Need a New Project for 2018? Join Our Cookbook Club

If one of your resolutions for the new year is to cook through more cookbooks, you've come to the right spot: Our Cookbook Club explores a new cookbook each month! Join us as we come together, get to know each other a little better, and learn from each other, all while engaging in one of our favorite pastimes—talking about food.

We'll be kicking off 2018 with Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Volume 1, but if you don't have a copy yet, we've got you covered: Read on for a few recipes from Julia Child. Plus, find out what books are coming up next and all the details on how to participate, too.

Note: Child's Zucchini Tian does not appear in Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Volume 1, but since we're sharing it here, it's fair game for sharing in the Club.

And if you're not quite ready to head into the kitchen just yet, curl up with your laptop and spend a little time getting to know Child:

Those of you who are familiar with our Cookbook Club know that the books we cook through are self-selected by the group. But this time, we wanted to do something special for the Club in February (read on!), so we selected other top vote-getters from our last round of voting to round out the first quarter of the year.

Without further ado, here's what's ahead for the Cookbook Club:

• February: Happy birthday to the Cookbook Club! Our Club turns one year old, so all of the books we’ve previously covered are fair game to revisit this month:
  • Art of the Pie by Kate McDermott
  • Deep Run Roots by Vivian Howard
  • Simple by Diana Henry
  • Small Victories by Julia Turshen
  • Ottolenghi's suite of books (other than Sweet) — Ottolenghi, Jerusalem, Plenty More, Plenty, and/or Nopi

  • My Paris Kitchen: Recipes and Stories by David Lebovitz
  • Dinner: Changing the Game by Melissa Clark
  • Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat by Samin Nosrat
  • Made in India by Meera Sodha
  • The Food Lab by J. Kenji López-Alt
  • Genius Recipes by Kristen Miglore
• March: Smitten Kitchen Every Day by Deb Perelman

2018 Bonus Book: Six Seasons by Joshua McFadden

What is a bonus book? While we focus on one book a month, this is an extra book that members can cook through the whole year long, too. The group will have more time to cook through McFadden’s book, and members will always have this book as an option to cook from if they don’t have access to the book of the month.

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For those eager to know what we'll tackle after March, in an effort to plan ahead, we generally hold votes for three months' worth of books at a time—it's especially helpful for library reserving, and book purchasing and shipping purposes. We'll vote for the books for the second quarter of the year (April, May, and June) in February.

If you're new to the Cookbook Club, here's a quick primer on how to join in the fun:

1) Get the Book(s)

Buy a book or two—many are available in our shop or pay a visit to your favorite local bookstore. Or, if you’re not ready to commit quite yet, check them out from your local library or borrow a copy from a friend.

2) Read & Cook

Rather self-explanatory, as this is one of the most important parts of participating in a cookbook club, right? If you’re not sure where to begin, take a page out of our former Cookbook Editor Ali Slagle's playbook. When she reviewed a cookbook, she'd read through the entire introduction as well as 15 headnotes and recipes, and then cook at least three recipes.

3) Share Your Opinions

We chat in our Facebook group all month long! Join the Cookbook Club here and post pictures of what you bake from the books and share reviews, too. Fill everyone in on what you thought of the dish (remember to share the recipe name and even the page number, if possible). You can share photos on Instagram as well. Just remember to tag them with #f52cookbookclub.