cookbook recommendations

buildersdaughter

Specifically, bread and/or baking; and Eastern cookery. Thinking simple versions of Vietnamese / Thai.
I personally like the Dorling Kindersley bread book, and Bill Granger's Everyday Asian. But I am buying a gift for a keen cook of average experience and would like to look a little wider.
Many thanks!

caronc

Breadwise I'd say you can't go wrong with "Dough" by Richard Bertinet or "The Handmade Loaf" by Dan Lepard. Baking - I'd go for Nigella Lawson - "How to be a Domestic Goddess". Asian is harder as it is so wide ranging. My son really likes David Thompson's "Thai Food" and I've heard good things about "Every Grain of Rice" by Fuschia Dunlop.

[Deleted User]

For bread I would suggest:


The Big Book of Bread by Anne Sheasby.


Also, for a posher style present I borrowed Paul Hollywood's Bread book from the library and that had some great recipes.

Need2bthrifty

I dont do any bread making, but for baking this is my bible so to speak everything I've tried from the simplest dropped scones to easy traybakes and a bit more challenging celebration cakes and fancy meringue creations have all turned out perfectly.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Mary-Berrys-Ultimate-Cake-Second/dp/0563487518

As for Asian recipes, Korean cuisine is becoming very popular and the ingredients are now available in most supermarkets. I bought this one fairly recently and have tried a couple of recipes which were really nice.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Our-Korean-Kitchen-Jordan-Bourke/dp/0297609718

Callie22

I recently bought 'Cook Thai' by Sebby Holmes and I think it's quite good. If you want to try Korean food then I'd recommend the cookbook by Maangchi - she also has a great Youtube channel where you can watch her make lots of her recipes. Fuchsia Dunlop is brilliant for Chinese food, 'Every Grain of Rice' is great for simpler recipes. For Japanese food, I'd recommend anything by Harumi Kurihara. I've also heard good things about the Hairy Biker's 'Asian Adventure' book - it's not strictly authentic but their books always make the recipes seem quite do-able.

For baking, I'd second the recommendation for Dan Lepard, his books are great and technical enough to be interesting without being overwhelming. For general cake baking, I'd always recommend Mary Berry's 'Ultimate Cake Book' or Delia's 'Book of Cakes', they are just classics and have all of the recipes you'd ever need.

buildersdaughter

Thank you all so much, I'm going to have a look at all of these. I'm debating whether to go for the simpler recipes as the recipient doesn't have a great deal of spare time, or whether the more'authentic' ones will interest him more.
I am quite a good cook, but I give up on a lot of Asian recipes (that's why my personal favourite is Bill Granger)
I have heard good things about Dan Lepard and have seen a few of his recipes in The Guardian.

Callie22

Dan Lepard's Rocky Road Rock Cakes. I'll just leave this here

Mr_Singleton

A good choice for bread baking for a keen cook would be Flour, water, salt yeast by Ken Forkish..... it!!!8217;s my go to bread book. I!!!8217;d also take a look at Tartine by Chad Robinson.
Most mass market bread books are meh!

Current favourite cookbooks in relation to OP....

Japanese - Cibi. Lots of easy tasty recipes!

Korean - My Rice Bowl

Not a big fan of Chinese (spent too much time there eating the authentic stuff) or Thai but have about 10 cookbooks