These restaurants know how to transport. Some bring the flavors of far-flung locales like the Caribbean and Indonesia; others welcome with homey dishes in nourishing settings. Here’s where to eat this winter.

Amba, Cleveland

A meal at Amba is a “feast for the senses, with low lighting, a lively soundtrack, and a menu built for sharing,” said Eater Chicago. The menu leans heavily on North Indian dishes, including local paneer with curry leaves and mustard seeds. But there’s wandering, too, as evidenced by Turkish fried eggs, wok-fried green beans with gai choy, and popcorn chicken with Thai basil.

Coquine, Portland, Oregon

“Coquine is the perfect little restaurant, unfailingly, 10 years running,” said Karen Brooks at Portland Monthly. The restaurant, with miraculous food from chef-owner Katy Millard, is somehow both precise and nonchalant. You could go all out with a five-course tasting menu, dine à la carte or pop next door to Katy Jane’s for a few rounds of oysters. Choosing your own adventure has never been more delicious.

Fallow Kin, Cambridge, Massachusetts

This brand-new restaurant has strong connections to both local farms and the community, showcasing a zero-waste menu section and donating a portion of its food to neighborhood food insecurity programs. Vegetables, such as parsnips with pickled pear and miso, as well as potatoes with bonito-flavored mayonnaise and trout roe, are the centerpiece of the menu at Fallow Kin but not its sole offering.

Kabawa, New York City

The Caribbean gets short shrift in fine-dining restaurants across the U.S. That has been shifting over the last few years, and Kabawa is a luminous addition to the sea change. Chef Paul Carmichael is at the helm, and he island-hops for inspiration, snatching influences from countries including Barbados, Jamaica and Trinidad for Kabawa’s prix-fixe menu.

Duck sausage is “jerked” with Jamaican spicings. A fillet of black bass is sauced with a Trinidad-evoking curry. In keeping with the Caribbean spirit, a meal at Kabawa can be a rambunctious good time. You need only clue the staff into your readiness to have a whole lot of fun.

Lem’s, Chicago

“Once you have tried Lem’s, you can’t help but develop a particular craving for it whenever you want barbecue,” said Chicago magazine. “Because nowhere else in town does it quite as well.” The city’s oldest Black-owned barbecue business, Lem’s specializes in rib tips and hot links. Who said you need to be in the South to eat good ’cue?

Mabel Gray, Detroit

Long live the longstanding! Restaurant culture, by its nature, is obsessed with newness. Mabel Gray celebrated 10 years in September of this year, and the restaurant is a “look into the creative minds of people who have seen the world,” said Danny Palumbo at Hour Detroit. The menu changes constantly; you can experience it a la carte or as part of a $92 tasting menu. Recent dishes include fluke with whole-grain-mustard beurre blanc, dirty rice arancini, and wilted spinach with smoky whipped tofu. Mabel Gray is always evolving, forever sublime.

Rice and Sambal, Philadelphia

Put yourself in the kitchen’s hands at Rice and Sambal, and you will experience the wide-ranging flavors of great Indonesian cooking. Come for brunch on Sundays to have an omelet with shallot, tomato and sweet soy sauce, or the coconut jam-slicked srikaya toast topped with, yes, chocolate sprinkles. For dinner, the menu is set, at either five courses on Thursdays and Fridays or the blowout Liwetan feast served in a communal bamboo basket only on Saturdays.

Zao Bakery and Cafe, St. Paul, Minnesota

When the weather is outstandingly sharp, you want a bowl of ripping-hot soup. Or you want a fluffy pastry. Or, you simply want it all. Zao Bakery and Cafe is “built for everyday moments and everyday meals,” said Justine Jones at Minneapolis-St. Paul Magazine, a place to “slip in weekly for a stomach and soul-warming lunch, a sweet pastry pick-me-up or a weeknight dinner.” For that bowl-connected need, it might be congee with ginger chicken or beef noodle soup. And the pastry selections, including taro twists and matcha custard buns, are near endless.

Good bars should impress. The best ones do it without batting an eyelash. Some of these bars have a laser focus on one style of drink; others are just welcoming locales with solid cocktails. Any of them will serve you well.

Daisy, Sherman Oaks, California

Almost any cocktail these days that has tequila, sweetener and lime juice dubs itself a margarita. Daisy, located just north of Los Angeles, aims to reclaim the classic drink’s soul. The bar’s beverage director, Max Reis, “treats the margarita as both template and playground,” said Punch, a drink magazine. So the standard iterations are sublime. But there is “ample room for customization,” too. Choose tequila or mezcal as the base. Make it regular or picante, up or on the rocks. You get the idea. Discipline and free will are good bedfellows.

Gilly’s House of Cocktails, San Diego

“One thing I’m really proud of is,” when Gilly’s House of Cocktails is packed, “no one is on their phone. You see strangers interacting with each other,” said Erick Castro, one of Gilly’s owners, to Imbibe magazine. “That’s something that’s missing right now in American society. We need to feel like we belong somewhere.” Gilly’s has been around since the 1960s. Castro and his crew bought it a few years ago. It’s now employee-owned, the cocktails are top-notch, but the laidback, community-minded vibe remains.

Loma, Providence, Rhode Island

Repeat after us: Latin American drinking is not a monolith. Loma, whose owners’ lineages trace to Puerto Rico and Guatemala, succeeds in proving the point — in the glass. You may find a singular rum from Michoacán, Mexico, used in a caipirinha or a Mexican mezcal stirred as the base of a martini. The food menu also flits from arroz y gandules (Puerto Rican rice and beans) to a local cheese plate. The hospitality welcomes, just as you hope it would.

Madeira Park, Atlanta

The newish wine bar from the crew behind beloved local institution Miller Union balances “historical appreciation and casual magnificence,” said Mike Jordan at Bon Appétit. The glass wine list centers on great styles and producers, like Domaine Fanny Sabre white Burgundy, tempranillo from Spain’s López de Heredia Rioja and, natch, a collection of vintage madeiras. Satterfield’s food menu at Madeira Park is, yes, grape-friendly: butter and anchovy tartine, a chicory salad with blue cheese and candied pecans, and steak au poivre with rutabaga.

None of the Above, St Louis

In agile hands, a speakeasy concept never grows tiresome. None of the Above sits below the events space City Foundry, hidden away as so many speakeasies are. But bar manager Fionna Gemzon has her sights looking up, up and away. There’s calamansi and red miso alongside black sesame-infused rye in the In the Mood for Love Cocktail. Gemzon’s “Filipino heritage inspires her tendency to lean on high-acid and sweet-sour flavors behind the bar,” said Imbibe magazine when selecting her as an Imbibe 75 Person to Watch.

Pretty Neat, Denver

No muss, no fuss, just friendly vibes and great cocktails. Pretty Neat stands by its name and mission. “It’s just a place to have good drinks and be comfortable,” said co-owner Xanthus Be Dell of his bar to Westword. The drinks move from deep classics, like the Amaretto Sour, to modern ones, including the Penicillin and Espresso Martini. And a bunch of Pretty Neat’s own inventions, such as Be Dell’s The Absinthe of the Fall, with vanilla-kissed rum, lime, pineapple, coconut puree and an absinthe rinse.

Providencia, Washington, D.C.

This wee bar in the nation’s capital is a group endeavor from bartenders Pedro Tobar and Danny Gonzalez with food from Erik Bruner-Yang and Paola Velez. Providencia is a “reflection of the quartet’s effort to seamlessly honor and remix shared and disparate influences,” said Elazar Sontag at Bon Appétit. It is, unabashedly, an immigrant–forward establishment.

So the Sabanetas cocktail with rum, blackberry and ginger is an explicit homage to Gonzalez’s mom’s blackberry agua fresca in Sabanetas, El Salvador. That same personal history runs across the rest of the menu. No hiding; only celebrating.

Winter requires the very most from your home cooking. Whether hosting a holiday hoo-ha or recovering from the gluttony of said gatherings, you are bound to eat a pendulum-swinging variety of dishes over the coming months. These recipes aim to solve your needs, from December through February.

Creamy Giardiniera Dip

Dips are the king, queen and court jester of any holiday gathering. They’re somehow both regal and cheeky crowd-pleasers. For this lush giardiniera dip, mix together sour cream, cream cheese, Parmesan and a bunch of chopped giardiniera, that jarred, zippy Italian pickle of cauliflower, celery and peppers. Bust out the chips, and keep the Champagne flowing.

Dutch Baby

There may be no more simple showstopper of a brunch dish than a proper Dutch baby. The way it puffs and burnishes as it bakes in the skillet. The way you garnish it as you like, then serve the entire thing in the same skillet you cooked it in. This recipe gilds the finished Dutch baby with powdered sugar and lemon — along with optional jam and walnuts. Choose your preferred fillip.

Hoppin’ John with Turnips and Turnip Greens

We all could use a little luck each New Year’s Day — even more so after 2025. Black-eyed peas and rice, aka hoppin’ John, is a New Year’s staple in some parts of the American South. Todd Richards’ version stars the obligatory ham hock but is loaded with so much flavor that the hock can be omitted without the dish missing a flavor beat.

Kimchi and Ketchup Fried Rice

Once you start being accustomed to cooking fried rice, there is a roteness to the move. You will generally reach for the same aromatics and additions, whether those be ginger and egg, or ham and green onions. It is then a treat to quiver the familiar, and this fried rice remains simple to execute. But the addition of both ketchup and kimchi takes the dish in a new direction. Unless, of course, you were always adding those all along.

Perfect Poached Eggs

So simple as to barely be a recipe, Mei Lin’s game-changing technique for poached eggs guarantees intact whites and runny yolks. You simply combine two parts water to one part vinegar. Then, about 30 minutes before you’re going to serve your eggs, crack however many eggs you are going to cook into the water-vinegar bath. The outside of the eggs essentially cure, tightening the whites. When you poach the eggs, the whites don’t spread into wandering filaments. Brunch, you’re welcome.

Totchos (Tater Tot Nachos)

Nachos are superb; totchos are just a whole other delight unto themselves. A simple made-from-scratch cheese sauce drapes the tots. Underneath and on top is a charred-tomato salsa, bits of chorizo and lots of green and red onion. Make it for a party or for a comforting night in.

Vegan Chili

During winter, there is reassurance in knowing there is a big pot of fortification waiting in the fridge whenever a need strikes. Chili is forever a correct answer, all the more when it is a meat-free variation loaded with kidney beans, the sweet musk of cumin and the hearty addition of bulgur.

This season’s collection of winter cocktails is hot, hot, hot! Whether you are eyeing a soothing nonalcoholic gut-filler or a sharp toddy variation with Irish whiskey and apple syrup, these warm drinks are the bouncy blanket for the months ahead.

Barraquito

The barraquito is a visual stunner, with layers of condensed milk, yellow Licor 43, frothed milk and espresso assembling into an striated, earthtoned sequence. The drink from Spain’s Canary Islands is a “midmorning pick-me-up, a post-meal ritual and an intergenerational tradition,” said the beverage publication Punch.

Francophile

Spices do wonders for wine during the coldest months. The Francophile’s way with mulled wine includes cinnamon simple syrup for sweetening and Calvados, the apple brandy, for a stout complement. An apple slice and cinnamon stick as garnishes remind you exactly what’s afoot in this gladdening cocktail.

Hot Tiger’s Milk

Like some hybrid of a hot buttered rum and a piña colada, Hot Tiger’s Milk is rich and coconutty. It’s an old recipe, dating back to the 1800s. You wouldn’t want more than one, what with its rich coconut cream base and addition of evaporated milk when you build the drink in your mug. But you are going to want to finish each drop of the one you do drink.

Moneygun Hot Toddy

Whiskey, step away from the toddy. Rum and cognac are stepping in for today’s performance. In the Moneygun Hot Toddy, named after the Chicago bar, a touch of fresh ginger, Darjeeling tea, cloves, lemon juice and honey are the supporting players that give this lively toddy a strong, welcoming point of view.

Peanut Atole

Atole is a hot, agreeable Mexican drink, nonalcoholic by nature. The base is nearly always made with corn. This variation employs that prototypical corn base but adds a slap of natural peanut butter for a welcome touch of richness. If Goldilocks really knew what was up, this would be her porridge of choice.

Queen of Cups

Hazelnut brown butter, spiced apple syrup, Irish whiskey: Thirsty yet? Not the kind of cocktail that one can throw together during a somnambulic moment, The Queen of Cups requires advance thinking to make the brown butter and apple syrup. Once those elements are prepared, though, you simply assemble. At that point, you can indeed make it in your sleep.

Verte Chaud

Hot chocolate is spiked with green Chartreuse in the simple, thrilling Verte Chaud. Imagine packing a thermos with this effortless cocktail. Anyone you share it with will thank you, profusely. Or just keep it all for yourself. You deserve it.

When one thinks of the Scottish capital, images of winding lanes, towering spires and snow-capped hills might come to mind. But after a wander round Edinburgh Castle, with its sweeping views and 900 years of history, you might find that you have become hungry – and this is where the real fun begins.

Edinburgh’s food scene is creative and dynamic, so don’t be shy, get stuck in and discover why it has become one to watch. Here’s some of the best the city has to offer.

Memorable fine dining

The Witchery

With its location right next to the castle, you might be afraid that this is a tourist trap – but don’t be. The building dates back to the 16th century, but the restaurant is from 1979, and feels like it has been around forever. The Medieval dining room glows in the dimmed light, as you enjoy a menu that is packed with favourites. This is classic cooking, from lobster bisque, to beef tartare, to some of the best haggis on the east coast. Food here is unctuous and indulgent – you will leave feeling spoiled.

thewitchery.com

Heron

Get out of the centre and head to the foodie hotspot of Leith to discover Heron. The brainchild of chef Sam Yorke, it was awarded its first Michelin star in 2023, and it has maintained this level of quality since. With a focus on local ingredients that are used with flair and creativity, it has been praised for its relaxed atmosphere and attention to detail. Don’t miss the sika deer with lingonberry and fig leaf, or the monkfish with black truffle. Wine pairings are perfectly matched, and the cocktail menu is innovative. This is a meal you won’t forget.

heron.scot

The Little Chartroom

Also in Leith, you will find a chic dining room that flickers in candlelight. Chef Roberta Hall-McCarron’s The Little Chartroom is a breath of fresh air, with truly excellent ingredients that showcase the best of Scotland’s larder. Treacle-cured chalk stream trout, Teasses Estate mallard, and locally caught plaice are among the delights you will be treated to on an invigorating menu that changes regularly. The service is relaxed, but oozes confidence.

thelittlechartroom.com

Gastropub favourites and stand-out seafood

The Captain Darling

A newcomer in a city that’s almost a millennium old, this gastropub is taking leafy Stockbridge by storm. This is a neighbourhood spot at heart, although the cuisine is a tad more elevated than that suggests. Chef Scott Smith has designed a menu of flavourful, seasonal dishes, including comforting pies, velvety cauliflower cheese, and crispy chicken schnitzel. It serves a cracker of a Sunday roast too.

thecaptaindarling.com

Tipo

Sometimes a big bowl of pasta is just the only thing that will do, so when that happens Tipo is the spot to run to. This is just one of chef Stuart Ralston’s restaurants, but it stands on its own two feet as a spot not to be missed. The creamy cacio e pepe with truffle will warm you up on a cold Scottish night, while the artichoke with endive and hazelnut side is a must.

tipoedinburgh.co.uk

Barry Fish

Another Leith establishment, the coastal town’s long fishing heritage inspired chef Barry Bryson to open a new seafood joint in 2025. And after earning a Michelin Guide recommendation just eight months after opening, its reputation is growing and growing. The menu is bright and exciting, with Mull cheddar beignets, halibut with mussels, and lobster with smoked fish agnolotti. Perfect for a sunny day by the water.

barryfish.co.uk

Scotch whiskies and small plates

Nishiki

The oft-overlooked area of Haymarket is worth heading to for some of the most authentic Japanese food in the city. Designed like a Tokyo izakaya, the vibe is casual, with an emphasis on fresh, fast flavours. Small plates include yakitori chicken, yakiniku beef, prawn katsu with cheese and avocado, and an impressive selection of sashimi. Don’t forget to sample the sake menu to feel like you really are on the other side of the world.

nishikiedinburgh.co.uk

Toscano

This Italian sandwich bar is a little outside the centre, but the picturesque stroll to leafy Bruntsfield district is worth it. It specialises in Tuscan schiacciata, a type of flatbread stuffed with authentic ingredients like deli meats and cheeses. The Il Toscano features prosciutto crudo, crema di parmigiano, rocket and balsamic glaze, and is a feast for the senses. This will keep you going all day.

toscanoedinburgh.com

Scotch Whisky Bar

You simply have to have some whisky while you’re here. Scotch, in the historic Balmoral Hotel, is one of the top places to explore our national tipple, and staff here make it their mission to find one that you will love. With an enormous selection behind the bar, they know a thing or two about the water of life, as it is known. Sláinte.

roccofortehotels.com/hotels-and-resorts/the-balmoral-hotel/dining/scotch/

Ardfern

Wine bars are having a moment, and Ardfern is certainly one of the best. This cafe, bar and bottle shop has a large selection to enjoy by the glass, as well as some really unusual wines by the bottle, that you can take home or have in store. Pair your choice with one of its bar snacks, such as sunflower seed hummus with chicory or oysters and chilli.

ardfern.uk

Vivien

It takes a second to adjust to the dark in this basement bar, but once you do you know you’re in for a treat. Sit in a cosy corner with friends, or at the bar where you can watch the team expertly prepare one of their unique concoctions. From the Essence de la nuit with calvados and lavender syrup, to the Poire au poivre, with Islay cask whisky and pink peppercorn.

vivienedinburgh.co.uk

Of course, no visit to the capital would be complete without exploring some of the city’s best pubs. The Guildford Arms, the Jolly Judge, the Blue Blazer, the Halfway House and the Sheep Heid Inn are all excellent examples of traditional watering holes.

Where to stay

W Edinburgh

Launched in 2023, the W Edinburgh has made its name as one of the most exciting properties in the city. It is situated in the St James’ Quarter in a purpose-built bronze, ribbon-shaped building, perfectly located for all the main sights. Its 244 rooms are designed with the W’s contemporary and disruptive style in mind, and are decorated in jewel tones, with stonework inspired by the Edinburgh landscape, and skyline-sweeping views. After a long day of sightseeing, you might also want to enjoy the Away Spa, with its private hot tub, experience shower and sauna space made for luxuriating in. Skilled therapists use products from Ishga, a Scottish brand that harnesses the power of Hebridean seaweed, for massages that refresh and revitalise.

Not to be missed is the W Deck rooftop bar, which has a 360-degree vantage point – surely the best hotel view in the city. The W Lounge on the floor below serves cocktails that you can enjoy beside floor-to-ceiling windows. This is also where you will find Scotland’s first branch of Sushisamba, the first branch in Scotland, where you can enjoy umami-rich dishes including lobster ceviche, sea bass with pickled chilli, and A5 wagyu beef on a hot stone.

Jaymi was a guest of the restaurants featured and the W Edinburgh

Even if you haven’t got a open fire to roast them on, chestnuts are so versatile, they can add flavour all manner of dishes, savoury or sweet. And, at this time of year, “I urge you to seek them out”, said Felicity Cloake in The Guardian.

The Romans had “something of a penchant for sweet chestnut trees, spreading them across Europe” so they could use the “fast-growing timber” as a raw material in their empire’s expansion, said BBC Future. Many of the trees alive today “will be descendants” from those that “ancient Roman legionnaires and foresters brought with them” thousands of years ago. By the Middle Ages, chestnuts had become a “staple food in many parts of Europe”, ground down to make flour or boiled with sugar to make a purée.

Chestnuts “might not be the first treat you think of” during the Christmas season, but “they’re still deeply rooted in global festivities”, said Express Online. Jamie Oliver recommends preheating your oven to 200C, slicing a cross on top of the shells with a sharp knife, and putting them “cross-side up” on a tray in the oven for 25 to 30 mins. Once they are cooked, the tops will split open and, after they have cooled, the shells can be peeled away, leaving the roasted nut ready for eating.

Though delicious in their own right, chestnuts can also be the basis of the perfect vegan alternative to a traditional Christmas dinner. A buttery mushroom, chestnut and thyme wellington will knock your guests’ socks off, vegan cook and food writer Katy Beskow told Stylist. Easy to prepare, with only a handful of ingredients, it is a “failsafe for the big day”.

Chestnuts are equally good in sweet dishes. Nigella Lawson’s chestnutty twist on a classic pavlova is a real delight, said Food & Wine. “Crisp” meringue with a “soft, marshmallowy interior” is topped with a sweetened chestnut purée and then “swathes of softly whipped cream and splinters of bitter chocolate”. It's a “fabulously festive” treat.

Table for one, please

More of us are dining out solo, and enjoying it, apparently. Recent surveys show that reservations for one have risen dramatically, and 49% of Gen Zers say they dine out alone at least once a week. While lunch is the most common meal to eat alone, solo suppers have become a self-care ritual for some diners able to find places where they don’t feel judged by observers or resented by staff who might worry about losing revenue to a twotop left half empty. “As a longtime waiter, I can guarantee that your server does not care at all,” said Darron Cardosa in Food & Wine. “Embrace your solitude and enjoy a meal with just yourself.”

Make mine with tallow

The “Make America Healthy Again” movement is making a difference in the nation’s food aisles. While many of their claims lack scientific backing, social media influencers such as the MAHA Girls and podcasts like Culture Apothecary are echoing the talking points of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.: beef tallow over seed oils, cane sugar over corn syrup, nix to ultra-processed foods and artificial food dyes. Nestlé, Starbucks, and other major companies have responded by tweaking ingredients, while Walmart has cleared space in its grocery aisles for moringa, chia seeds, and lion’s mane mushrooms. The push may not last, but health advocates are hopeful. “Food is the only bipartisan issue we have,” food and wellness consultant Maha Tahiri told The New York Times. “This is really a moment if we play it well.”

Protein everywhere

Protein everywhere “There’s no escaping the sense that we’re living in the era of peak protein,” said Emily Heil in The Washington Post. Forget protein bars and shakes. Boosted levels of the macronutrient are now a marketed feature of everything from pasta to potato chips to moon pies. While justly touted as critical to building and retaining muscle mass, protein has become synonymous with healthy for many consumers. Experts note that most of us are getting plenty of protein without having to supplement our intake and should resist doing so by neglecting other key nutrients. “Treating protein as a holy grail of health ignores the fact that your body’s needs are complex and nuanced,” said Caroline Tien in Self. “Your diet should reflect that.”

Got milk again?

Cow’s milk is making a comeback. Reversing a long trend, sales of dairy milk are on the rise and alt-milk sales declining. The protein craze and MAHA’s interest in raw milks have contributed to the rebound, and milk has enjoyed an image makeover. Demonized in the 2010s as inflammatory, unethical, and environmentally harmful, it’s being recognized again for its health benefits and for being purer than processed soy, nut, and oat milks. On TikTok and beyond, young consumers who grew up on plant-based milks are discovering dairy for the first time and, perhaps inspired by Nicole Kidman in Babygirl, treating it as the decadent, sexy choice. “After a decade of restriction and replacement,” said Ashliene McMenamy in Bon Appétit, “milk feels nourishing and subversive.”

The Southeast Asian breakout

It was a banner year for restaurants featuring the cuisines of Southeast Asia, with new footholds in fine dining established for several foodways. Kasama, a Filipino tasting-menu restaurant in Chicago, gained a second Michelin star, while the James Beard Award for Emerging Chef went to Phila Lorn for the Cambodian-American cooking at Philadelphia’s Mawn. Minneapolis became the U.S. capital of Hmong cooking thanks to Vinai and Diane Moua’s Diane’s Place, which earned Food & Wine’s Restaurant of the Year honors. It was joined on other bestrestaurant lists by New York City Vietnamese standouts Bahn Ahn Em and Ha’s Snack Bar and by three Laotian restaurants: Baan Mae in Washington, D.C., Bar Sen in Oklahoma City, and Lao’d Bar in Austin.

Flavor combos gone wild

Food collaborations got seriously weird this year. Cruising the grocery aisles in 2025, consumers could find Pepsi tinged with Peeps Easter candy, Chunky soups infused with Pabst Blue Ribbon, potato chips that tasted like IHOP pancakes, a hot sauce spiked with 5-Hour Energy, and other way-out food collaborations. At times, even nonfood products got in on the action. Krispy Kreme and Crocs gave us doughnut-themed clogs, while Red Clay and the hair-care company TRESemmé put out a hot honey called Hot Gloss. That move evoked a hair oil add-in and for me went too far, said Jaya Saxena in Eater. “Absurdity is fun, but I don’t want to drizzle it on my pizza.”

Matcha mania

The focus of tranquil tea ceremonies in Japan, matcha has become a monster in the U.S. The green tea powder now helps sell lattes, cookies, and even KitKats, and matcha bars draw long lines in cities across the country. The boom has caused matcha shortages in Japan and a profusion of counterfeit powders. Meanwhile, Americans are drowning the tea’s subtle grassy flavors in sweeteners, ignorant of the four principles of the matcha tea ceremony: respect, purity, harmony, and tranquility. “Sure, let’s sip our strawberry matcha lattes,” said Frances Giangiulio in Salon, “but maybe, while we’re sipping, we can remember the farmers who picked the leaves and the monks who first whisked them into something more.”

Babybel, the “small, ready-to-eat industrial cheese wrapped in its signature red wax”, is an unexpected beneficiary of anti-obesity drugs, said Le Monde.

Its French-owned producer Bel is investing €60 million to ramp up production of the cheese in response to a 6% growth in global sales, and a 12% increase in the US.

Healthy snacks are in demand as meals are being “swapped for grazing” as the rise of weight-loss jabs encourages a “change in eating habits”, said The Independent. In the UK more than 1.5 million people are thought to be using weight-loss drugs, which will have repercussions for the way we shop and eat.

‘Open up your palate’

As well as generally reducing appetite, GLP-1 weight-loss drugs like Wegovy and Mounjaro reduce the “reward value” of junk food. This means that “many patients go off” them, Alexander Miras, a professor of endocrinology at Ulster University, told The Guardian.

We’re “hardwired to like things that used to be scarce in evolutionary terms”, like “large amounts of fat and sugar”, said Jason Halford, of the European Association for the Study of Obesity. By reducing those cravings, weight-loss jabs can “open up your palate and allow you to appreciate other tastes”.

Not all those new tastes are particularly sophisticated. A high-protein version of Babybel has found a thriving market in the US among consumers on weight-loss jabs who want savoury, protein-rich snacks rather than sweet ones.

In the UK, Waitrose has reported that 57% of its customers are opting for “snacky foods” over full meals, due to appetite-suppressing obesity jabs and broader “concerns over ultra-processed foods”, said City A.M.

Cold turkey

The surging popularity of weight-loss drugs is already having a slimming effect on restaurant menus, and it’s also impacting on how we shop, particularly as the festive season approaches.

The supermarket sector is “unprepared for the change this Christmas”. More than one in 10 Britons say they will be hosting at least one guest this year who is on anti-obesity medication.

“There is a worry that Christmas retail hasn’t caught up with reality,” said Toby Nicol, chief executive at weight-loss group Chequp. “Millions of people now eat dramatically smaller portions, yet the supermarket aisle still assumes everyone wants a full adult serving.”

However, what retailers lose in junk food sales, they may gain in other sectors. Data suggests that while weight-loss drug patients are spending less on food, they are splashing out more on clothing and hair and skincare products as they “become more interested in their appearance”, according to market research analysts Berenberg.

You want the recipes in a cookbook to work. All the more so in a baking cookbook. This is the obligatory minimum.

A proper cookbook should also swell your imagination and expand your kitchen confidence. Natasha Pickowicz’s “More Than Cake: 100 Recipes Built for Pleasure and Community” succeeds on all counts, supplying both inspiration and a grounding sense of the altruistic ways in which baking can bind.

Baking for good

Pickowicz is a longtime pastry chef turned writer who for years has harnessed her baking prowess and that of her restaurant-world pals to raise money for a variety of charitable organizations through bake sales. She takes the “for pleasure and community” part of the book’s subtitle seriously. “Creating recipes is a loving, community-based act in constant communion with our world,” she writes in the book’s introduction. “Baked goods are part of my commitment to community building.”

And so, for example, Pickowicz devotes an entire chapter to “modern layer cakes” — shareable creations to delight and encourage communing with either your loved ones or the people in your community at large. The chapter is formatted as a choose-your-own-adventure. Select a cake base, say, a black sesame chiffon cake. Then a soak for that base, like maple and vanilla milk. Fill it with, for example, sweet and spicy hazelnuts and frost it with Italian espresso buttercream. There are 21 of these base items, so the permutations are, well, you do the math: near-endless.

Flavor, considered

That wild menagerie of layer cake foundations is simply the door leading to a wonderland under the pastry-kitchen stairs. Pickowicz’s carrot cake is striated with coconut flakes; she tops her pine nut sablé cookies with a smear of funky Taleggio cheese; she transmutes miso soup into a danish; rose water and mezcal are conjoined in a deeply, darkly caramel flan.

Whether you’re baking a toasted vanilla bean pound cake for nibbling across a week yourself or blowing it out for a party with a caramel chocolate chip ice cream bombe, “More Than Cake” offers a solution for endless occasions. “Baking brings me closer to my parents, friends and my neighbors,” Pickowicz writes. “Baking is more than cake.” This book is ready to prove that to you, if you let it.

Panettone is “synonymous with Christmas in Italy”, said Forbes, but over the years, the festive bread-cake has become popular “all over the world”. Whether “elegantly boxed, tinned, or wrapped in paper”, it is the “quintessential” edible gift.

Carluccio’s limoncello panettone

This elegant and dangerously sweet panettone is an ideal treat to enjoy in those festive in-between days. With a gorgeous white chocolate crust adorned with sparkling sugar crystals, the sweet bread wouldn’t go amiss as the centrepiece of a festive dessert table. Slicing into the middle, you’ll find a soft, buttery centre studded with glistening lemon peel for an extra zing of flavour. It is also oozing with a delicious limoncello-flavoured custard, that is yellow and bright. While the Italian liqueur has become a popular flavour in recent years, this is a panettone that still feels refreshingly unique.

carluccios.com, £29.95

DukesHill chocolate panettone

Keen to ditch the traditional dried fruit offering? Look no further than this luxury panettone that makes chocolate the star of the show. While you’ll no doubt recognise the typical Italian recipe with its fluffy centre, the addition of chocolate chips adds a decadent touch to the festive sweet treat, and a velvety chocolate cream runs all the way through. It means the bread is best served warm, allowing the chocolate to melt. Not too sweet, this option carefully balances chocolate and bread for exactly the kind of Christmas indulgence necessary.

dukeshill.co.uk, £19.95

Vergani Dubai chocolate and pistachio panettone

This panettone puts a festive twist on 2025’s runaway flavour trend: Dubai chocolate. What started as a social media craze of chocolate filled with pistachio and filo pastry soon spiralled into a demand so great that it triggered a global pistachio shortage. Vergani’s expertly crafted panettone is an even-textured dough stuffed with a generous helping of velvety chocolate pieces, and smooth, almost buttery, pistachio cream that isn’t overpoweringly sweet. The result is a contemporary dessert leaning into a popular flavour, but without losing the traditional festive feel of a classic panettone. Wrapped in glossy Dubai-inspired packaging, the panettone neatly nods to the moment, but more than delivers on taste first.

valentinadeli.co.uk; £32.95

Fattoria La Vialla organic panettone

Straight from an organic farm in central Italy, this traditional wholewheat panettone is ideal for those who want to get back to the roots of the traditional bread-cake. The quintessential Christmas favourite still shines with festive flavour, featuring fragrant orange peel and bursts of tasty golden sultanas – and there are lots of them. The bread feels silky and rich, given that extra virgin olive oil replaces butter. It also means the panettone is a slightly healthier treat to enjoy in an otherwise gluttonous season. An Italian tradition reimagined for the modern palate, each bite is somehow more delicious than the last.

lavialla.com, £22.70

Seggiano chestnut panettone

Chestnuts roasting on an open fire immediately evoke the feeling of Christmas, so combining this flavour and smell with a traditional festive cake is a recipe for success. This panettone is filled with marrons glacés – candied chestnuts – that melt into the crumb and provide a warm, earthy sweetness. Drenched in acacia honey, the panettone also has a delicate floral taste that lifts the cake. It could perhaps be a tad moister and more visually appealing, but the chestnut flavour is steady and satisfying – a perfectly packaged treat that will have you devouring every fluffy mouthful.

seggiano.com; £20

CORD by Le Cordon Bleu panettone

This panettone is the kind of bake that makes supermarket versions feel like pale imitations. The name speaks for itself, but it’s a treat to find the panettone doesn’t let the reputation of the culinary school down. A burnished, floured crust gives way to a light and fluffy centre, with delicious notes of vanilla and citrus – rich in flavour but not dense. It’s also a reminder of Le Cordon Bleu’s ethos: attention to detail, finesse and respect for the classics. While it might not be as showy as some of its other panettone counterparts, the festive bread is a showstopper, embracing tradition while being elevated into a refined treat.

cordrestaurant.co.uk; £25

With Christmas around the corner, mince pies have returned “in full force” to supermarket shelves, said Holly Morgan in The Mirror. The seasonal staple is part of the festive furniture, as beloved as “carol singers and questionable novelty jumpers”. Brits eat more than 800 million of the delightful mincemeat-stuffed pastries a year, and it isn’t hard to see why.

Mince pies are an excellent “no-fuss” addition to any Christmas gathering, said Emma Henderson in The Independent. Gone are the days where hosts need to stress about “impromptu visitors during the Christmas period”: the mince pie is the “perfect treat to keep in the cupboard”, to be served with a “glass of mulled wine” at the drop of a hat.

Waitrose No1 Brown Butter Mince Pies with Cognac

For the second year in a row, Waitrose scooped “Best Buy”, coming in as the “clear favourite” in the supermarket category, said Rebecca Marcus in Which?. Expect “moreish” brown butter pastry surrounding “fruity” mincemeat, bound together with brandy and festive spice. Though one of the “priciest” around, it’s well “worth splashing out”.

waitrose.com

Iceland Luxury Butter Mince Pies

Look no further for a “masterclass in harmony”, said Stacey Smith in Good Housekeeping. Building on traditional flavours, the “yuzu juice-spiked” mince pies are “densely packed” with fruity, “zesty” filling. “Testers described it as ‘a fantastic, classic mince pie’.”

iceland.co.uk

Marks & Spencer Collection Mince Pies

Whether you’re looking for the “standard” or “posher” versions, the M&S entries “aced it in my tests for their fruity, nutty filling and buttery pastry", said Xanthe Clay in The Telegraph. For those who are sustainability minded, they don’t contain any palm oil, and are made with Wildfarmed regeneratively farmed flour.

marksandspencer.com

Sainsbury's Taste the Difference All Butter Mince Pies

These tasty mince pies are “hard to fault”, said Henderson in The Independent. The pastry has an “excellent creamy, buttery flavour”, while the mincemeat is well-balanced with a “decent tang” of brandy. Brilliant quality, they are a “cut above” other supermarket mince pies.

Sainsburys.co.uk

Beans are “having a moment”, said Andrew Ellson in The Times. “Small, dry and often flavourless”, the humble legume has never been particularly “glamorous” – but its fortunes have changed of late.

Major supermarkets have seen “soaring” demand, with Waitrose’s canned beans sales up 122% year-on-year.

A major “culprit” for the bean renaissance is newcomer to the market, Bold Bean Co, said Charlotte McCaughan-Hawes in House & Garden. The brand’s butter beans are “fat, creamy, wonderful nuggets of joy”: it’s no surprise the company has amassed a dedicated online following.

Beans are certainly making “waves” among foodies, and it’s clear the enthusiasm is “here to stay”. There are so many benefits to integrating beans into your diet: “they’re a healthy source of protein for anyone trying to cut out meat”, low in fat, high in minerals and a “very sustainable” food source.

But “versatility” is what really makes beans stand out. On the one hand, they can be “an excellent foil for fatty meats like hunks of pork or as a purée with lamb”, but they also make a good pasta substitute. You can happily “chop and change” ingredients based on what’s in the fridge – “there is, simply, no right way to cook a bean dish and the fun, for me at least, has been in the process”.

The simplest recipes can pack the biggest punch, and charred tomato beans are as simple as they sound. Easy to fix in a rush, just add stock and pan-softened tomatoes with chilli and garlic to a tin of beans for a “hot, tasty, nourishing bowl of food on the table in 15 minutes”.

The nutritional value doesn’t just help us: growing beans alongside other crops can be brilliant for the environment. Many beans are “nitrogen fixers”, converting nitrogen from the atmosphere into the ground, which ends up making the soil “more fertile for other crops”, food writer Eleanor Maidment told The Guardian.

Beans can quickly become the “bedrock” of your cooking, Jenny Chandler, author of "Super Pulses”, told the publication. “Salads, soups, purées, curries, stews and even puddings” can be heightened by the addition of legumes.

Best of all, they are faff free. There is a common misconception that pulses have to stew for hours: this is simply not the case. Don’t be “put off by the idea that you have to soak dried pulses in advance”, said Maidment. “I am rarely organised enough to do so, but thankfully there’s a huge range of jarred and canned varieties that require no prep and are hugely convenient.”

Starbucks is selling a majority stake in its business in China after it struggled in the East Asian nation.

But as the US chain has struggled, China’s coffee consumption has been “increasing by double-digits annually”, said South China Morning Post, and it now has a 300-billion-yuan (£32bn) coffee industry. So what gives?

Local players

Starbucks opened its first outlet in China nearly 30 years ago. There was “much fanfare”, said CNN, including a “troupe” performing a traditional “golden lion” dance and “eager customers” sampling cappuccinos.

The arrival of the US brand “helped spur the rise of a thriving coffee culture among the burgeoning middle class” in a country that traditionally drank tea, and by 2017, the giant was opening a new outlet every 15 hours in China.

But “dozens” of domestic chains have “exploded onto the scene” in recent years offering coffee at “steep discounts”.

In 2024, Luckin Coffee opened its 20,000th store in China and “doubled its footprint in a single year”, said Campaign. “The message is clear”, the nation’s "coffee game" is being “rewritten by local players”.

Pork drizzle 

Chinese brands are “constantly dropping seasonal specials with local ingredients, herbs, superfoods, the works”, Roolee Lu, food and drink category director at Mintel China, told the outlet. There are “lattes drizzled with pork sauce” or “spiked” with Chinese alcohol, said NBC News.

Yes, tea “remains foundational to Chinese culture”, but some "young, middle-class consumers” are “finding coffee’s caffeine kick” is “more suited to the pressures of a competitive job market and workplace”, with its “high job stress and long hours”. It can also be “attributed to a shift in lifestyle preferences” because “more people have more disposable income”.

So although tea has “long been the drink of choice” for Chinese people, a “coffee culture has boomed”, said the South China Morning Post. Coffee shops in suburban areas are seen as a means of “rural revitalisation” because they “create jobs and drive up the local economy”, helping “offset urban-rural disparities”.

Meanwhile, in cities like Shanghai, a café culture was “really” given a “boost” after Covid, as locals began to “embrace outdoor living, looking for places to meet their friends and family”, said the BBC.

When we think of Puerto Rico a few things come to mind: Bad Bunny, Bacardi rum and, of course, piña colada, which is believed to have originated from the Caribe Hilton in 1954. The islanders are to this day arguing about which particular bartender had that stroke of genius but you can leave that to them and simply embrace boricua, the islanders’ name for themselves that encapsulates their pride in their way of life.

We stayed at Aire de O:live, a beachfront hotel in the Isla Verde district of San Juan, a perfect location for exploring this small island. It has a popular rooftop Asian fusion restaurant and bar overlooking the beach serving breakfast, lunch and dinner. However, the best way to experience boricua is to dive into the local food and drink culture.

A whistle-stop tour of San Juan

First up was a food tour through the ancient capital with Flavors of Old San Juan. We met our guide in a square where the roads were paved with blue bricks that arrived as ballast in Spanish galleons in the 15th century. Pablo, a local university history student, was overflowing with stories of the island – from the original Taínos, Christopher Columbus’ arrival in 1493, to the African slaves and the takeover by the Americans in 1899 after the end of the Spanish-American War.

To get us going we started with coffee at Café Cuatro Sombras, a farm-to-table coffee shop. Puerto Rico became one of the world’s largest coffee producers in the 18th century, exporting vast quantities to Europe. The coffee is excellent and might in part account for the lively nature of the locals.

Buoyed by the coffee and a delicious passionfruit lolly made by A Paleta, a native producer using only local fruits, we walked past Parque de las Palomas, eating alcapurrias – traditional fritters made with mashed plantains – along the way. We ended at Chocobar Cortés for quesito cortés, delicious cheese and chocolate pastries. The fourth generation family-owned bean-to-bar chocolate company is famed for its hot chocolate and is a favourite across the island.

Eat like a local

Our second tour was with Laura Ortiz Villamil – a local historian who founded Sofrito Tours, to showcase the island’s vibrant culture, food and history. After visiting a mangrove restoration project in Loiza and taking a traditional bomba dance class, we visited El Burén de Lula, a family-run food stand that is open every Sunday. Started by 90-year-old matriarch Vilma, six generations of women have helped preserve the recipes. We had crab empanadas, corn arepas and sweet tortillas made from cornmeal with coconut, sugar and cinnamon and wrapped up in banana leaf, all cooked on traditional hot plates. You need to get there early as by the time we left the queues were snaking into the street.

Next up was El Sazón de Sylvia for alcapurrias fritters made with a dough of green bananas and cassava and stuffed with either crab or beef with some tasty crab rice on the side. The indulgent food was washed down with Kola Champagne, an iconic Puerto Rican fizzy drink that was like a cross between cola and cream soda with hints of fruit. It was very sweet but speak ill of it at your peril as it’s beloved by the locals. We ended the day at Luquillo Beach, a popular area with lots of vibrant bars and food stands.

Make perfect cocktails at Casa Bacardí

We also learnt how to make the ubiquitous piña coladas during a tour of Casa Bacardí, home to the company since 1930, blending rum, pineapple and coconut cream to create the perfect cocktail. The cocktail class was full of spring breakers and hen parties from the US so the cheer was particularly loud but the cocktail helped take the edge off. There are daily tours of the distillery where you can learn about the process of making the famous rum. You’ll also learn fascinating snippets about its history, including how the founder’s wife noticed the fruit bats hanging in the rafters and suggested the bat as the company logo, as the winged mammal is a symbol of good health and fortune among the Cuban Taíno people. More importantly we learnt the golden ratio for all perfect cocktails: one part sweet, one part sour and two parts rum.

Drink excellent coffee

In the cool mountains in the centre of the island are the coffee plantations, sitting in dreamlike landscapes with waterfalls and mist-filled valleys. Hacienda Tres Ángeles is a coffee plantation set up 12 years ago by a husband-and-wife team and their three daughters (the three angels in the name), following the Puerto Rican dream of their grandparents to own a farm. The coffee plantation has gone from strength to strength, becoming the islands’ first certified agrotourism coffee farm recognised by the UN World Tourism Organization. It produces high-grade medium-roasted coffee with complex chocolatey flavours, all processed and roasted on the farm with no waste – even the husks feed the biomass generators, along with solar panels and back-up generators.

Get back to nature with a farm visit

Frutos del Guacabo is a family-owned farm around an hour’s drive from San Juan. It was set up in 2010 by Efrén Robles and Angelie Martínez, with a focus on hydroponically grown plants for local restaurants and bars. When they had to rebuild after Hurricane Maria, with the help of World Central Kitchen, they increasingly focused on the sustainability of products and processes. They also began offering educational tours, while continuing to supply more than 200 hotels and restaurants with speciality produce. Happily grazing beneath the mango and custard apple trees were some very happy goats, including Ursula, who graciously allowed us to milk her while she feigned extreme indifference to our cack-handed attempts. The farm uses the milk to make delicious fresh cheeses, along with soaps and other products.

The verdict

Arriving back in damp and grey England with my duty-free rum, I set to making my own piña colada in the hope of recreating the feeling of that lush Caribbean island. But sipping it on my sofa rather than in a rooftop pool with the sun setting over the beach just wasn’t the same. They may have American passports but Puerto Ricans have a culture all their own. Passionately independent, they are rightly proud of their food, music, beautiful landscapes and, of course, the rum. Raise a glass and cheer Boricua.

Natasha was a guest of the Puerto Rican tourist board; discoverpuertorico.com

Telling your personal narrative through food is a common cookbook trope. Taking an anthropological wander through a people’s or country’s food culture is another prevailing cookbook methodology.

Less ubiquitous is an author who merges the two, swiveling a mirror to look at both themself and their ancestral background. Niloufer Ichaporia King’s 2007 masterpiece, “My Bombay Kitchen: Traditional and Modern Parsi Home Cooking,” might be the exemplar of this double-vision.

Parsis and global cooking

Across the book’s 300-plus pages, King tells the story of the Parsis, a group of Persians who practiced Zoroastrianism thousands of years ago and were persecuted after the Arab-Islamic conquest of Persia. As the persecuted often do, the Parsis fled. Many landed on the western coast of what’s now India.

This meant, for King’s family, establishing themselves in Bombay, merging their Persian cooking with Indian influences. The resulting cooking featured an “immense range of tastes and techniques,” King said in “My Bombay Kitchen,” a real “magpie cuisine.”

King moved from Bombay to Baltimore in 1962, then to Berkeley, California, acquiring all the more culinary influences as she worked on a doctorate in anthropology at the University of California, Berkeley. In time, she connected with the food-world rabble-rousers at the formative Chez Panisse restaurant, eventually spearheading an annual Nowruz (Persian New Year) dinner there for more than a decade. There, King’s bright way with the flavors of India and Persia showcased with California’s faultless ingredients exploded how to think about cooking and eating.

Innovation in the kitchen

“My Bombay Kitchen” compiles recipes that flaunt that same fresh, innovative cooking style. King’s Parsiburgers are a breezy take on kebabs, with your choice of ground meat seasoned with chopped yellow or green onions, ginger, fresh green chiles, cilantro and mint. You shape them into patties, sizzle them in a skillet and serve them however you like. This is how King cooks: the spirit of Persia and the Indian subcontinent on the wings of California’s freewheeling individuality.

Parsis are mad for potatoes. “If I had to draw a Parsis food pyramid, it would rise out of a plinth of potato chips,” said King in her book. There are recipes for both fried angel-hair potatoes and potato wafers, aka potato chips, plus hash with curry leaves and turmeric.

Of note is King’s kicky, sharp tomato chutney. It’s fresh and plucky with loads of cane vinegar, chile powder, cloves, cinnamon and matchsticks of fresh ginger. Recipes that become ritual are a surefire tell of an indispensable cookbook.

The cocoa content of Club and Penguin bars is now so “debased” that Britain’s much-loved lunchbox biscuits can no longer legally be marketed as chocolate, said Tony Turnbull in The Times. Their downgrading to “chocolate flavour” highlights how products that look and taste like chocolate may actually contain very little of the real ingredient.

Dire harvests in the world’s key cocoa-growing regions have sent the price of cocoa beans soaring, sparking a “cocoa crisis” that is affecting the solid chocolate bar sector, too. Some manufacturers are simply downsizing their bars (so you get less chocolate for your buck) but others are “adjusting” their product, using fewer cocoa solids and more palm oil or shea oil. As a result, it’s harder to find a flavourful bar of chocolate, made with good-quality ingredients, for a reasonable price.

Milk chocolate sold in the UK must contain a minimum 20% cocoa solids (lower than the EU’s 25% minimum but higher than the 10% specified in the US). White chocolate must contain at least 25% cocoa butter (milder and creamy that cocoa solids), and dark chocolate must contain at least 35% cocoa solids, although high-quality bars can have up to 90%. In all cases, the remaining percentage is usually made up of emulsifiers, flavourings and other fillers.

“Dark chocolate with a higher cocoa percentage typically has a richer, savoury taste,” said Which?, while bars with “lower cocoa percentage may be sweeter and more mellow”. For most people, a “70% cocoa content provides the perfect balance between sweetness and intensity”, said Tom Hunt in The Guardian.

The majority of chocolate is made from processed cocoa beans, which are then “conched” and “tempered” – technical terms for the aerating, heating and cooling steps that give good chocolate its glossy finish and distinct snap. If you’re after a higher-end, “more distinctive” product, look for “high-value bean-to-bar chocolate”, where the beans are “roasted and processed entirely in-house”.

Just like wine, which is influenced by the soil and climate in the region where the vines are grown, cocoa has a “its sense of terroir”, said Turnbull in The Times. Beans grown in Venezuela, for example, “range from nutty and creamy to dark and earthy”, whereas cocoa from Ecuador and Peru is more fruity, floral and caramelised. West African-grown amelonado beans are “earthy and bitter”, but can develop “notes of tobacco and rum” when grown in the Caribbean.

For milk chocolate, Pierre Marcolini Chocolat au Lait is the “best posh” choice. The Belgian chocolatier’s 44% milk bar “uses amelonado cocoa beans from São Tomé and Príncipe”, providing notes of “caramel and honey”. Tony’s Chocolonely Milk is the best supermarket choice. Although it only contains 32% cocoa solids, this still “gives it the edge over” Lindt Excellence (30%), and its “chunkiness” is an added bonus.

The best supermarket dark chocolate is Green & Black’s Organic 70% Cocoa bar, said The Guardian. It “starts with vanilla, then a powerful bitter cocoa flavour builds in complexity with sour notes, before finishing on a lingering sweetness”. With its “smooth and quick-melting texture”, it’s “excellent value as an entry-level organic chocolate”.

This has to be one of the easiest, most decadent desserts you’ll ever make, says Poppy O’Toole. I picked it up when working in the kitchens of a bank: for big events it would be our go-to sweet treat, as it was so easy and everyone loved it

Ingredients (serves 8-10)

• 20cm loose-bottomed fluted tart tin
• 250g Hobnob biscuits (or your favourites – Oreos, Bourbons, digestives... anything you fancy)
• 300g unsalted butter
• 200g light brown soft sugar
• 200ml double cream
• 200g 70%-cocoa dark chocolate, broken up
• pinch of flaky salt

Method

• Place the biscuits in a large sandwich bag and smash them with a rolling pin to a fine crumb (or you could blitz them in a food processor).
• Measure out 100g of the butter and melt in a microwave-safe bowl, with bursts of full power.
• Mix the melted butter through the crumbled biscuits, then press the crumbs into the tin to make a base, easing it up the sides and into the fluted edge. Transfer the tin to a fridge to set the base for 30 minutes.
• To make the filling, in a saucepan on a medium heat, add the sugar and remaining 200g of butter. Leave the butter and sugar to melt (it can help if you chop the butter first), then bring it to a simmer. Once simmering, leave it bubbling gently for 2-3 minutes, then give it a stir to combine.
• Stir in the cream and bring the mixture to the boil. Reduce the heat and simmer for 5 minutes. Remove the pan from the heat, and mix in the chocolate, until melted, smooth and glossy.
• Pour the filling into the set base and sprinkle the top with the flaky salt. Leave the tart to set in the fridge for at least 2 hours. Remove the tart tin and serve in delicious slices.

Taken from The Actually Delicious One Pot Cookbook by Poppy O’Toole.

Sign up for The Week’s Food & Drink newsletter for recipes, reviews and recommendations.

Mezcaleria Alma

Denver

Every spot that Johnny and Kasie Curiel have opened in Denver in the past few years has been “a window into Mexico’s dynamic food heritage,” said Kate Kassin in Bon Appétit. Late 2023 brought Alma Fonda Fina, winner of a Michelin star. Late 2024 brought this companion, a deeply stocked mezcal bar whose brief food menu is “nothing short of transportive.”

Visit with a friend, and the two of you “could work through Mezcaleria Alma’s one-page menu in a sitting.” The roughly dozen dishes include applewood-smoked tuna, pockets of tender masa filled with cheese, and bowls of leaf-green kanpachi ceviche shot through with dill. All of them are “electric.”

And then there’s the bar, and a bottle list that “would make for an eternity of great drinking without ever repeating your order.” The mezcals, tequilas, sotols, and pechugas “can be sipped as is, or transformed into studied cocktails like a zingy, earthy corn sour.” You could get an education in Mexican spirits at this mescaleria. You’d also be more than happy to eat here every night. 2550 15th St.

The Wren

Baltimore

“The Wren is warm, intimate, and in many ways out of time,” said Lydia Woolever in Baltimore magazine. Inspired by the public living rooms of Dublin, the tin-ceilinged bar just two blocks from Baltimore’s harbor takes no reservations and blasts no Spotify playlists. Sitting on a stool with a whisky or a perfectly pulled pint of Guinness at your elbow, “you could very well be in a pub off the Irish Sea.”

In this convivial setting, Will Mester, a star local chef, is clearly in his element, using a couple of induction cooktops in the back corner to conjure “a simple yet sophisticated ode to European country cooking.” Mester’s chalkboard menu might feature tender pork cheeks in a turnip-laden broth or sage-fried egg and blood sausage in a smoky-sweet brown sauce.

When Mester is cooking, “even the basics are blissful,” and his Dublin-born wife, Millie Powell, makes delicious home-style desserts to match when she isn’t busy handling her maître d’ duties. Like its name-sake bird, which in a Celtic folktale outsmarts an eagle, “this old-soul watering hole proves that small can mean mighty.” 1712 Aliceanna St.

McGonagle’s Pub

Dorchester, Mass.

If there’s a battle raging over what Irish food is these days, chef Aidan McGee isn’t just in it: “He’s winning, decisively,” said Julia Moskin in The New York Times. At McGonagle’s, an upscale pub south of Boston, McGee serves an award-winning Sunday roast and uses a U.K.-built chip-cutting machine for his fish and chips.

But there’s also an adventurous, globally inspired side to his menu that’s common to pubs in today’s Ireland, such as croquettes of Irish cheese that are clear upgrades to American mozzarella sticks. Better yet, he has introduced to these shores “the spice bag”: a “magnificent late-night Dublin drunk food” that’s “a Chinese-Indian-Irish jumble” of fries and fried chicken bits tossed with chiles, cumin, star anise, and turmeric.

The Guinness is always handled with care here, served two degrees warmer than other beers, said Rachel Leah Blumenthal in Boston magazine. But McGonagle’s also has special house cocktails, a feature “expected at modern bars in Ireland but less so at Irish pubs in Boston.” Try the “Ah Go On Then”: gin and elderflower liqueur served cheekily in a teacup. 367 Neponset Ave.

For me, soups are always superior when the veg has been roasted beforehand (as opposed to boiled), said Flora Shedden. The squash and apple in this recipe both develop a lovely natural sweetness when they are left to roast and caramelise; the other great thing about this recipe is that you just shove everything in a tray to cook together.

Ingredients (serves 4-6)

• 1 butternut squash (about 900g), peeled and deseeded, then cut into 1cm slices
• 2 eating apples (about 250g), cored and cut into 1cm slices
• 1 large onion (about 250g), cut into wedges
• 4 garlic cloves, peeled but left whole
• 45g fresh root ginger, peeled and roughly chopped
• 45ml/3 tbsp cider vinegar
• 10g sage leaves
• 1kg chicken (or vegetable) stock
• olive oil, for cooking
• sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
• yoghurt, to serve

For the crispy breadcrumb topping:

• 50g fresh breadcrumbs
• 50g pumpkin seeds
• 10g sage leaves, the smaller the better, but if large tear in half
• olive oil, for frying

Method

• Preheat the oven to 180C fan/200C/400F).
• Put the squash, apples, onion, garlic and ginger onto a baking tray and drizzle over the cider vinegar and a generous amount of olive oil. Season well with salt and pepper, then add the sage leaves. Toss everything together with your hands, then place in the oven to roast for 40-50 mins, stirring halfway through, until the squash is soft and nearly falling apart. If your veg is browning too quickly, cover the tray with foil.
• Once cooked, spoon the vegetables into a large saucepan and pour over the stock. Use a splash of the stock or some boiling water to rinse out the roasting pan, then use a wooden spoon to loosen off any caramelised bits. Add those to the pan with the veg, then bring the soup to the boil and cook for 10 mins or until everything is simmering.
• Remove the pan from the heat and use a hand-held blender (or food processor) to blend the soup until very smooth. Season to taste.
• To make the topping, heat a little oil in a frying pan over a medium heat and fry the breadcrumbs, pumpkin seeds and sage leaves for 5 mins, or until everything is crispy and fragrant.
• Serve the soup with the crispy breadcrumbs, a dollop of yoghurt, and a drizzle of oil.

Taken from “Winter in the Highlands” by Flora Shedden.

Sign up for The Week’s Food & Drink newsletter for recipes, reviews and recommendations.

Relaxing in the autumn months with a glass of sherry and bowl of “briny olives” can only be described as a “deeply satisfying pleasure”, said Victoria Moore in The Telegraph. The timeless experience “remains relatively inexpensive”, even when you choose a more premium bottle.

Sherry – a wine fortified with grape spirit – originates from the province of Jerez in southwest Spain. The vast majority of sherries are made from the white palomino grape variety.

The fortified wine is made using the “solera system” of maturation which involves gradually adding younger sherries to older ones, creating a “blend from different years”, said John Clarke in The Independent. This method offers a “wide and exciting range of tastes and flavours”, and is a lower-cost way of experiencing “centuries of traditional winemaking”: it is “history in a glass, if you like”.

“Long seen as old-fashioned, sherry is undergoing a quiet revolution,” said Sophie Arundel in The Drinks Business. For years the fortified wine had a reputation for being “sticky, sweet, and destined only for certain aunts at Christmas”. In reality, though, it can range from dry to intensely sweet, and everything in between.

Undaunted by the “baggage” of sherry’s past, producers are turning to younger drinkers, encouraged by signs that millennials are embracing natural and orange wines, which have comparable “nutty, oxidative qualities”, said The Buyer.

“In my book, the idea of a modest sherry before Sunday lunch is maybe not such a bad one,” said Fiona Beckett in The Guardian. Though sherry thrives in the Spanish summer sun, some of the nuttier, darker styles work “brilliantly” at this time of year.

Most sherries are best served chilled alongside olives and chorizo, to bring out the salty flavours, said The Telegraph. Drier versions like manzanilla and the more traditional fino pair well with salted almonds, tomato bread and manchego cheese. The darker, “more intense and nutty” oloroso works better with “heavier” food like oxtail stew to complement the richer flavour.

If you’re looking for something “dry” and “strongly flavoured” at the lower end of the price scale, which is “not for the faint-hearted”, Morrisons’ “superb” The Best Palo Cortado NV (£7.50) fits the bill. Or for something “easier to drink”, try Gonzalez Byass Tio Pepe Fino Sherry NV (£13.50). “Apple-fresh with notes of sourdough and salt”, it is perfect served straight from the fridge with tapas nibbles.

These extra-special breakfasts and brunches are worth waking up for. From the perfect eggs benedict served at the marble counter of a Michelin-starred restaurant to soft, fluffy waffles enjoyed from the 40th floor of the Heron Tower, these are some of the best spots in London.

Engel Bar, City of London

Located on the mezzanine floor of The Royal Exchange, the Engel Bar is a great spot for those wanting to take in the beauty of the historic architecture while soaking up the 1920s Berlin-style atmosphere. The Marlene Brunch, available only on Saturdays, takes it up a notch with a specially curated menu alongside live R&B, soul and jazz performances. With an amazing line-up of singers on the roster (such as Jermain Jackman and Natalie Williams), the experience is not to be missed. 

The food is sublime: a mix of classic brunch go-tos and a few fun fusions. It’s hard to go wrong with the fried chicken and waffles. The sea bass with a yuzu and soy glaze is bursting with flavour. Diners are spoiled for choice drinks-wise with the option to pick bottomless fizz, Bellini or Aperol spritz. If that’s not enough, there is a champagne menu that’s 50% off for the afternoon. In all, the Marlene Brunch makes for a memorable experience in the heart of the capital. Something definitely worth leaving the house early for.



The Mezzanine, First Floor, Royal Exchange, EC3V 3LQ; engelbar.co.uk

Pavyllon London, Mayfair

There’s an effortlessness to dining in a Michelin-starred restaurant that is hard to replicate elsewhere. Pavyllon London achieves this in its breakfast offering but without forced pretension. This is impeccable, attentive and refined service at a marble counter, an experience that offers a front row seat to the theatre of the kitchen.

A health shot to start will zap you awake. It is followed by a fluffy vanilla muffin, an amuse-bouche of sorts – and, of course, your choice of tea and coffee.

The eggs benedict here is certainly a contender for the capital’s best: toasted muffins are topped with pillowy eggs that break into golden silk with the puncture of a knife. The dish is drawn together with a rich, creamy hollandaise and paprika – flavours that make the breakfast sing.

Another must-have is the Frenglish platter, offering a bridge to Gallic finesse – it’s everything you’d expect of a full English, but with interesting twists like the crispy Pommes Anna, soft sourdough bread and tomatoes that taste as if they’ve just been picked from the vine. To finish, try the crepes. Thin and velvety with caramelised brown sugar, their flavours are elevated through a drizzle of maple syrup, fresh berries and a cloud of vanilla whipped cream.

Four Seasons London at Park Lane, Hamilton Place, W1J 7DR; pavyllonlondon.com

Duck and Waffle, Liverpool Street

No list of Britain’s best breakfast and brunch spots would be complete without Duck and Waffle. Located on the 40th floor of the Heron Tower right in the heart of the City of London, the restaurant is one of the highest in the capital, and boasts some of the best dining views on the planet.

Open 24 hours a day, seven days a week, the restaurant attracts City types, foodies and tourists, with different menus for different times of the day. Brunch is available between 10am and 4pm on Saturday and Sunday, and includes the eponymous duck and waffle, alongside the more traditional fare of smoked salmon royale, the full English breakfast and vegetarian options, too.

110 Bishopsgate, EC2N 4AY; duckandwaffle.com

Dishoom, various locations

Breakfast at this Bombay cafe chain is an evocative experience where flavours dance on your tastebuds. Bacon and eggs may be morning stalwarts; naans less so. But this combination, in tandem with some killer chilli tomato jam, cream cheese and fresh coriander, makes for a very tasty breakfast.

Dishoom also offers a host of other options, including Bombay omelettes, cinnamon-jaggery pancakes and the “Parsi power breakfast” of spicy chicken keema served with chicken liver, fried eggs and home-made buns. The chain has acquired a cult following since it was founded in 2010 and it is easy to see why.

Various locations; dishoom.com

45 Jermyn St, Green Park

It is no good adding salmon or caviar to eggs in a bid to improve them if you haven’t got the eggs right in the first place. Fortunately, that essential building block of the very best breakfasts is done perfectly at 45 Jermyn St.

And that isn’t the only basics the swish St James’s establishment does well. Coffee, juice, avocados and toast may all sound simple enough, but in the hands of the chefs at 45 Jermyn St, they are all elevated into something spectacular. The eggs, scrambled and mixed with cream, are quite possibly the most indulgent in London. And with a dollop of caviar or a side of salmon, they are pure brunching perfection.

45 Jermyn Street, St James’s, SW1Y 6DN; 45jermynst.com

St Pancras Brasserie by Searcys, King’s Cross

Sitting below St Pancras’ magnificent vaulted ceiling, with an art deco design by Martin Brudnizki, St Pancras Brasserie by Searcys feels like a throwback to the golden age of travel. It offers Europe’s longest champagne bar and the fizz to go with it.

The breakfast menu is available from 8am to 11.30am on Monday to Friday, and 10am to 11.30am on Saturdays, where visitors can enjoy a dish from the “bakery and bowls” section of the menu, eggs or the full English breakfast. Searcys also has a substantial menu for its bottomless Sunday brunch. Two courses and 90 minutes of free-flowing lager, prosecco or mimosas are available, and there is plenty to choose from. Stand out dishes include the mouth-watering breakfast cheeseburger, the pork belly benedict and the buffalo chicken waffle.

St Pancras International Station, N1C 4QL; stpancrasbysearcys.co.uk

Quaglino’s, Green Park

Brunch at Quaglino’s can be a disconcerting affair. The food, the wine, the dramatic lighting – and your fellow diners, dressed to impress – lull you into a late-night frame of mind, and you may well find yourself blinking in surprise as you emerge into the early afternoon sunshine.

The illusion starts the moment you step into the dark, cavernous restaurant and descend the illuminated stairs. Art deco glamour oozes from every surface, from the velvet curtains of the cabaret stage to the gilded marble bar. The menu is also suitably starry. Brunch classics – eggs benedict, royale or florentine, with avocado and smoked salmon – are tucked away in one corner, but there are also surprising options on offer. Take the Cygnet 22 gin cured trout, or asparagus and ricotta tortelloni, for instance. The brunch is available on Saturdays only.

16 Bury Street, SW1Y 6AJ; quaglinos-restaurant.co.uk

Theo Randall at the InterContinental, Park Lane

Celebrity chef Theo Randall’s Saturday brunch invites diners to enjoy la dolce vita in true Italian style, with a three-course festa in famiglia – a chance for families and friends to experience the best of the country’s produce.

Try not to fill up too much on the help-yourself antipasti – as tempting as the platters heaped with vibrant salads and cured meats are – as to follow is your choice of secondi, with options including porchetta (a slow-cooked crispy pork with potato and fennel al forno), as well as a sumptuous baked fontina cheese soufflé. Those with a sweet tooth will want to hold out for the desserts – a highlight of which is Randall’s palate-cleansing Amalfi lemon tart.

1 Hamilton Place, W1J 7QY; theorandall.com

Yauatcha City, Liverpool Street

On Fridays and Saturdays, this high-end Chinese restaurant offers one of the capital’s most sophisticated brunches: the Infinite Yum Cha Brunch.

Unlimited rounds of delicious dim sum (featuring black truffle dumplings, pork and prawn shui mai, and shrimp har gau) and soft bao buns are followed by a selection of signature main courses. Guests can choose from options including stir-fried rib eye beef in black bean sauce, sweet and spicy sea bass curry, and more, perfectly complemented by steamed jasmine rice or egg fried rice. End the experience with delicious soufflé pancakes topped with honeycomb.

1 Broadgate, EC2M 2QS; taogroup.com

Smithereens

New York City

“Summer on Cape Cod this is not,” said Matthew Schneier in NYMag.com. Chef Nick Tamburo’s homage to New England oceanic foodways occupies a cramped subterranean East Village space that makes a meal there “closer to dining belowdecks on the Pequod.” Fittingly, the menu is full of deep cuts and dark riffs on the New England theme: a maple-infused pâté of smoked bluefish, rye-like anadama bread, grilled mackerel that’s “perfumed with tamarind, allspice, and chile,” and head-on whiting that’s whole-fried and “served with the dignity usually accorded to branzino.”

Tamburo also isn’t afraid to be impious: He serves a delicious riff on clam chowder that buries quahogs in steamy rice. Not every dish lands. The chef’s “abiding interest in the weird” isn’t for all diners, and maybe seaweed doesn’t belong in any dessert. But after several months of unsteady experimentation, Smithereens has found its sea legs. Though it’s “not a restaurant for everyone,” it “might be an even better thing: a restaurant very much for some.” 414 E. 9th St.

Bayonet

Birmingham, Alabama

“Everyone is having fun at airy Bayonet,” said Kim Severson in The New York Times. Rob and Emily McDaniel have given their Southern chophouse, Helen, a breezy companion of a seafood-forward sister, and the newcomer is so good that it made our newspaper’s list of America’s best new restaurants. Rob’s short rotating menu has him working wonders with sustainable fish. “He uses caramel sauce to punch up bánh mì stuffed with Gulf shrimp, makes schnitzel out of cobia, and pairs an acidic fruit salsa with fatty Ora King salmon collar.”

Meanwhile, at the raw bar, “Alabama oysters fight it out with East Coast stalwarts.” Clearly, “the chef and his team are tapped into the local seafood scene,” said Caroline Sanders Clements in Garden & Gun. But the McDaniels also recognize the value in variety, shipping in oysters from North Carolina’s Dukes of Topsail and Cape Cod’s Moon Shoal. Pop a dozen while snacking on hand-cut fries dipped in lemon aioli. “And no meal at Bayonet is complete without a martini stirred tableside with a plump, salty oyster at the bottom of the glass.” 2015 N. 2nd Ave.

Ostrea

Detroit

When Ostrea was announced, “I had high, if not unreasonable, expectations,” said Danny Palumbo in Hour Detroit. It’s a spin-off of the London Chop House, “a titan in the history of Detroit’s dining scene,” and while Ostrea turns out to be more easygoing, the food is just as refined.

Occupying a street-level space above the Chop House, the place always feels bustling, “even in its quiet moments,” in part because of the fresh seafood that’s constantly arriving. The oyster offerings change regularly. My dozen included Corktown Golds, Bad Boys, and Pink Moons, and “each one popped with a clean, oceanic freshness.”

Elsewhere, the menu is sneakily adventurous. Seafood restaurants today are almost required to serve hamachi crudo, but Ostrea’s is special, a “divinely harmonic” marriage of hamachi, basil, and grapefruit. The lobster roll, with flavors “faintly reminiscent of a Bloody Mary,” feels “both traditional and new.” The prices here have scared off some locals, but consider whether it’s wise to spend $22 on a chowder made with a crab and lobster velouté and loaded with scallops, swordfish, and chunks of bacon lardon. “For something so luxurious, I’d encourage it.” 536 Shelby St.

For the archetypal US conservative male, beer has long been seen as the booze of choice, but a growing number of right-wingers are turning against a cold one.

Conservatives in America have had a “stormy relationship” with beer in “recent years”, said Slate. Now the right is waging a “war” on the beverage on several fronts, and “beer is losing badly”.

Dizzying backlash

In 2023, a “conservative uprising” against Bud Light became “one of the highest-profile beverage-themed revolts since the Boston Tea Party, except with more guns and influencers”.

For two decades, the brand had been the best-seller in the US with “boorish marketing aimed squarely” at men of all ages, but when a transgender influencer featured in a social media ad campaign, it sparked a backlash that was “swift and dizzying”, as “seemingly every conservative personality” turned against the brand.

Sales “plummeted” and Bud Light “tumbled” from top spot to third. Twelve months later, it was estimated that the company had lost $1.4 billion (£1 billion) in sales from the “backlash”.

Next, two Mexican beers – Modelo and Corona - found themselves in the “conservative crosshairs”. Donald Trump’s tariffs meant that selling beers imported from Mexico became a “disastrous business model” because the president was “obsessed with keeping out stuff from abroad, especially stuff (and people) from Mexico”.

Beer is also suffering from a wider trend of sobriety among Republicans. Many leading right-wing figures, including Donald Trump, Tucker Carlson and Robert F. Kennedy Jr., have talked about being sober. So did Charlie Kirk. “Maybe the rising tide of Christian nationalism has revived an old-fashioned Protestant temperance,” said The Guardian, or perhaps heeding RFK’s quest to “make America healthy again” means “eschewing beer, barbecues and bourbon”.

‘Anti-woke’

For those right-wingers who want to boycott what they see as “woke” brands but without giving up the booze, there is a solution: “anti-woke” beer. In the wake of the Bud Light boycott, a “slate of alternative ‘anti-woke’ brands” has appeared on the scene to “meet the boycotters’ needs”, said Politico.

One was “Conservative Dad’s Ultra Right 100% Woke-Free American Beer”. It has an alcohol volume of 4%, but one tester for Politico said it tasted “like a non-alcoholic IPA”, adding: “I can’t imagine anything less conservative” than that.

There was also bad news for this brand earlier this year, when beer giant Anheuser-Busch filed a trademark claim against it, claiming that Ultra Right Beer infringes on the trademark of Michelob Ultra, a move the makers of Ultra Right described as “revenge”.

The challenges facing the brewing industry go beyond the political divide. In a poll last month, Gallup found that the percentage of American adults who reported drinking any alcohol had fallen to 54%, the lowest number in nine decades of polling. Once again, the demographic “leading the charge” were “self-identified Republicans” of whom “more than half are off the sauce altogether”.

When it comes to picking the best barbecue throughout the South, “you have to go with your gut,” said Robert F. Moss in Southern Living. Two years after I last ranked a top 50, a newcomer has taken the No. 1 slot, pushing two established greats down one notch each. But change is to be expected. Every year, some old favorites close or lose their edge, and “there’s been no shortage of ambitious players entering the business and making a splash.”

City Limits Barbeque

West Columbia, South Carolina

The brisket, hot links, and beef ribs at this two-year-old weekend-only spot are “as good as any east of the Mississippi,” and City Limits “shines even brighter” when pitmaster Robbie Robinson focuses on such local treats as pork shoulders cooked “burn-barrel style.” While a “dizzying” array of contemporary fusions adds more joy, “what really pushes City Limits to the front of the pack are the Saturday spareribs.”

Snow’s BBQ

Lexington, Texas

A visit to Snow’s is “an adventure no barbecue fan should miss.” Operating since 2003 and only on Saturdays, it opens at an “egregiously early” 8 a.m., creating hours-long queues. But free beer and Bloody Marys “take the edge off,” and you might glimpse 90-year-old pitmaster Tootsie Tomanetz as you pass the open pit houses. “The payoff comes” when you reach a little red building and load up on brisket, spareribs, and “best of all, tender, juicy pork shoulder steaks with mahogany-hued bark.”

Fresh Air Bar-B-Que

Jackson, Georgia

In Georgia, chopped pork is the game, and “no restaurant better represents the state’s distinctive style” than this 96-year-old institution. Fresh hams are cooked over hickory and oak, and the finished pork is chopped into shreds and dressed in a “thin, tangy” red sauce.

Four authors with four points of view could be a recipe for cookbook disaster. “The Woks of Life: Recipes to Know and Love from a Chinese American Family” instead hinges on the four varied — yet complementary — stances of the members of the Leung family: dad Bill, mom Judy and daughters Sarah and Kaitlin.

Digital to analog — forever delicious

It’s a formula the Leungs know well. In 2013, Sarah launched a blog by the same name, The Woks of Life. In the ensuing years, the site enlisted the other three family members, grew to monster size and became a contemporary resource for fans of cooking a variety of Chinese dishes.

The cookbook take on that same mission, “The Woks of Life,” is divided into ten chapters: Dim Sum, Starters, Noodles, Rice, Poultry & Eggs, Pork Beef & Lamb, Fish & Shellfish, Vegetables & Tofu, Soups & Stocks, Sauces and Desserts & Sweet Things. Much like the blog, a different Leung often introduces each recipe. You learn who likes what, and you can adjust your recipe preferences.

Predictably, the dim sum section is labor-intensive. If you crave homemade pan-fried garlic, chive and shrimp dumplings, you’ll require three kinds of starch (wheat, tapioca and corn) for the wrappers, then a whole lot of rolling and pleating. The plush, crackling result warrants the effort, and the Leungs’ clear instructions encourage success.

Other sections trumpet both Chinese American fixtures and more traditional regional Chinese home cooking. Sesame chicken is a sticky, comforting similitude of the takeout staple; torn cabbage leaves, stir-fried with garlic, ginger, oyster sauce, black vinegar and an optional modicum of thinly sliced pork shoulder, embodies the healthy resourcefulness of much Chinese home cooking.

How to succeed in Chinese cooking

Any great cookbook needs to give you the tools to triumph. The Leungs stack the front of “The Woks of Life” with a series of guides that cover cooking tools, a slim, nine-ingredient pantry compilation and a short primer on cooking techniques, including a four-step map to achieving wok hei, the “complex charred, savory aroma and flavor” central to the best stir-fries.

And if you want to dig deep, the final section of the book is a nine-page glossary of additional Chinese pantry and refrigerator items — with a handy QR code that links to the same information on The Woks of Life blog. Keeping it all in the family is just what the Leungs do.

Ed Sheeran and Brooklyn Beckham are among the latest celebrities to release their own hot sauce, as the trend for spicy condiments notches up to fiery new levels.

On supermarket shelves, countless bottles offer just about every heat and flavour combination you can imagine – from smoky, jalapeño-based condiments to super-hot scotch-bonnet-packed sauces.

The “global hot sauce craze” is being fuelled by Gen Z and social media, said Anne Shooter in The Times. YouTube show “Hot Ones”, featuring celebrities being interviewed as they eat “increasingly spicy chicken wings”, has almost five billion views.

Meri La Bella, a buyer at Ocado, told Shooter that sales of hot sauces are “up 90% year on year”, while, at Waitrose, online searches for hot honey – a sweet, spicy honey infused with chillies – have risen by 416% since 2024. The food department in Selfridges now stocks over 100 hot sauces, and sales are “outstripping ketchup and mayonnaise combined”.

The best hot sauces have some “fermentation going on to round out the chilli heat and balance the flavours”, said Thomasina Miers in The Guardian. “And, as with most things in life, a bit of ageing helps enormously!”

Classic Tabasco Pepper Sauce is a safe bet. “Deliciously tangy” and with a heat that “soon dissipates on contact with food”, its “rounded flavour” gives it a “huge lead in terms of taste”. For something sweeter that makes a “great accompaniment to a burger”, try Lingham’s Chilli Sauce – “very moreish”.

If you’re after a hot sauce that really packs a punch, try El Yucateco Salsa Picante de Chile Habanero, said Ella Duggan in The Independent. “This isn’t your average green drizzle”; expect bold, fiery heat that will make your “lips tingle and your tongue do a double-take”. You’ll want to “approach with caution”, as a generous dollop is enough to “set your mouth ablaze”. But, when used carefully, it’s an “incredibly versatile” hot sauce that makes a great addition to salad dressings, guacamole, fresh salsa or drizzled over grilled fish.

My favourite of Selfridge’s swankier offerings is Yellowbird Habanero Hot Sauce, said Shooter in The Times. Made with habanero chillies, tangerines, dates, garlic and carrots, it expertly balances spice with sweetness and has a lovely “freshness of flavour”.

Should you really want to push the boat out, there’s Truff Hotter Sauce. I’m not a fan of truffle-flavoured foods, so I was “ready to hate this” but it’s surprisingly “delicious – slightly sweet and earthy – and extremely hot. Worth £21 a bottle though? I’m not sure it’s that good.”

My recipe for mustardy green beans nods to a classic French green-bean salad, but has a few welcome additions, said Ben Lippett. The pro move here is to add crème fraîche to the dressing: the dairy cuts the sharpness of the vinaigrette beautifully, rounds out the tarragon flavour, and gives everything a punch of lactic acidity.

Ingredients (serves 4)

For the salad:

• 400g mixed long beans; green, yellow, runner or piattoni
• 50g toasted hazelnuts
• 4 spring onions
• 20g dill
• 250g cooked beluga or puy lentils
• zest of 1 lemon
• 60g manchego cheese

For the dressing:

• 25g Dijon mustard
• 20g wholegrain mustard
• 35ml white-wine vinegar
• 25ml olive oil
• 25ml neutral oil
• 5-10g fresh tarragon
• 50-80g full-fat crème fraîche
• fine sea salt
• black pepper

Method

• Start by making the dressing. Put the mustards and vinegar in a bowl along with the salt and 6-8 twists of black pepper, then whisk to combine.
• Working gradually, whisk in the oils one by one to create a thick, emulsified dressing. If it’s a little too thick, add a splash more vinegar or a drop of water. Pick the leaves from the tarragon, finely chop, and add to the dressing. Mix through the crème fraîche and set aside.
• Bring a large pot of water to the boil. Heavily season it with salt (roughly 120g per litre of water) – you want it to be much saltier than you think and far saltier than pasta water. Trust me. Set up a bowl of iced water and season that generously, too. Top and tail the beans and cook in the boiling water for 3-4 minutes, or until tender.
• Remove from the boiling water and plunge into the salty iced water. Jostle the beans around to ensure even cooling then remove. Dry the beans as best you can, using either a tea towel or a salad spinner.
• Use the flat of your knife to crack the hazelnuts into chunky pieces. Trim and thinly slice the spring onions and roughly chop the dill. Toss the cooked beans into a bowl along with the hazelnuts, spring onions, dill, lentils and the zest of the lemon. Shave in half of the manchego cheese with a peeler.
• Pour over the dressing and gently toss to combine everything. Divide among plates, shave over the remaining manchego, and serve.

Taken from How I Cook: A Chef’s Guide to Really Good Home Cooking by Ben Lippett.

Sign up for The Week's Food & Drink newsletter for recipes, reviews and recommendations.

Diane’s Place

Minneapolis

Our 2025 Restaurant of the Year served its first dinner several months after its 2024 opening, said Raphael Brion in Food & Wine, but it “has always seamlessly blended Diane Moua’s experience as a classically trained pastry chef with her roots in Hmong home cooking.” Moua was raised on a Wisconsin farm where her parents often fed other Hmong refugees, and after working for 20 years in top Twin Cities kitchens, she opened her own spot with a goal of creating a morning-to-night atmosphere just as welcoming as her parents’ place.

“As Wonder Woman is to golden lassos, so is Moua to sugar, butter, and flour,” said Dara Moskowitz Grumdahl in Mpls.St.Paul. “But now that she has all the restaurant domains to play with, we can see her soar.” Extreme attention to detail is evident everywhere in her 65-seat restaurant, from the warm surroundings to the graceful service. Start with the scallion croissants, the newest “knee weakener” in Moua’s pastry portfolio. Move on to the laab carpaccio—thin-sliced beef tenderloin under a tangle of herbs, lime, and roast-rice powder—and then the stewed Thai eggplant and duck, “harmony and elegance made edible.” Moua, “a once-in-a-generation talent,” has “freed herself to be her whole self,” and the results are “nothing short of thrilling.” 117 14th Ave. NE.

Vinai

Minneapolis

Moua isn’t the only chef in Minneapolis who’s “leaning into the jumble of culinary influences that define Hmong cooking,” said Tejal Rao in The New York Times. Yia Vang named his year-old restaurant for the refugee camp in Thailand where he was born, a common stop for Hmong who had fled Laos amid a communist takeover. Vinai is Vang’s tribute to his parents, and the dining room is “embroidered with memories,” including family photos and gray tiles that recall the camp’s corrugated metal rooftops.

At a wood-fired grill, “cooks with excellent timing sear pork chops, whole fish, and chickens, and roast chiles for the various hot sauces—each one distinct and worth ordering.” Vang transforms the grill bounty into “an opulent chicken curry, full of fine rice noodles and tender-yolked quail eggs.” A smoked, confit mackerel and tomato appetizer had me entranced, “and when all the fish was gone, I dipped warm purple sticky rice into the sweet oil that was left.” Be warned: The portions are Midwestern-generous. When servers say a dish should be shared, “they’re not messing around.” 1300 NE 2nd St.

Turan Uyghur Kitchen

Houston

I’ve learned two lessons when dining at Turan Uyghur Kitchen, said Bao Ong in the Houston Chronicle. First, order the “big plate chicken.” Second, “always bring companions.” The Asiatown restaurant, which specializes in the Chinese and Middle Eastern–mixing cuisine of north-west China’s Uighur minority, doesn’t tone things down for unfamiliar audiences. Rather, “it serves its dishes with conviction.”

Start with the thugur: thick-doughed dumplings “hand-pleated with the precision of a Savile Row tailor.” The crisp flat-bread goshnaan is “another crowd-pleaser” and is stuffed with “rich and fragrant” cumin-spiced lamb. And about that “big plate” chicken: The plate itself is “larger than an extra-large pizza,” and the chile-sauced noodles “rank among the best I’ve eaten.” The kitchen sometimes has pacing issues, but that allows you time to watch other families sharing plates and pulling on flatbreads. “This food is not just to be eaten but experienced.” 9330 Bellaire Blvd.

Sometimes classics connote drinks and bars that have been around long enough to be timeless. Other times, classics suggest a certain vibe from another era or culture. These watering holes trumpet the classics from all angles.

Anvil, Houston

The sweet, sweet draw of an institution that can make pretty much any classic cocktail, impeccably. Anvil opened in 2009, setting in motion the cocktail renaissance in Houston. Get that perfect Tom Collins; ask for a Gaby des Lys (gin, orgeat, absinthe). Or jump into the present with one of the rotating seasonal cocktails. Anvil is capable of it all.

April Jean, San Francisco

A little cheeky, a mite breezy: April Jean is loaded with nostalgia and sunny vibes. One example is the Pat’s Pie, a cocktail take on key lime pie, starring falernum, singani, sour lime and the requisite pie crust. The space, too, conjures the past, with “old-growth redwood” for a soothing bar that complements April Jean’s “midcentury modern leanings,” said Eater.

Bar Crisol, Tucson

Drinking agave spirits in the Southwest desert just feels right. This “mezcal-focused bar and educational space,” said Imbibe magazine, zeroes in on those spirits made with agave by providing guests with “guided tastings every first Thursday.” Bar Crisol is the nighttime operation; during the day, the café Exo Roast Co. operates in the space.

Blyth & Burrows, Portland, Maine

Long live the oyster shot — and Blyth & Burrows offers two: the Sloop, with tequila, shallot and Champagne vinegar, and the Skiff, with gin, kimchi and vermouth. These shots are simply wind-ups or cool-downs for the wide-ranging cocktail list or high-roller bourbons and Japanese whiskies.

Firstborn, Los Angeles

Bar director Kenzo Han’s “Korean, Japanese and French American heritage has shaped their deep appreciation for the way traditions can intersect in the glass,” said Punch when they dubbed Han one of 2025’s Best New Bartenders. Those influences show up at the Chinese American Firstborn as Green Mandarin pu-erh tea in a Kingston Negroni and a classic bamboo cocktail with shochu as the base.

La Licor Panamericana, Chicago

“Javier Arroyo and his friendly team” love to show off the diverse majesty of Latin American spirits at La Licor Panamericana, said Chicago magazine. That might mean Bolivian singani, Colombian aguardiente or, of course, a number of Mexican spirits made from agave. Try them unadulterated or experience them shining in an array of house cocktails, like the Escandalo with raicilla, dragon fruit, mango tea and lime juice.

Martiny’s, New York

Refinement is what you will find at Martiny’s. It’s a touch of Tokyo in the heart of Manhattan. From the “glassware to the soft jazz,” bartender Takuma Watanabe’s “meticulous skills and eye for beauty” are the gospel of this multi-story bar, said World’s 50 Best Bars. There is no wrong answer for where to sit among the bar’s three floors, nor for what to drink.

English fizz “chalked up” a milestone victory over its “rivals across the Channel” earlier this month when a bottle of Nyetimber’s Blanc de Blancs became the first sparkling wine from outside Champagne to scoop a prestigious prize at the International Wine Challenge ceremony, said The Telegraph.

In a historic first, the producer, based across Sussex, Hampshire and Kent, took home the Champion Sparkling Wine Daniel Thibault Trophy for its Blanc de Blancs 2016 magnum. Judges described it as a “time capsule of a wine”, said London’s The Standard, bursting with “mouth-watering acidity, citrus zest and camomile”.

The brand is a “favourite of the royal family” and its winning entry is the product of a warm growing season in 2016, which, added to its five years on the lees, has created a “complex” wine. Expect “biscuity notes”, with a hint of brioche and “aromas of warm peaches and candied lemon”.

This isn’t the first time UK sparkling wine has demanded attention. British fizz has been bounding from “strength to strength”, attracting a raft of “awards and accolades” in recent years, said The Independent. In many cases, even to the most sophisticated oenophile, certain bottles produced in Essex, Sussex, and even South Wales can be considered superior to “those made in Champagne”.

The three classic champagne grapes – chardonnay, pinot noir and pinot meunier – that “thrive” on similar chalk-based “south-facing” French vineyards are also cultivated on this side of the channel and the wine is made using the same “méthode traditionelle”.

The future for the British sparkling industry is bright, said The Times. Our climate is suited to producing “naturally green, lean, high-acid wines”, which is a staple of the “finest fizz”, giving the wine its unique selling point. Higher quality yields in the UK tend to have come from temperate, “frost-free 2014, 2015 and 2020 vintages”, backed up by “long, warm, quality-enhancing autumns”.

Our cooler climate (relative to Champagne) when the vintage is on song creates “a delightful tingling acidity, and super-fresh, zesty fruit flavours”, which is near-impossible to find in “mass-produced” or “hot-region” wines, said The Telegraph. To get the most out of British sparklers, pair them with “light, savoury food”, “mild cheeses” and “creamy pasta sauces”.

Most importantly, a lot can be done to enhance a British sparkling wine before the bottle has even been opened. Chill to a temperature of around 8-10 Celsius to preserve the “elegant aromas” and “fresh-as-a-daisy flavours” and once opened, drink within three days, should you resist the temptation to down it straight away.

If you don’t want to shell out on Nyetimber’s prize fizz, Morrison‘s The Best English Sparkling is less than half the price. With creamy citrus notes, and “rumoured to be made by a very prestigious winemaker”, it's “surprisingly rich”, said The Guardian.

The season of comfort is upon us! Master that French omelet. Produce those hearty soups. Tackle a cake that might be your new baking fixture. These recipes are autumnal-minded slam dunks that will not merely draw you to the kitchen, but also remind you there is sometimes no better place to be.

A Forever Cake

The planet, arguably, needs not another recipe for almond cake. Until pastrywhiz Nicola Lamb gets involved. In her curious, methodical way, Lamb tested a range of variables to achieve her optimal almond cake. She dubs it Forever Cake because it is versatile, pleasant for all occasions and reliable. One of her discoveries during testing: whipped egg whites provide a beautiful lift to what can otherwise be a bake that lists toward brickiness.

Buttery oyster sauce noodles

Six ingredients, salt included: This is the kind of pantry recipe that relaxes the mind and soothes the soul. Boil dried pasta — whatever shape at hand — toss with butter and a touch of the pasta cooking water to thicken. Glug on some hoisin sauce, oyster sauce and a murmur of toasted sesame oil. Call it lunch, dinner, late-night snack or anxiety coping mechanism.

French omelet with caramelized onions and goat cheese

An American-style omelet is all airy fluff; a French one is taut and slick. There is a place for both, but mastering the French omelet is an easy way to impress yourself. Fill it with caramelized onion and goat cheese then surround it with a moat of lush Gruyere sauce. Complicated, sure. You deserve it, no?

Fully loaded rosti

Eggs and potatoes are a breakfast stalwart. This rosti inverts the formula, with a massive wheel of roasted, shredded potatoes that have been seasoned with an array of spices. Once the potato-wisp pancake has baked until its filaments crackle, the rosti is served with a garlic-pepperoncini-juice yogurt sauce and as many poached eggs as you require.

Gnocchi piccata

Shelf-stable gnocchi are a pantry godsend. Unlike their from-scratch brethren, these gnocchi are stolid and forgiving, with a chew their cousins cannot emulate. Build a garlicky white wine sauce, bright with sliced lemon half-moons and kicky with chile flakes, then add the gnocchi. A one-skillet dinner as fast as it is comforting.

Hungarian mushroom soup

Double the mushroom action guarantees this soup teems with those singular earthbound notes. Dried porcini or shiitakes plus fresh cremini or shiitakes form the base; Hungarian sweet paprika, Worcestershire sauce and thyme provide the counterpoint. Heavy cream, added come go-time, prolongs the soup’s essence while supplying welcoming richness.

Maraq misir

The Somali way with lentil soup requires a collection of savory perfumings: sautéed onions and tomatoes, plus xawaash, a spice blend comprising cumin, coriander, black pepper, clove, cinnamon and cardamom. The requisite red lentils tend to undo themselves during the cooking process. If you want the soup all the more textured, puree half. One wants their comfort to have a stance.

Autumn’s new cookbooks are an admixture of new releases from heavy hitters and debut works from extremely personal restaurants in San Francisco and Paris. Some are optimal for weekend projects (charcuterie, anyone?), while others rely on a well-stocked pantry for turnkey meals.

‘Good Things: Recipes and Rituals to Share with People You Love’

Samin Nosrat’s first cookbook, the lauded “Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat,” was an anti-recipe manifesto that mostly elided recipes, providing instead blueprints, charts and thinkpieces to help the reader think like a cook. Nosrat’s long-anticipated sophomore book, “Good Things,” beats with the same teaching heart, but this go-round relies more on real-deal recipes. Across sections such as “Good Things to Welcome Others,” “Good Things to Keep Up Your Sleeve” and “Good Things Are Better Shared,” Nosrat lets her hospitable, knowing self shine so you can do the same. (out now, $45, various booksellers)

‘My Cambodia: A Khmer Cookbook’

Nite Yun first brought the flavors of Cambodia to the restaurant Nyum Bai in Oakland, California. Now Yun runs the restaurant Lunette in San Francisco’s Ferry Building, and her debut cookbook, “My Cambodia,” captures the flavors of her Khmer cooking. Yun’s famous pork noodle soup, a pomelo salad with shrimp and crispy shallot, and round mochi orbs filled with palm sugar and covered in loads of fresh coconut are some of the recipes starring in the book. (Sept. 23, $35, various booksellers)

‘On Meat: Modern Recipes for the Home Kitchen’

It has been eight years since Los Angeles chef Jeremy Fox published his first cookbook, “On Vegetables.” He has teased the eventual release of his comprehensive take on carnivorousness. It has now arrived and with it a collection of Fox’s ways with cured and smoked meats, along with sausages like merguez. Oodles of the recipes are projects; plenty of them are less involved. The throughline is always Fox’s precise point of view and zero-waste inclinations. (Sept. 24, $49.95, Book Larder)

‘Mokonuts: The Cookbook’

Mokonuts, the Paris restaurant run by Moko Hirayama and Omar Koreitem, has no peer in that city. A little Japanese, a mite Lebanese, some Italian and, of course, a touch French, the menu at Mokonuts wanders the world but feels like it could also exist nowhere other than Paris. The restaurant’s namesake cookbook shows you how to make some of Mokonuts’ most beloved plates, including labneh toast, tomato soup with crispy mussels and those world-famous cookies. (Sept. 25, $49.95, Book Larder)

‘Six Seasons of Pasta: A New Way with Everyone's Favorite Food’

Joshua McFadden is back; let the home cooks rejoice! His debut cookbook, “Six Seasons,” showed vegetable-loving cooks how to prepare vitalizing, big-flavored salads, mains and sides according to his organization of produce based on which seasons it grows in — two extra shoulder seasons beyond the normal four. His newest book, “Six Seasons of Pasta,” applies the same principle to dried pasta. There are new ways with his famous — and famously simple — pureed kale sauce, plus three variations on pasta fagioli and an endless array of seasonal pasta dishes. His co-author, Martha Holmberg, is a recipe whiz. You can be sure every recipe in this book will sing. (Sept. 30, $40, various booksellers)

‘Baking and the Meaning of Life: How to Find Joy in 100 Recipes’

Helen Goh is a pastry chef and spent many years developing recipes for the Ottolenghi empire in London. Now, she is launching her debut cookbook, “Baking and the Meaning of Life.” The recipes are a footloose compendium of all types of baking-adjacent items: Dutch baby with berries and yogurt cream, potato-garlic focaccia, chocolate mousse tart with poached pears. Goh convinces the reader that baking for your people is an admirable act. (Oct. 21, $40, various booksellers)

‘Something from Nothing: A Cookbook’

Dill, anchovies, brown butter, olives, turmeric: These are a mere few signature flourishes from the Alison Roman recipe vault. In Roman’s new cookbook, “Something from Nothing,” she wields those anchovies in a romano-bean braise with wine, serves roasted squash with dates warmed in brown butter and gilds chicken with turmeric and crushed olives. This is a pantry-centric cookbook that counts the boundless ways you can do the very most with the very least. (Nov. 11, $38, various booksellers)

‘Turtle Island: Foods and Traditions of the Indigenous Peoples of North America’

Cookbooks can be complex beings. Some feature faultless recipes; others sing a historical song. Some do both. “Turtle Island,” the latest book from the Indigenous Minnesota chef Sean Sherman, is about “both paying homage to the past and positioning Indigenous foodways as a path for the future,” said Bettina Makalintal at Eater. Sherman was raised on South Dakota’s Pine Ridge Reservation, and “Turtle Island” honors his youth. But the book also shares the food stories and recipes of Indigenous people from across all of North America. “Turtle Island” is an essential work. (Nov. 11, $45, various booksellers)

Traditional British desserts are “struggling for survival” but could an Australian sweet treat be the answer to the UK’s pudding woes? Tim Tams, “a sort of antipodean Penguin”, hit UK supermarket shelves last year, and now, “a new contender, the lamington, is coming for our tea tables”, said Xanthe Clay in The Telegraph.

A staple of “countless children’s birthday parties and grown-up afternoon teas” in Oz, a typical lamington should follow a “strict formula”: a fluffy cube of vanilla sponge cake, sandwiched with jam, rolled in a “sticky” chocolate sauce and dusted with desiccated coconut.

M&S has caused quite a stir, though, with the launch of its two lamington “varieties”: classic coconut and chocolate, and a caramelised biscuit version. Both veer away from Aussie tradition: adorned with a “leaden swirl of icing on top”, they are made with chocolate cake instead of vanilla sponge.

“As an Australian living in London”, I was surprised to discover my British colleagues hadn’t even heard of lamingtons, said Rose Johnstone in The Guardian. So I gathered a group of fellow Aussies to taste the new M&S offerings.

The “artfully piped buttercream” is “unconventional” but it does look appealing. We were “genuinely shocked”, though, to discover the chocolate cake inside. “I can’t fully convey just how wrong this made us feel; like shucking an oyster to reveal a piece of popcorn instead of a pearl.” Still, all tasters “somewhat guiltily” enjoyed the balance of the jam’s “tartness” with the “rich density” of the chocolate centre. “Just don’t call it a lamington.”

“My Aussie heart skipped a beat” when I heard about the M&S lamingtons, said Mel Evans in Metro. I grew up on the “staple” dessert, which was served at “every party I was ever invited to”. Unfortunately, the M&S version didn’t quite bring back the memories I was hoping for. “I’d call this a twist. A take. A tribute, if you will.” But a very “tasty” one at that.

After the lazy days of summer, autumn demands a touch of effort. But let’s be real, not too much. This collection of cocktail recipes will introduce you to a stylish dame and a reconsideration of a few classics, including the daiquiri, the margarita and the Penicillin.

White Lady

Gin always feels civilized. Shake it with ice, Cointreau, fresh lemon juice and simple syrup. Then, add an egg white and shake another round. The result: a delicate ochre drink with a demure cloud cover of egg white. Civilized indeed.

Paper Plane

A modern masterpiece that shows the charming capabilities of amaro, bourbon, Aperol and lemon. Yes, it’s true there is Aperol life far from a spritz. The Paper Plane is herbal, sharp and boundlessly refreshing. Bonus: The four components are measured equally, at ¾ ounce a piece. You could fly this plane in your sleep.

Greta Garbo

Like its Pa, the daiquiri, the Greta Garbo was born in Cuba. The crucial difference with the liquid Ms. Garbo is the addition of three dashes of absinthe. That mere touch of anise edge complements — rather than steamrolls — the green brightness of a traditional daiquiri.

Tequila Espresso Martini

Hoo boy, like an espresso martini needed to feel better about itself! In this take on the classic, slightly aged reposado tequila is the ballast. Providing assists are coffee liqueur, Licor 43, two kinds of bitters and espresso, of course. The agave verdancy of the tequila moves the drink effortlessly across the caffeine-up and alcohol-down roller coaster of a proper espresso martini.

Hot Penicillin

The honey-ginger-Scotch mingling of a Penicillin is consistently soothing. When you boil together a honey-ginger syrup and add two kinds of Scotch and a wallop of fresh lemon juice, the tingly warmth of this Hot Penicillin is so tranquilizing, you'd best have an armchair and a blanket at the ready.

Coconut Margarita

Your freezer is your pal when you want to make a coconut-kissed margarita. Simply combine tequila and good coconut oil, then freeze overnight. Scoop off the fat set into a raft on top. Then mix the coconut-licked tequila with lime juice, orange liqueur and agave nectar. A touch of the tropics without leaving your house.

Sunn’s

New York City

“If you’re lucky, there will be scallops on the menu at Sunn’s,” said Ligaya Mishan in The New York Times. They’re exemplars of the enchantment of this tiny storefront in Chinatown, because chef Sunny Lee’s father dives for them in the chilly waters off Gloucester, Mass., and provides them to his daughter as a gift. Lee enhances the magic by tossing the raw scallops with fatty tuna, dark cherries, and white cloud-ear mushrooms in a color-conscious arrangement that’s at once pleasurably crunchy and spongy.

Her setup at Sunn’s is minimal: an induction burner, an oven, two rice cookers, and an under-counter fridge. Guests must share just six tables and eight stools. Lee’s menu is limited, too, “yet somehow there is a sense of abundance.” She stuffs dumplings with crab, chicken, and schmaltz, “giving them warming-from-within unctuousness.” She’s also “a master of banchan,” the small dishes that complete a Korean meal.

Sometimes, as you rub elbows with neighboring diners, “a communal exuberance takes hold, as if we were all in this together, this magic act of eking out a beautiful dinner in an under-equipped squeeze of a space.” 139 Division St. Shia Washington, D.C.

Shia

Washington, D.C.

At Edward Lee’s “gem” of a corner restaurant in the Union Market District, “some nights look like an evening out in Seoul,” said Tom Sietsema in The Washington Post. Look around and you’ll see its roughly three dozen seats filled with generations of Korean Americans who’ve come for the chef and cookbook author’s fantastic food, which blends authenticity and innovation.

A $90 five-course tasting menu is served at the bar, seven courses are served at $185 a head in the small dining room, and both begin with sweet-tart tea and an “exquisite” snack of a hot oyster and scallop wrapped in seaweed and accented with cool Asian pear and spicy ssamjang.

Next might come amberjack scrolls topped with a foam made from leftover kimchi liquid that demonstrates Shia’s no-waste ethos, which is evident if you’re looking for it but is never preached about. My meal included a seared braised sea bass in an “intoxicating” soup of crisp greens and broth coaxed from fish scraps, and the duck was another wonder, served in alternating slices with “gently crisp” mountain yam. 1252 4th St. NE.

Restaurant Ki

Los Angeles

Finding the way to this 12-seat chef’s counter “feels like a grown-up version of sneaking into a top-secret tree house,” said Cathy Park in The Infatuation. You must first locate Bar Sawa, a discrete Japanese omakase spot, then weave through a series of doors, including one marked “Employees Only.” But for $285 a head, you’ll enjoy a 12-course feast of modernist Korean cooking “that’s as exciting to watch come together as it is to eat.”

A team of cooks bounces to a soundtrack of Beyoncé and Flo Rida while chef-owner Ki Kim presides, stopping now and then to show you hunks of lamb or shiny lobster tails “before they’re sliced, torched, and delicately tweezed” into compelling compositions. “Traditional ingredients like doenjang and rice wine are sneakily and smartly remixed into luxurious creations accented with seafood and caviar.”

Not all is fancy. Lamb paired with stuffed morels is “pure comfort.” Sure, a meal at Ki “isn’t the most refined experience,” given the cost. But “what it lacks in polish it makes up for in enthusiasm and originality.” 111 S. San Pedro St.

Fall is award season, not just for TV. (Hello, Emmys!). This is the time of year when some of the publications that most know what’s afoot in the food world knight their chosen favorites for the year. For some pubs, that means dubbing a select handful of places as the best restaurants of the year. For others, it’s about name-dropping the country’s best chefs. However you use your abacus with that data, it means there’s a lot of good eating to be had.

Avize, Atlanta

Atlanta loves a lemon-pepper wing. It wasn’t until Avize opened that Atlanta discovered it also loves lemon-pepper frog legs. The Alpine-Atlantan cooking of Avize’s Karl Gorline slips right into the “tradition of Atlanta chefs expanding upon Southern food by leaning into their heritage,” said Pervaiz Shallwani at Bon Appétit when picking Avize for one of 2025’s Best New Restaurants.

Comadre Panadería, Austin

You know you’re in a Mexican panadería when you spot a concha, those domed, crackly pastries named for their resemblance to a shell. You know you’re at Comadre when those conchas have a red-berry coating or are loaded with chunks of chocolate. The bakery’s owner, Mariela Camacho, won a coveted 2025 Best New Chef nom from Food & Wine. Whether it’s pink cake with locally milled corn flour or a delicate polvoron with Texas pecans and mesquite, Comadre focuses on “making food that’s nostalgic and makes you feel warm and fuzzy while still honoring really nutritious ingredients,” Camacho said to the magazine.

Cordelia, Cleveland

Chef and co-owner Vinnie Cimino, winner of a Food & Wine 2025 Best New Chef nod, harnesses the warm essence of “Midwest Nice” at the slightly cheeky and seriously delicious Cordelia. “It’s about holding the door, greeting people with a smile and the respect they deserve,” he said to Food & Wine. It’s nice, too, how Cimino and his crew created a menu that nods to myriad regional traditions: a relish tray you can assemble from seven spreads and bites, greens with Akron-style white French dressing, and lamb that has been corned à la corned beef.

Giovedì, Honolulu

Fritto misto with makrut lime aioli, prosciutto with Vietnamese donuts, gnocchi mapolonese: The cooking at Giovedì is an unabashed amalgam of Italy and the Asian continent. Yes, that gnocchi mapolonese is a hybrid of gnocchi with mapo tofu. Instant winner. “Local food in Hawai‘i is singular,” said Jennifer Hope Choi at Bon Appétit when selecting Giovedì as a Best New Restaurant of 2025. It is “defined by the natural merging of flavors across the islands’ many diasporas.” Giovedì merely stretched those diasporas a touch further — into the European continent.

Lenox, Seattle

Restaurants that trumpet Black cuisine from either the African diaspora or the African-American canon are somewhat easy to find. Afro-Latin cuisine, less so. Jhonny Reyes, with his Seattle restaurant, Lenox, shines a gleaming spotlight on plates like mofongo (mashed plantain served, uncommonly, with prawns) and lechon (pork belly with peas and rice, plus Reyes’ own touch, pickled mustard seeds). “Each dish is a snapshot of the chef’s life, presented with no pomp or ego,” said Elazar Sontag at Bon Appétit for Lenox’s selection as a 2025 Best New Restaurant.

Mawn, Philadelphia

A little Cambodia and quite Philly, Mawn is a noodle house that stretches not just its dough but also its wings. Phila Lorn, its chef, snagged a 2025 Best New Chef award from Food & Wine for his free-wheeling cooking that “casts a wide net of Southeast Asian flavors,” said the magazine. Steak comes seasoned with prohok (fermented fish paste). Cold noodles are slicked with tahini, ground lamb and chili jam. An entire fish is served with fish sauce vinaigrette. Rice pudding, in various forms, is always on the menu. All easy to admire. More challenging? Snagging a reservation.

Recoveco, Miami

One barometer of a restaurant’s greatness is how much it loves where it is located. Recoveco, situated in South Miami, loves it some South Florida. So the menu is loaded with items from the area: grouper, wahoo, Royal Red shrimp, Brogden avocado — much of what Recoveco employs are Florida’s “less obvious treasures,” said Kate Kassin at Bon Appétit. The restaurant’s unearthings are diners’ happy discoveries.

Sun Moon Studio, Oakland

The San Francisco Bay Area adores celebrating its farmers and purveyors. In the United States, that ethos arguably began around those parts. Nonetheless, “dinner at Sun Moon Studio still feels like a revelation,” said Elazar Sontag at Bon Appétit. Sun Moon Studio, a wee restaurant of 12 seats that received a Best New Restaurant 2025 nod from Bon Appétit, uses products from some of the region’s finest purveyors; it includes quail from Wolfe Farm and tofu from Hodo. In the region where this culinary philosophy first took root, dinner at Sun Moon Studio still feels like a revelation. The restaurant’s cuisine is served across 10-plus courses and swerves from Taiwan to France to Japan — all to say the cooking is extremely Californian.

Vinai, Minneapolis

Hmong culture is an indelible part of Minnesota life. A nomadic people originally from Southeast Asia, many Hmong landed during the twentieth century in the northern-central United States. Yia Vang’s Vinai, a 2025 Best New Restaurant winner, is an homage to his Hmong heritage, where “every meal is a chance to tell the story of family,” said Kate Kassin at Bon Appétit. That might mean grilled chicken with coconut-ginger vinaigrette or roasted eggplant that comes from the family’s nearby farm. Bonus: There are four housemade hot sauces to turn the dial up on your meal.

Summer might be over but now is a great time to start planning a visit to a cider farm. The orchards are laden with fruit, which means harvest season is fast approaching.

From the rolling hills of Somerset to the rugged Welsh mountains, the UK is home to plenty of farms offering tours, tastings and, of course, buckets of cider. Here are some of our favourites.

Dunham Apples, Greater Manchester

This “tranquil spot” is a short drive out of Manchester, just west of Altrincham, said Manchester Evening News. The 20-acre orchard is home to an on-site farm that makes fresh juices and ciders. There’s also a shop and tea room where visitors can enjoy homemade cakes and wood-fired pizzas. Best of all, in October Dunham is hosting an apple festival, where guests can hand-pick apples in the orchard before heading to the pressing station to make fresh apple juice. Afterwards, stop by at the Apple Barn to sample the array of refreshing ciders.
dunhamapples.co.uk

Welsh Mountain Cider, Powys

Sitting more than 1,000 feet above sea level in the Cambrian Mountains, this six-acre cider farm is the highest in the UK. Tours and tastings focus on the minimal intervention approach to farming and “natural fermentation methods” at the heart of the cider-making process, said The Sunday Times. Guests will also have a chance to stroll through the sprawling “museum orchard”, which is home to more than 450 varieties of apple and 50 varieties of pear. Enjoy the “fabulous surrounding countryside” and make a weekend of it by pitching up at the “no-frills” campsite.
welshmountaincider.com

Burrow Hill Cider, Somerset

This 250-acre farm at the base of Burrow Hill in Somerset has been making cider for more than 200 years. It’s a “picturesque” setting to spend an afternoon, said Stylist. On Saturdays from April until October you’ll find the “iconic cider bus” serving a range of ciders and cocktails (“when it’s not partying at Glasto, of course”), with live music and food trucks. Visitors can also join a guided tour and tasting, which ends in the bonded warehouse where the farm’s brandy is matured. Be sure to amble up to the top of Burrow Hill to take in the magnificent views.
somersetciderbrandy.com

Saxby’s Cider, Northamptonshire

Once known for his sausages, Saxby’s head cider maker “switched out pork for pints” over a decade ago and hasn’t looked back, said Stylist. “Now, the only remnants of his butcher past is the smiling pig on the front of the bottles.” Tours are available through to October and include a (weather permitting) trailer ride through the orchards and cider tasting. Drop by at the taproom afterwards for more cider, quiz nights and live music.
saxbyscider.co.uk

Mixologists are no strangers to pickles but the ingredient is finally getting a "star turn" on drinks menus everywhere, said The Independent. The liquid is being used to add a "zing" to an array of cocktails from martinis to margaritas.

"Pickles have become a defining food of Gen Z," said Ben Sixsmith in The Spectator, and the juice left over from humble jars of gherkins has been inspiring all sorts of "eccentric" concoctions.

"Well, excuse me," said Victoria Moore in The Telegraph, "but if you want to meet the real pickle generation then look at us Gen X-ers, who celebrated our single-digit birthdays with pickled onions on cocktail sticks stuck into a foil-covered orange." We've been feasting on cornichons for decades; using the leftover juice to "add piquancy to drinks isn't a trend – it's a no brainer".

It's not just the leftover juice from mini cucumbers, either. "Across the country pickled onion, beetroot, pickle, jalepeño and even oyster brine are appearing on bar menus," said The Guardian. And olive brine has, of course, been a key ingredient in dirty martinis for over a century.

But "how do we get dirty without being downright scummy?" Only use brine that's "reasonably fresh", said drinks writer Alice Lascelles. "You don't want stuff that's been sitting in the fridge for six months getting all manky."

For a cocktail that packs a punch, try making a "tangy margarita", said Moore. Add 50ml of tequila to an ice-filled shaker, along with 25ml of triple sec and the same of lime juice, and 10ml of pickle juice and strain into a salt-rimmed glass.

The leftover brine also makes a "terrific" lemonade, as the pickle pairs perfectly with the acidity of lemons.

But the simplest drink you can make is pickle-flavoured soda. Just mix 20ml of your favourite pickle juice with 200ml of sparkling water. "It doesn't get easier than this."

My friend Luigi Speranza, who runs a pasta factory in Brooklyn called La Trafila, made me this quick vodka sauce for supper one evening, only leaving out the vodka, said Mateo Zielonka. I enjoyed it so much I’ve since recreated it at home.

Ingredients (serves 4)

• 360g dried rigatoni
• 30ml/2 tbsp olive oil
• 2 garlic cloves, crushed
• 80g tomato purée
• 1⁄2-1 tsp chilli (hot pepper) flakes (depending on how spicy you like it)
• 250ml double cream
• 1⁄2 bunch of basil (about 15g), leaves only
• parmesan or pecorino (vegetarian, if necessary), grated, to finish
• Salt and pepper to taste

Method

• Heat the olive oil in a large saucepan, add the garlic and fry for a minute before adding the tomato purée and chilli flakes. Stir together and fry for 5-7 minutes until the tomato purée mixture darkens; it will start catching on the bottom of the pan, but that’s what you want to capture all the flavour.
• Reduce the heat to low, pour in the cream and mix well – I like to use a balloon whisk. Scatter over the basil leaves, mix again and season to taste with sea salt and freshly ground black pepper. Leave to one side while you cook the pasta.
• Bring a large pan of water to the boil before adding salt, then add the rigatoni and cook it until it is al dente, following the instructions on the packet.
• Drain the pasta, reserving a ladleful of the cooking water, then add the pasta to the sauce. Toss or swirl together until the pasta is well coated in the sauce, adding some of the cooking water if you think it needs loosening a little.
• Check the seasoning before serving with a generous topping of parmesan or pecorino cheese. Green beans with lemon would be tasty alongside.
• To make a vegan version: replace the dairy cream with the same amount of oat cream. Finish the dish with nutritional yeast or pangrattato (crispy toasted breadcrumbs).

Taken from "Pasta Pronto: Simple, Speedy Recipes to Make Again and Again" by Mateo Zielonka.

Sign up for The Week's Food & Drink newsletter for recipes, reviews and recommendations.

Repeat after me: Jam wants an existence beyond toast. In 2021, master preserver and pastry chef Camilla Wynne published "Jam Bake: Inspired Recipes for Creating and Baking with Preserves." Plenty of cookbooks have taught home cooks how to make jam; others have included recipes for cooking or baking with jam. Wynne's faultless book might be the first to do both and each with sticky, enviable aplomb.

A (jam) river runs through it

Let's start at the end: Those baking recipes in which you will recruit the jam recipes in “Jam Bake.” Before turning to preserving and pastry, Wynne was part of a touring band. Her baking tastes wander wide, courtesy of all those travels. She knows, too, that we sometimes want a baking project and other days crave a simple bake. To that end, Wynne categorizes the books' baked goods according to a difficulty scale from one to three whisks. On the effortless end sits ginger crunch, a Scottish bar cookie with a ginger-y base and a spiky lemon jelly or ginger marmalade topping. Her coffee cake is another one-whisk-level endeavor, its streusel crown hearty with ground hazelnuts and the cake itself laced with raspberry or blackberry jam.

Swing the whisk pendulum, and you land on Black Forest Puffs. A project indeed, they are a head-spinning reconsideration of Mallomars. Wynne's version has a chocolate cookie base topped with a Black Forest jam of sour cherries and cocoa nibs. Over top of each cookie goes a plop of marshmallow, then a glaze of thinned chocolate. Snack attack for Type A adults.

Your fruit is cooked

Wynne provides store-bought jam substitutes for all the baked goods in "Jam Bakes." Handy in a pinch, sure, but Wynne is a precise teacher. An adventure in jam-making is advisable.

She walks through the microbiology of jams, allaying botulism concerns. She demonstrates myriad ways to test if a jam is done, comparing the sheeting test to a love story "wherein we are looking for the jam to fall in love with the spatula." Steadily and slowly dripping, the jam declares "undying love for the spatula, clinging to it fiercely."

And, oh, Wynne's jam flavor combinations! Raspberry and lambic beer; coffee, date and pear; cherry Negroni, rhubarb and Amarena cherry — inspired, ingenious, insured for success. Should you default to morning slathering with any of these jams, your toast will curtsey in your direction.

"If it sometimes feels as if there is a Costa Coffee in every town and city in the UK, that is because there almost is," said The Observer.

Britain's biggest high street coffee chain has more than 2,000 outlets and at least 14,000 self-service machines. They sell "millions of cups a week", yet despite this "market dominance". Coca-Cola, which bought Costa in 2018, is reportedly "considering offloading" it. Its global coffee sales fell 3% last year, mostly due to Costa's performance in the UK; its 2023 revenues were well below 2018 levels.

But Britain's "obsession with coffee shops certainly shows little sign of abating" – its £6.1 billion branded coffee-shop market reportedly grew by 5.2% in 2024, according to Allegra World Coffee Portal. Consumers want "higher-quality, artisan" coffee; smaller chains, independent sites and speciality houses are booming. "So have we reached peak coffee, or just peak Costa?"

Coffee sector in hot water

Costa was founded in 1971 by two brothers as a London roastery, supplying coffee to restaurants and caterers. By the time hospitality company Whitbread bought it in 1995, it was a chain with nearly 40 shops "dedicated to actual coffee", said The Telegraph's restaurant critic.

Coca-Cola bought Costa for nearly £4 billion – but now it is a "dowdy brand", a "proliferator of unnecessary volumes of milky liquid, obesity-inducing horrors" and foods that will "welcome you to an early grave".

Now, analysts told Sky News, the chain could sell for just £2 billion: a staggering loss.

But the whole coffee market is struggling: drought, crop failures and global supply shortages have pushed the price of coffee up to record highs, while the cost-of-living crisis has squeezed consumer budgets.

The sector has suffered from Rachel Reeves' Budget, said The Telegraph. The National Insurance "tax raid" and higher National Living Wage mean payroll costs have "absolutely rocketed". Inflation has surged since the pandemic, and energy-intensive coffee shops have also suffered from higher energy costs. But Costa has "found itself between a rock and a hard place" – losing business to cheaper chains like Greggs, which now has more than 2,600 sites, and to "premium competitors" like Gail's.

"And you know there's a problem when the world's biggest coffee chain, Starbucks, is suffering," said The Grocer. Britain has more than 1,200 outlets, but last year the chain recorded a £35 million loss in the UK and a 4% decline in revenue.

It's an "undeniably tough market" for hospitality in general. But the key difference in such a "competitive and overcrowded" market? Unlike Starbucks, Caffè Nero and Pret A Manger, Costa "missed out on one of the biggest trends in recent years: the viral matcha iced latte".

The 'meteroric' rise of matcha

Around the world, coffee chains are struggling with the "meteoric" rise of matcha, said World Coffee Portal. It's easy to see the appeal. "Matcha is highly caffeinated, visually appealing, a versatile flavour canvas and boasts health benefits that would make a kale smoothie blush."

Costa's high street rivals, as well as premium chain Gail's and smaller ones like Blank Street Coffee, "jumped on the trend", said the BBC. Blank Street, which began in 2020 as a "tiny coffee cart in the garden of a Brooklyn diner", now has 35 stores in London. It reported a 27% growth in outlets last year, its popularity "driven by its TikTok appeal", with its "minty-fresh decorated cafes" and "pastel-hued drinks".

The rise of smaller chains and artisanal independent stores has "eaten into the share" of the major chains, said Clive Black, vice chair of independent investment group Shore Capital.

A "luxury drink as an affordable treat", a trend that emerged after the pandemic, has only grown, said the BBC – but a "straight-up latte isn't a treat", said Clare Bailey, independent retail analyst.

With so much choice, and the rising popularity of home coffee machines, "competition to attract customers heats up", said the BBC. "And when a coffee can cost you the best part of £5, you expect something you can't make yourself."

"The real energy in the market is coming from the independents and speciality roasters, Sahar Hashemi, who co-founded Coffee Republic (one of Britain's first modern coffee-shop chains), told The Observer. There are "people queuing on the street" for a Blank Street coffee, because the "indy-styled chains are offering a lifestyle experience."

Dogon

Washington, D.C.

"How do you follow up a blockbuster?" asked Ligaya Mishan in The New York Times. Three years ago, Kwame Onwuachi conquered New York City with Tatiana, a celebration of the food of the Black diaspora as he'd known it while growing up in the Bronx. With his grand second act, Dogon (pronounced DOE-gon), "the narrative has shifted," giving D.C. a fine-dining celebration of the diaspora that occasionally showcases local treasures.

The name refers to the Dogon people, the West African ancestors of 18th-century astronomer Benjamin Banneker, who helped draw the boundaries of the nation's capital. Onwuachi's carrot tigua, a peanut stew, pays direct tribute to Banneker's forebears. Meanwhile, his cornbread, made with a berbere-spiced chickpea butter, nods to D.C.'s large Ethiopian population, and he makes a marvelous lamb dish inspired by the founder of Ben's Chili Bowl, a local landmark. "At times it seems Onwuachi wants to grasp the whole world," blurring the menu's focus. But the food is mostly excellent, and Dogon, which is far larger than Tatiana, also seems more replicable. When you dine there, you're "witnessing the birth of an empire." 1330 Maryland Ave. SW.

RVR

Los Angeles

Travis Lett's previous solo restaurant venture, MTN, was "dripping in hipness," said Bill Addison in the Los Angeles Times. Though trend chasers loved the place, the experimental izakaya didn't survive the pandemic. But Lett, who'd previously redefined modern California cuisine at Gjelina, has retaken control of MTN's former space in Venice and transformed it into RVR, an equally hip but more assured incarnation that "turns out to be shockingly good, thanks especially to the kitchen's brilliance with vegetables."

During summer, apricots step in for cucumbers in a riff on a Japanese salad, and the flavor burst of ripe tomatoes is sharpened by sweet potato vinegar. Even midwinter, the kitchen plates such Technicolor wonders as a pinwheel of Fuyu persimmons under rounds of lilac-purple daikon. Beyond the vegetarian-friendly options, "there's plenty more that entices," from duck meatball tsukune to "smoky-sweet" Monterey Bay squid. As at all izakayas, "the drinking component is critical," and the sakes, wine list, and negronis fully deliver. 1305 Abbot Kinney Blvd.

Minari

Minneapolis

Until recently, chef Jeff Watson had been "one of the unseen forces" propelling Minneapolis' dining scene into the national spotlight, said Dara Moskowitz Grumdahl in MplsStPaul magazine. Now Watson has opened "the most ambitious Korean restaurant we've ever had in Minnesota," and even at this early stage, its "culinary thrills" outweigh its overreaches.

The 180-seat burgundy dining room feels like a favored hangout of "terrifically sexy" 1920s vampires. There's dim sum. There's charcoal barbecue. There's even a world-class crab pasta. And the menu's "cold and raw" section makes Minari "the most innovative sushi-adjacent spot we've had in years." Watson, who's been Dani del Prado's right-hand man in the city's dominant restaurant group, began his kitchen studies under his Korean mom, and his meticulousness shines through in Minari's "jigsaw-tight" gimbap rolls. But Minari doesn't yet get every dish right, which makes me want to advise him to do less. "Except it's terrible and stupid advice." Watson has earned the opposite kind of guidance: Keep reaching, chef. 323 13th Ave. NE.

Fruit beer is having a "modern renaissance in the UK", said The Telegraph. Demand for the light, refreshing drink is soaring, with sales up 250% year-on-year at Tesco.

The "conventional narrative in the beer world" is that these fruity tipples "cater for younger drinkers who have a sweeter palate than previous generations", said Pete Brown in The Sunday Times.

But this doesn't have to be the case. There's a growing number of inventive, top-quality fruit beers cropping up on supermarket shelves and in pubs that appeal to grown-ups, too.

Any fruit beer worth drinking incorporates "real fruit juice rather than artificial syrups" or is "aged in oak barrels with actual whole pieces of fruit". Some use stone fruits like plum or damson to bring out the "forest-fruit notes" you find in ales and stouts, while others pick out the "tropical fruit aromas" present in New World IPAs.

And they aren't necessarily sweet, either. Belgian kriek, for example, is made by adding cherries to lambic and fermenting out the sweetness to leave behind "bright acidity".

Bacchus Kriek gives an "intense cherry hit" with a "mouth-puckering" sourness, said The Telegraph. Ideal for beginners wanting to try Belgian beer, it's "beautifully clean" with a heady aroma that "jumps from the glass".

Another great option for those looking for something more acidic is Gravity Well Brewing's Shall I Give You Dis Pear?, which begins with notes of "fresh pear" and a "persistent sourness" and finishes with "tropical tones of guava". It's the perfect match for a simple walnut salad.

We love Kirkstall Brewery's Judicious juicy pale ale, said delicious. Bursting with pink grapefruit, pineapple, lychee, passion fruit and peach, it's balanced with a "hint of creamy coconut alongside citrussy hops". And for a crowd-pleaser, said Jane Macquitty in The Times, try Indian Brewery's "easy-swigging", "alphonso mango puree-charged" Juicy Mango.

Mori Nozomi

Los Angeles

A female sushi chef with an all-woman team is still a rarity, even in Los Angeles, America's sushi capital, said Tejal Rao in The New York Times. "But the thrill of Mori Nozomi is in Nozomi Mori's distinct style as a chef—the way she annotates the singular focus of the omakase with some of the more complex, seasonal digressions of kaiseki and rituals of the Japanese tea ceremony."

Behind an eight-seat counter in an airy, sparsely decorated room, she proceeds serenely as soft music plays. She "carves sheer petals out of swordtip squid" and "etches her blade into the milky top of a scallop so it yields its sweetness more immediately." In this $250, two-dozen-course meal, there are no caviar bumps or torched Wagyu. "The closest thing to a show" is Mori pulling out a butchered tuna and scooping tender meat from its bones with a spoon. It's a move that defies the wastefulness of most sushi counters. It also yields delicious toro taku hand rolls for each guest. 11500 W. Pico Blvd.

Kira

Houston

"Japanese restaurants continue to open at a clip that dwarfs our city's newest options for steakhouses or Tex-Mex," said Bao Ong in the Houston Chronicle. Kira, a 15-seat listening bar, is a standout, and has become "the restaurant I seek out when I want a sophisticated yet casual meal." Credit lead chefs Luis Mercado and Paolo Justo, who "do more than quietly slice through delicate cuts of glistening fish from Japan."

The pair and the team they manage have created an atmosphere that balances tradition and easygoing creativity. As a mix of hip-hop, funk, rock, and Japanese city pop plays on the sound system, you might order the hand roll in which crisp seaweed swaddles ocean trout that sits atop a bed of rice, tofu cream, sour cream, and onion powder. It's like an everything bagel with more fish. More-traditional crudo and sashimi feature "buttery" cuts that are "not too thin or too thick." Yes, "a parade of fancy add-ons" and the "smart lineup of cocktails, wine, and sake" can run up your tab. But with careful ordering, Kira can also be a bargain. 2800 Kirby Drive.

Soraya

Detroit

"Every bustling downtown metropolis needs at least one solid, reliable sushi restaurant," said Melody Baetens in The Detroit News. Detroit has found its standard-bearer in Soraya. The "sleek" double-height space in the Bedrock Federal Reserve Building offers cozy booths, a welcoming modern bar, and big windows facing Fort Street. John Kim's sushi menu provides "a good balance of familiar and fun."

Inventive dishes include a spicy ahi tuna roll that's brought to table aflame and the shenron roll: shrimp tempura rolled with cucumber and avocado and topped with tender eel. Executive chef Jorge Morales adds fusion options such as udon cacio e pepe and a ramen bowl whose roasted pork shank is a nod to Morales' Puerto Rican roots. The delicious chicken katsu is available at both lunch and dinner, while a once-a-month pop-up menu features Korean fried chicken that's the stuff of dreams. Factor in moderate price points, a friendly staff, and "banging happy-hour specials," and Soraya is pure satisfaction. 160 W. Fort St.

When you make a purchase using links on our site, The Week may earn a commission. All reviews are written independently by our editorial team.

If you have read even a smidge about Italian cooking, you have encountered the adage that Italian food is all about simplicity. Defining simplicity, though, is not always simple. Marco Canora's "Salt to Taste: The Keys to Confident, Delicious Cooking," published in 2009, traces the ways simplicity materializes in Italian-inspired cooking.

Successful simplicity demands either minimal or standout ingredients and also precise cooking technique and resourcefulness. Canora, the chef-owner of New York City's Hearth restaurant and also the arguable progenitor of the bone broth craze thanks to his brothy endeavor Brodo, shows you how these are endgames you can achieve at home.

Generational wealth

Canora's family hails from Tuscany, so "Salt to Taste" is riddled with the flavors of that central Italian region. Cacciucco is a seafood stew teeming with squid, clams, mussels and shrimp, its base piquant with tomato puree, white wine and dried oregano. Tuscan kale, aka dinosaur or lacinato kale, steps into the spotlight across the book. Its appearance predates the wrinkly vegetable's ubiquity so much so that Canora calls it "black cabbage."

He directs you to strip it of its ribs, then toss the leaves in a zip-top bag and store in the freezer. Then when you go to make yet another iconic Tuscan dish, the vegetable soup known as ribollita, you remove the kale from the freezer and "when you crush the frozen cabbage, it winds up in a million little pieces — just what you want." The leaves are put to softer use in a risotto with sausage and in a nonchalant braise alongside chickpeas served over soft polenta.

Two sides of simple

Little in "Salt to Taste" exemplifies Canora's proficiency in showing you how to build flavor like his pasta e fagioli. You first warm pieces of bacon and either prosciutto or pancetta in olive oil, then when the meaty bits have rendered their fat, you add diced onions. Cook down. Add chopped garlic. Cook down. Add fresh rosemary and sage. Cook down. Then comes tomato paste and, yes, more cooking down. Tier upon tier of compounding flavor are established before broth and beans are added. Right before serving, you boil short pasta like ditalini or elbow macaroni and mix it into the soup. Finish with a nub of butter and a dusting of Parmigiano, along with fresh ground black pepper and a lash of olive oil. Bowls of deep-seated comfort.

Canora's stracciatella sits at the other side of the swinging pendulum. It is no more than good homemade broth into which you add eggs that have been mixed with Parmigiano, parsley and a whisper of nutmeg. Cover the pot and let sit for a few minutes. Whisk the eggs and they transform into wispy rags. Five ingredients, plus salt and pepper. See? Simplicity is multivalent. In Marco Canora's hands it is also reliably gratifying.

Tahini sauces are wonderful for adding creaminess to dishes without the need for dairy, said Yasmin Khan. Here, broccoli florets and radishes are first roasted and then dressed with a curry-spiced tahini dressing and served on a bed of lentils. Giving exact measurements for tahini dressings can be tricky as each brand varies so much in thickness (and on how long you've had the jar open), so use the quantity below as a guide and add a touch more water or lemon to loosen, or extra tahini to thicken.

Ingredients (serves four to six as part of a mezze)

For the roasted vegetables:

• 700g broccoli (about 2 crowns)
• 140g radishes (about 16 small red round ones)
• 2 tbsp vegetable oil
• salt

For the lentils:

• 240g Puy lentils
• 600ml just-boiled water
• 2 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil
• 3 tbsp lemon juice
• salt and freshly ground black pepper

For the curried tahini sauce:

• 120g tahini
• 75ml lemon juice
• 60ml water
• 1 garlic clove, finely grated
• 1 tbsp maple syrup
• 1 tsp medium curry powder
• salt and freshly ground black pepper

For the toppings:

• 6 Medjool dates, pitted and roughly chopped
• 1 small handful chopped parsley or coriander leaves (optional)

Method

• Preheat the oven to 200°C/Fan 180°C.
• Break up the broccoli florets and slice off the stalks as they naturally separate. Cut the stalks into thick pieces about the same size as the florets. Put the broccoli and radishes on a large baking sheet and toss with the vegetable oil and half a teaspoon of salt. Roast for about 20 minutes, until cooked but still firm. The broccoli will be slightly charred and that's OK. Set aside to cool.
• While the vegetables are in the oven, combine the lentils and just-boiled water in a small saucepan, cover, and cook over a medium heat for 25-30mins, until the lentils are soft but still have some shape. Drain and return to the saucepan, then dress with the olive oil, the lemon juice, half a teaspoon of salt, and a quarter of a teaspoon of pepper.
• To make the curried tahini sauce, whisk together the tahini, lemon juice, water, garlic, maple syrup, curry powder, half a teaspoon of salt, and a quarter of a teaspoon of black pepper in a small bowl. The sauce will thicken as it sits, so if you are making it ahead of time, you might need to add more water.
• To serve, spread the lentils in a shallow servingdish, spoon over two-thirds of the tahini sauce, pile the roasted broccoli and radishes on top, drizzle over the remaining tahini sauce, and scatter the dates and herbs (if using) on top.

Taken from "Sabzi" by Yasmin Khan.

Sign up for The Week's Food & Drink newsletter for recipes, reviews and recommendations.

"Summer 2025 is all about rosorange", said Ellie Smith in Country & Town House. The "love child" of "ever-trendy" orange wine and rosé, it's a "crisp, quaffable and surprisingly complex" tipple, wine expert Libby Brodie told the magazine.

Rosorange can now be found in a "dreamcoat array" of "sunset hues" spanning everything from amber to vermilion, said Victoria Moore in The Telegraph. These wines get their Instagram-worthy colours from "skin contact": fermenting white grapes with their skins on creates an orange-hued wine; limiting the fermentation time of red grape skins achieves the pale pink shades of a rosé; "combining both approaches gives you rosorange".

It's an "intriguing" proposition, said Hannah Crosbie in The Guardian. The combined "styles" couldn't be further apart: rosé drinkers often seek something "bone-dry" and "classic" with "no alarms and surprises", while those buying orange wines are usually after a "funkier", more experimental bottle. Perhaps the rosorange trend is part of efforts by the industry to introduce orange wine to a "broader audience" of established rosé drinkers.

Aldi's rosorange is a "successful summery fusion", said David Williams in The Observer. Expect "soft cherry tones", which gradually open into a "subtly bitter orange with the merest nip of perfectly brewed tea-type tannin". At £9.99 a bottle, you certainly can't "knock the price", said Hannah Rees in the Liverpool Echo. "Light" and subtle, with a "hint of citrus", it's a "refreshing" wine.

Another excellent option for £10 is Waitrose's "nifty" Côté Mas Rosorange, said Jane MacQuitty in The Times. Perfect for "adventurous chefs", the notes of candied orange peel and tea leaf fruit work perfectly with everything from a "spicy vegetarian dish to a punchy curry".

This is a wonderfully quick curry to throw together, said Mandy Yin. I prefer using Worcestershire sauce to tamarind, but if you're vegetarian, feel free to just use tamarind paste. Serve on its own with rice, or as a side dish.

Ingredients (serves four)

• 3⁄4 tsp salt, plus extra for the cooking water
• 1 small onion, roughly chopped
• 2.5cm piece of ginger, peeled, chopped
• 3 garlic cloves
• 2 fresh red chillies, roughly chopped (optional)
• 4 tbsp vegetable oil
• 1 tsp ground turmeric
• 300g spring greens, leaves stripped and sliced into 1cm pieces
• 400g canned chickpeas in salted water, drained and rinsed
• 250ml UHT coconut cream (usually in a can or carton)
• 2 tbsp Worcestershire sauce or tamarind paste
• 1⁄2 tsp sugar (only add if using tamarind paste)

Method

• Bring a large pot of heavily salted water (like the sea) to a rolling boil.
• Using a food processor to save time, finely chop the onion, ginger, garlic and chillies. Transfer the mixture to a large non-stick wok, then add the oil, 3⁄4 tsp salt and turmeric, and place over a medium-high heat. Stir-fry for 9 minutes, stirring frequently to avoid burning.
• While the onions are cooking, add the spring greens and chickpeas to the pot of boiling water. Simmer over a medium heat for 5 minutes. Drain thoroughly.
• Add the coconut cream, Worcestershire sauce and sugar to the wok. Bring to the boil, then turn off the heat. Add the spring greens and chickpeas to the sauce, stir to combine and serve.

Taken from Simply Malaysian by Mandy Yin.

Sign up for The Week's Food & Drink newsletter for recipes, reviews and recommendations.

Mahari

Chicago

"Mahari brings not just the vibrant cuisines of the African diaspora to Chicago, but also chefs blazing their own paths," said Louisa Kung Liu Chu in the Chicago Tribune. Rahim Muhammad and his mother co-own the Hyde Park restaurant, whose dining room, with its woven-grass ceiling, creates "an escape from the everyday." Mahari's strong communal vibe starts in the kitchen, where cooks from across the Caribbean, West Africa, and the American South contribute to a menu overseen by Muhammad. His Louisiana upbringing and Le Cordon Bleu training shine through in a "spectacular" prawn and polenta dish and "stunning" salmon calas—a savory twist on New Orleans' breakfast rice cakes. A Haitian chef creates the pikliz, a peppery condiment, used for the popular lamb burger while a friend of East African heritage makes the meat-and-lentil-filled sambusas. Muhammad's mother, known as Mama Shawn, makes the desserts, which are "endearingly homestyle," a sharp contrast to her son's elevated mains. But community is everything here. Visit for a birthday and it'll be celebrated by Caribbean drumming and a room-wide toast. 1504 E. 55th St.

Kabawa

New York City

Plenty of restaurants "seem focused on making guests feel rich," said Matthew Schneier in NYMag.com. At Kabawa, where the menu's directive reads, "Love yuh self. Eat yuh guts full," chef Paul Carmichael and crew dedicate themselves to making their diners happy. Kabawa is Carmichael's "ode not just to his own Bajan upbringing but to the entire Caribbean diaspora," and it's an exercise in deliciousness. A meal at the counter that wraps the open kitchen is interactive and boisterous, and usually begins with roti that you use to scoop up chickpea curry and other dips. Carmichael, who has earned this perch in the Momofuku empire, "knows how to coax deep, almost outrageous flavors from even simple dishes." His duck sausage has "a coffeelike richness and subtle heat," and you're not likely to find a more tender square of goat than what Kabawa serves in a stewy dried-scallop curry. I do wish the dining room wasn't so dark, but that doesn't kill the joy Kabawa cultivates. Sure, the three-course prix fixe costs $145. But you leave "lighter in pocket and in spirit." 8 Extra Place

Elmina

Washington, D.C.

At Elmina, former Top Chef contestant Eric Adjepong is "putting the food he knows from childhood on a pedestal," said Tom Sietsema in The Washington Post. In a sleek, three-level space, the son of Ghanaian immigrants offers diners two ways to engage. "One is to belly up to one of the two bars and graze from a menu of dishes rooted in West African street food." You can't miss with kelewele—fried ripe plantains with peanuts—or chofi—fatty, juicy turkey tail that's also fried and eaten with a "bold and funky" shito sauce. The $105 four-course tasting menu, served in the upper-level dining rooms, might open with a "sunset-colored" corn bisque or mashed eggplant with roasted tomato and goat cheese. "The prize among second courses" is the fufu. Here the pounded plantain and cassava are served atop a bar of braised goat that sits in a peanut soup, all of which I so obviously enjoyed that a server exclaimed, "Slap your momma, right?" All signs point to success for Elmina. "Amen to that, and pass the fufu." 2208 14th St. NW

Once brushed off as "back-of-the-cupboard" fare, tinned fish has become one of Britain's "chicest grocery indulgences", and a "surprisingly sexy new status symbol", said Hannah Twiggs in The Independent.

In a world filled with UPFs and "scandalously long ingredient lists", there is something "refreshingly simple" about a tin of tuna smothered in extra virgin olive oil. "It's a rare thing: unpretentious but vaguely exotic, convenient but also a conversation starter."

Colourful, retro branding from Spain and Portugal has helped transform ordinary tins of fish into "treasures" to "show off on Instagram" and artfully display in your kitchen, Patrick Martinez, founder of The Tinned Fish Market, told the publication.

The tinned fish snack has become a go-to, "the king of the cupboard", said Steve Dineen in City A.M. Taking out a subscription means delivery of everything from "impossibly soft and juicy" sardines to "fat little Spanish mussels" arrives straight to your doorstep.

If you want to be "chic", said Xanthe Clay in The Telegraph, simply "plonk a can of fish on the table with some fantastic bread and posh butter, and dig in". Not only are sardines "packed with protein" and "brain-boosting omega 3 oils", they're considered to be among the most "sustainable catches around".

Of course, prices vary massively, with those at the upper end of the spectrum costing over £15 a tin, while supermarket basics can be as little as 50p. If you're planning to use the tinned fish to bulk out a sauce, it's probably not worth splashing out. But for a "treat on toast", fancy brands come into their own. Ortiz's "neat and silvery" sardines "gleaming in dark amber oil" have a "nice meaty texture" and look good enough to "serve straight from the tin".

Or, if you're after a budget-friendly option, you can't go wrong with John West sardines in olive oil, said José Pizarro in The Guardian. The flavour and consistency of the fish is "pretty great", especially considering the price (around £1.30). After the blind tasting, it would be "lying if I said I wasn't very surprised indeed" to find out where these were from.

"I have yet to meet a tinned fish aficionado" for whom Fangst's Danish freshwater trout wasn't near the top of their list, said Charley Lanyon in Eater. Delicately smoked with juniper and lemon thyme, this "fresh, bright" trout represents "all that is exceptional in Nordic tinned seafood". And when it comes to mackerel, you can't go wrong with Mouettes D'Arvor – the "classic" French cannery is "one of the world's best". For a "zingy and almost pickled" flavour, try the version with Muscadet wine and herbs – "perfect on cold pasta or alongside a gin and tonic".