Holiday gift guide: 7 cookbook gifts

Ratio: The Simple Codes Behind the Craft of Everyday Cooking, by Michael Ruhlman (Scribner, $27)

While making gravy for Thanksgiving, I had to look up, for what seemed like the millionth time, how much fat, flour and stock I would need. Then I remembered Michael Ruhlman's book, which came out in the spring. There on Page 113 were the relevant ratios: Roux = 3 parts flour: 2 parts fat. Thickening ratio = 10 parts liquid: 1 part roux.
?Ratio? was inspired by a conversation Ruhlman had with Uwe Hestnar, a chef-instructor at the Culinary Institute of America, where the latter handed the former a chart that contained ?the fundamentals of the culinary arts, distilled to a page and half.? Ruhlman found the ratio sheet beautiful, ?Like a poet chipping away at his words, compressing and polishing until his idea is a diamond,? he ?removed every extraneous element of cooking.? The resulting book is, of course, more than a page and a half long, but it is admirably concise, presenting 33 ratios (e.g. Bread = 5 parts flour: 3 parts water. Chocolate sauce = 1 part chocolate: 1 part cream), recipes and variations. It?s not an exaggeration to say that this book plus a good scale are all you need.

The Pleasures of Cooking for One, by Judith Jones (Knopf, $27.95)

Judith Jones is the legendary cookbook editor who not only published Julia Child but such culinary giants as Marcella Hazan, Madhur Jaffrey and Claudia Roden, to name a few. As an author, she collaborated with her husband, Evan, on three cookbooks. When he died in 1996, she writes, ?I was not sure that I would ever enjoy preparing a meal for myself and eating it alone.? Ultimately, however, she found her way back into the kitchen, observing that, ?if you like good food, why not honor yourself enough to make a pleasing meal and relish every mouthful.? Jones? writing is clear and simple, as are these recipes. The book is small and illustrated with Christopher Hirsheimer?s quiet, thoughtful photographs. The longest chapter covers cooking throughout the week, offering recipes for main dishes with what Jones calls ?second and third rounds.? (First you roast a chicken, then you make minced chicken on toast.) The remaining chapters cover soups, eggs, vegetables and salads, grains and legumes and, finally, sweets.

Momofuku, by David Chang and Peter Meehan (Potter, $40)

David Chang is the gifted chef who founded Momofuku Noodle Bar in 2003 in Manhattan?s East Village. Although the restaurant (named in honor of Momofuku Ando, who invented instant ramen in 1958) was casual and inexpensive, the food was prepared with an almost maniacal devotion to quality. Within the next five years Chang opened Momofuku Ssäm Bar, devoted to Korean-style wraps; Ko, a high-end restaurant with only 12 seats and Milk Bar, an extension of Ssäm Bar famous for its ?compost cookie? made from pretzels, potato chips, coffee, oats, butterscotch, chocolate chips. All of the recipes that made Chang famous are here, including ginger-scallion noodles, ramen broth, bacon dashi, pork shoulder, pork belly, pork buns. The guy's at the forefront of the modern pork-meat-rules movement. Some of the recipes are very simple ? I made and enjoyed the watermelon rind pickles ? but even the ones that are too involved for the home cook offer a fascinating window into the mind of David Chang.

The Craft of Baking: Cakes Cookies & Other Sweets, by Karen DeMasco and Mindy Fox (Potter, $35)

Karen DeMasco was the ?founding pastry chef? at Tom Colicchio?s Manhattan restaurants Craft, Craftbar and ?wichcraft; since 2008 she has run the dessert program at Locanda Verde, the TriBeCa spot co-owned by Robert De Niro. Despite her restaurant experience, however, DeMasco has the soul of a home cook: She is not in love with her own creativity, noting, ?I refer to baking as a craft because it?s about making things with care and ingenuity ... to excel at the craft of baking means being inventive while retaining a recipe?s original integrity.? The woman?s greatest influence may well have been her Grandma Rankin. DeMasco writes clearly about her craft, offering many valuable tips along the way ? you can hasten butter?s softening by cutting it into cubes ? but the best things about the book are the recipes: concord-grape pie, lemon steamed pudding, and, instead of a parade of complicated layer cakes, these homey alternatives: raspberry-pistachio brown-butter cake, almond pound cake, caramelized-apple skillet cake, lemon olive oil cake, brown sugar cake.

Salt to Taste: The Key to Confident, Delicious Cooking, by Marco Canora and Catherine Young (Rodale, $35)

Canora, who cooked at Craft before striking out on his own at Hearth in the East Village and Insieme (in midtown, which he left a few months ago), is another Colicchio acolyte and another professional chef who has written a book with the home chef in mind. ?I?ve made a conscious effort to take a step back and really examine how I approach what I do,? he writes. Canora?s mother was born in Tuscany and he cooked for a decade in Florence. His food has a vibrant Italian simplicity. He is a big advocate of the soffritto, the sauteed Tuscan flavor base made from onions, celery and carrots (or fennel). Soffritto, lemon, olive oil, fresh herbs ? this is about as far-out as his seasoning gets. Some of the most appealing-sounding recipes: an escarole soup with four ingredients, red-wine-braised octopus, roasted red snapper with potatoes and onions, and Tuscan fried chicken with sage.

Seafood alla Siciliana: Recipes & Stories from a Living Tradition, by Tony Lydecker (Lake Isle Press, $38)

?The location of Sicily,? writes Lydecker, ?surrounded by three seas, explains the importance of seafood to its unique crossroads cuisine.? This thoughtful and original volume contains wonderful historical information, valuable touring advice (should you find yourself traveling to Sicily) and a real appreciation for the distinctive cuisine: ?At the heart of Sicilian cooking is a short list of phenomenal core ingredients, among them olive oil, sea salt, capers, preserved anchovies and tomatoes? which ?are employed in an astonishing number of permutations.? While the recipes capture the soul of Sicily, they are entirely workable in an American kitchen: Lydecker makes thoughtful substitutions such as mahi mahi for the local Sicilian fish lampuca alla matalotta. Photographs are striking and do justice to such recipes as pistachio-crusted shrimp, rigatoni with fried eggplant and swordfish, tuna poached in olive oil, roasted red mullet and the ?"national dish,? pasta con le sarde (pasta with sardines, currants, pine nuts and wild fennel). Plus a smattering of side dishes and desserts, a glossary, reading list and source list.

Encyclopedia of Pasta, by Oretta Zanini De Vita and Maureen Fant (University of California Press, $29.95)

This chunky little volume starts out with an overview of pastas? origins and meaning, then launches into an exhaustive listing of 310 Italian pasta shapes, from abbotta pezziende to zumari. Each entry contains the pasta name, what type of pasta it is (long, short, stuffed, etc.), its ingredients, how it is made, what it is also known as, how it is served, where it is found and extensive ?remarks.? Let?s untangle gnudi, Tuscan dumplings made from chopped greens that are literally ?nude?: they have no pasta encasing them. They are also known as malfatti, ravioli gnudi and strozzapreti. However, strozzapreti, literally ?priest stranglers,? can also be used to describe a totally different pasta, rather coarse flour-based shapes that are also known as strangolapreti in central and southern Italy; gnocchi di prete, in Friuli; frigulelli, in the Marche; maccheroni alla molinara, in Abruzzo; and affogaparrini (?drown the priests?) in Sicily. This is my idea of a good time.