Our Christmas Top Picks: Food, Drink and Cookery Books

Our Christmas Top Picks: Food, Drink and Cookery Books

5 Ingredients

Jamie Oliver’s 5 Ingredients is his most straightforward book yet. Using five ingredients, cleverly combined, you’ll conjure up THE most exciting food. Jamie’s new cookbook takes the stress out of mealtimes and will inspire cooks and non-cooks alike with beautiful, crazily simple ideas .

At My Table

Nigella Lawson is a champion of the home cook and her new book celebrates the food she loves to cook for friends and family. The recipes are warming, comforting, and inspirational, from new riffs on classic dishes to adventures in a host of new dishes and ingredients.

Rick Stein: The Road to Mexico

Rick Stein brings his unrivalled enthusiasm and trusted expertise to the fresh, flavourful food of Mexico and California. No one better captures the food essence of a country and brings the best recipes into our kitchens like Rick.

Mary Berry’s Complete Cookbook

Packed with over 650 recipes, this is the biggest ever cookbook from Britain’s best-loved cookery writer that no kitchen should be without. This updated edition of Mary’s million-selling cookbook is the only Mary Berry book that you need.

The Hairy Bikers’ Mediterranean Adventure

The Hairy Bikers are on their bikes again, searching out the very best recipes from around the world. This time, they’re discovering the most delicious food from our favourite Mediterranean countries.

The Christmas Chronicles

From the BBC1 presenter and bestselling author of Eat, The Kitchen Diaries and Toast comes a new book featuring everything you need for the winter solstice. The Christmas Chronicles is the story of Nigel Slater’s love for winter.

Gino’s Italian Costal Escape

Everyone’s favourite Italian chef takes us on a journey of discovery, as he sails along the stunning coast of Italy to explore delicious, local food by the sea. This book is a collection of recipes that will delight all lovers of Italian food and give us a true taste of the beauty of the Italian coast that lies along the way.

A Baker’s Life

A Baker’s Life contains 100 of Paul Hollywood’s very best baking recipes, which have been finessed over the length of his thirty-year career. Each chapter is filled with bakes that represent a different decade.

Sweet

In his stunning new baking and desserts cookbook Yotam Ottolenghi and his long-time collaborator Helen Goh bring the Ottolenghi hallmarks of fresh, evocative ingredients, exotic spices and complex flavourings.

Cooking for Family and Friends

Bestselling author Joe Wicks, aka The Body Coach, presents this gorgeous full-colour book featuring more than 100 delicious and nutritious recipes that are perfect for sharing with the special people in your life.

River Cottage: Much More Veg

Hugh’s River Cottage Veg Every Day! became the UK’s best-selling vegetable cookbook, persuading us through sheer temptation to make vegetables the mainstay of our daily cooking. In this much-anticipated follow-up, Hugh delivers more irresistible recipes, and this time, takes things one step further.

Made at Home

From Tuscan tomato and bread soup to monkfish stew, simple spaghettis or lemon and pistachio polenta cake, Made at Home is a colourful collection of the food that Giorgio Locatelli loves to prepare for family and friends.

Stir Crazy

In Stir Crazy, Ching explains the techniques behind making a good stir fry, with tips on controlling the heat, choosing the right oils and the right order in which to add your ingredients, focusing on simple preparation to entice even those with little or no cooking skills to try something new.

New Classics

Following on from his Sunday Times bestseller Marcus at Home, Marcus Wareing delivers a must-have new classic for your shelves. Marcus is one of the most respected and acclaimed chefs and restaurateurs in Britain.

Kirstie’s Real Kitchen

In Kirstie’s Real Kitchen she brings together her favourite recipes – the ones she relies on to feed her family, and whoever else happens to be around. Packed with delicious recipes and stories from family life, the book gives a unique glimpse into the kitchen of the Queen of home-making, Kirstie Allsopp.

Masterchef Kitchen Bible

From cooking know-how such as how to make fresh chicken stock, to dinner party recipes including roast lamb and panna cotta, MasterChef Kitchen Bible covers everything you need to know to cook like a champion.

Les Abats

With this book, the two-star Michelin chef hopes to change the way we think about offal and demonstrate that, with a little time and effort, it can be used to produce enticing and delicious food to impress friends and feed families.

Nadiya’s British Food Adventure

Now with her own prime-time BBC2 cookery series, Britain’s favourite Bake Off winner presents her latest cookbook, featuring mouth-wateringly delicious recipes from the programme.

Fast & Fresh £1 Meals

In Miguel Barclay’s second book, the original One Pound Chef focuses on fresh and light food, all for GBP1 per person. Here are warm, delicious salads, light soups, nutritious stir-fries and lots of vegetarian meals.

Tom Kitchin’s Meat and Game

Tom Kitchin’s Meat & Game showcases the brilliant talents of one of the UK and Scotland’s favourite chefs. Tom’s passion for game, and his ability to transform that passion into irresistible ways to enjoy it at home, is fully celebrated within the covers of this beautiful book.

East by West

For anyone with a passion for eating well, feeling great and having dessert at lunchtime! East by West is a cookbook that champions the ancient Ayurvedic philosophy of eating to nourish, sustain and repair.

Jolly Good Food

Have you ever dreamed of having picnics with the Famous Five, midnight feasts with the Malory Towers girls or party teas with the Folk of the Faraway Tree? With this cookbook, inspired by Enid Blyton’s stories, you can!

The Big Family Cooking Showdown

Get your family cooking and eating together with 120 delicious and inspiring recipes from The Big Family Cooking Showdown. The Big Family Cooking Showdown is the ultimate recipe book from anyone who wants to bring their family together around the kitchen table.

Truly Scrumptious Baby

Weaning my little ones was a joyous, messy and occasionally testing experience! This book aims to help you through the next development phase: introducing your baby to the colourful, flavourful, wonderful world of food.

The Clever Gut Diet

In this groundbreaking book, Dr Mosley takes us on a revelatory journey through the gut, showing how junk food and overuse of antibiotics have wiped out many “good” gut bacteria, leading to a modern plague of allergies, food intolerances and obesity.

James Martin’s French Adventure

James Martin’s French Adventure showcases the superstar chef’s handpicked favourite recipes from the series and sees him journey the length and breadth of the country, sampling the very best food France has to offer.

Deliciously Ella with Friends

The much-anticipated new cookbook from Deliciously Ella, the inspirational bestselling food writer who has taken the cookery world by storm.In the follow-up to her amazing chart-topper Deliciously Ella Every Day, Ella makes it easy to prepare delicious food for you, your friends and family.

Nadiya’s Bake Me a Festive Story

Join Great British Bake Off sensation Nadiya Hussain for scrumptious stories and delicious bakes that the family can enjoy together at Christmas.Christmas is a time when families come together.

Crave

Crave is the second book from Sunday Times bestselling author and Great British Bake Off contestant, Martha Collison. Using brilliant food science and delicious flavour combinations, she provides go-to recipes incorporating 8 of those things we so often hanker for.

IPA: A legend in our time

This is a long-awaited book from Roger Protz, a highly respected authority on beer, on the rebirth of IPA or India Pale Ale – one of the most popular styles in today’s craft beer revolution.

Oz Clarke’s World of Wine

Oz Clarke is recognized the world over as one of the leading experts on wine and this new book, Oz Clarke’s World of Wine, is an entertaining yet authoritative guide to the world of wine that has grown out of all recognition in the last 20 years.

Cheese

Michel Roux guides us through classic recipes and techniques and inspires with a multitude of inventive ways to make the most of fantastic international and easy-to-find cheese varieties in cooking.

Tom Kerridge’s Dopamine Diet

If you’re struggling with your weight and need to shift unhealthy pounds, this new approach makes it easy, and is guaranteed to make you feel happier in the process.

Catalonia

In Catalonia, Jose Pizarro travels from the impressive Gaudi architecture in buzzy Barcelona, to the Roman and Greek ruins in Girona and secluded beaches in Costa Brava to create some of the best-loved dishes from the Catalonian region at home.

I Quit Sugar

A sugar-free cookbook for those still dreaming of a world filled with chocolate. Sarah Wilson shares how to make delicious treats for any occasion, from special breakfasts to show-stopping sugar-free cakes and bakes.

Marcus at Home

Marcus at Home will cover delicious meals all week long, from chapters on Midweek and Weekend to Entertaining and Baking. Focusing on great flavours and inspirational touches, these are recipes that will become time-honoured favourites in your home.

The Little Library Cookbook

Paddington Bear’s marmalade, a Neopolitan pizza with Elena Ferrante, afternoon tea at Manderley… Here are 100 delicious recipes inspired by cookery writer Kate Young’s well-stocked bookshelves.

Classic Food of Northern Italy

Classic Food of Northern Italy has become a well-thumbed bible on the shelf of every discerning cook. In this revised and updated edition, Anna Del Conte celebrates the cooking of northern Italy – both rustic and sophisticated, ancient and modern.

Two Kitchens

From the award-winning weekly Guardian Cook columnist and winner of the Andre Simon and Guild of Food Writers’ Awards comes an Italian food book of sumptuous recipes, flavours and stories from Rachel Roddy’s two kitchens in Sicily and Rome.

Whisky

In this sumptuous coffee-table guide from the world’s bestselling whisky writer, Michael Jackson reveals the secrets of the aromas and flavours found in whisky, the stories behind great distilleries around the world, and offers his expert tasting notes for their must-try whiskies.

The Modern Cook’s Year

An essential addition to every cook’s bookshelf, The Modern Cook’s Year will show you how to make the most of seasonal produce, using simple, hugely inventive flavours and ingredients.

Claridge’s: The Cookbook

Claridge’s: The Cookbook celebrates that heritage in style, with a collection of over 100 of the best-loved dishes and drinks from The Foyer and Reading Room, the Bar and The Fumoir.

Japan Easy

Many people are intimidated at the idea of cooking Japanese food at home. But in JapanEasy, Tim Anderson reveals that many Japanese recipes require no specialist ingredients at all, and can in fact be whipped up with products found at your local supermarket.

Lagom

Lagom: n. just the right amount, balanced, harmonious. This beautiful, fresh cookbook offers genuine insight into how Swedes eat and cook – with recipes that fit around the seasons, occasions, times of day, and appetite.

The Science of Cooking

In The Science of Cooking, fundamental culinary concepts sit side-by-side with practical advice and step-by-step techniques, bringing food science out of the lab and into your kitchen. Get the answers to your cookery questions with intriguing chapters covering all major food types.

Comfort

With the concept of hygge emphasising the importance of enjoying the sensual, warming things in life, cosy cooking has taken on a new life. John’s collection of enticing recipes will have you cooking up a comforting feast in the kitchen.

The Easy Fasting 5:2 Diet Cookbook

The intermittent fasting diet, or alternate day fasting, is transforming lives. It is based on the principle that reducing your daily intake to under 500 calories for selected days a week is a more natural way to eat, as well as a highly effective way of reducing weight rapidly

Cook. Eat. Love.

When Fearne’s not making us laugh onscreen or keeping us company on the radio, you’ll find her in the kitchen cooking up a storm. Easy, healthy recipes that are fun to make and delicious to eat – these are the recipes Fearne loves and has become famous for. 

Comfort

This year the Sunday Times columnist will be bringing out her first cookbook – all about home comforts. These are the recipes Candice learned to bake from her nan and mum, recipes close to her heart, that should be served up as a big generous slice – and preferably on a vintage plate if you have one.

Nosh for Students

This is the 4th edition of “Nosh for Students”, a book originally inspired by the author’s son, Ben, who left for university with no cooking skills. Toasted sandwiches and Mars bars were his staple diet, but these didn’t serve him too well!

Freakshakes

The ultimate dessert for milkshakes-lovers, cake-lovers and dessert-lovers. Over the top, mega and indulgent are the best words to describe this new dessert taking the UK by storm.

Basics to Brilliance

Australia’s bestselling cookbook author returns with a stunning new book, Basics to Brilliance – and a TV series tie in. Australia’s most trusted and best-selling cookbook author, Donna Hay, wants to take you from basics to brilliance.

Mary Berry’s Family Sunday Lunches

For Mary, Sunday lunches are all about getting together with family and friends. With people coming round there’s an excuse to push the boat out and so there’ll be a starter and pudding! This great book shows you Mary’s foolproof recipes.

Super Food Family Classics

Freshen up your family favourites and expand your recipe repertoire to make your weekly menu something to shout about Sneak in extra veg with Squash Mac ‘N’ Cheese and enjoy a no-arguments family dinner with Chicken Fajitas, Smoky Dressed Aubergines & Peppers.

Tom Kerridge’s Proper Pub Food

With an exclusive new cover for WH Smith customers, Tom Kerridge’s Proper Pub Food features over 130 recipes to help you create your favourite pub classics at home. Simple and fuss-free, these delicious recipes will have friends and family coming back again and again.

The Hairy Bikers’ Asian Adventure

As seen in the BBC Series The Hairy Bikers’ Asian Adventure this book follows their journey through Asia to discover the secrets of some of the world’s most inspiring cuisines. The boys travelled to Hong Kong, Japan, Thailand and Korea.

Mary Berry: Foolproof Cooking

In this fantastic book, the nation’s best-loved home cook will teach you to cook with confidence, with over 120 delicious recipes. This book features all the recipes from the show.

Great British Soups

A celebration of comforting, tasty soup recipes from every corner of the United Kingdom, for soup-lovers everywhere. Great British Soups is full of ideas for using local ingredients and regional flavours to create hearty, healthy soups.

Great British Bake Off – Bake it Better: Pies, Tarts and Puddings

Exclusive to WHSmith! A masterclass in baking, here is your essential guide to making the best pies, tarts, puddings and desserts.

The Hairy Bikers’ Big Book of Baking

The Hairy Bikers, travel the length and breadth of Europe to discover the best baking recipes from the Continent. From Norway to Southern Spain, the boys eat their way across ten countries, making friends and swapping recipes along the way.

Check out more of our Christmas Top Picks here