up in Appalachia, I sort of hope that this particular set of flavors and comfort cooking gets its own cookbook. I didn’t really see that set of references play out in this book, and there are very few elevated books on Appalachian cooking (the one that comes to mind is the James Beard-award winning cookbook Victuals). And those that do exist tend to hew fairly close to traditional recipes, which are under-documented. There is space here for Sharma’s unique voice.

I have the feeling that this cookbook may end up flying below the radar a bit because it is so unique, and I hope that this spurs other people on to give it a try. This would be an excellent addition to the library of any cook that has a well-stocked spice cabinet, and who would like to add some sophisticated small plates, salads, and seafood to their repertoire (other proteins and vegetables and sweets are featured but I think those chapters are particularly strong.)

Disclaimer: I received an advanced reviewers copy to read for free, although took my sweet time in absorbing this complex cookbook. ( )