10 Middle Eastern Cookbook Titles We Recommend
Updated: Oct. 08, 2021
This collection of cookbooks is your window into the beautiful world of Middle Eastern cooking. The list includes books with recipes spanning various Middle East regions, diets, cooking methods and levels of complexity.
Cooking in Iran
by Najmieh Batmanglij
Cooking in Iran: Regional Recipes and Kitchen Secrets is more than a cookbook. This book covers a journey through Iran, cooking with locals, exploring the culture and developing recipes. It has over 250 Iranian dishes, all with beautiful photographs. Author Najmieh Batmanglij shares plenty of inspiration (and lots of tips) with ambitious home cooks.
Notable recipe: Even the thought of Caramelized Onion, Walnut + Raisin Rice with Pomegranate Syrup will make your mouth water.
Jerusalem: A Cookbook
by Yotam Ottolenghi and Sami Tamimi
The authors, both born in Jerusalem, have created a vibrant, personal cookbook with over 120 pages of stunning photographs and recipes. Some of the ingredients in Jerusalem may be exotic and hard to find, but the outcome of these recipes is spectacular and worth every effort taken to gather the ingredients.
Notable recipe: Na’ama’s Fattoush, a salad made with flatbread, greens and other vegetables. You can test out this Fattoush Salad recipe while you wait for the book to arrive!
Julie Taboulie’s Lebanese Kitchen
by Julie Ann Sageer and Leah Bhabha
Like her Emmy-nominated cooking show Cooking with Julie Taboulie, each of the recipes in Julie Taboulie’s Lebanese Kitchen comes with hands-on instructions and tricks for making homemade Middle Eastern dishes using fresh ingredients. Every chapter includes a multitude of dishes for diets of all kinds, include vegetarian, vegan, pescatarian, non-vegetarian and gluten-free.
Notable recipe: Mouhamarah, a roasted red pepper and walnut spread.
The Middle Eastern Vegetarian Cookbook
by Salma Hage
The Middle Eastern Vegetarian Cookbook is a vegetarian cookbook with an array of traditional recipes. This 2017 James Beard award-winning book is an approachable authority on Middle Eastern recipes. Though it includes traditional recipes, the recipes are somehow modern and trendy, too.
Notable recipe: Quinoa Tabouleh is a must. Learn more about the Middle Eastern spices to use when experimenting with the traditional recipes.
Sababa
by Adeena Sussman
In this Israeli cookbook, Sababa: Fresh, Sunny Flavors From My Israeli Kitchen, Adeena Sussman brings the spicy bright flavors of Israeli cuisine alive. Sababa, which means “everything is awesome” in Hebrew, stands true to its name for its recipes, expertise and culinary knowledge. It will teach home cooks in the United States how to use ingredients like tahini, sumac, harissa and za’atar.
Notable recipe: 40-Minute Amba, a lightning-fast version of the spicy-savory sauce made with mangoes.
Malouf: New Middle Eastern Food
by Greg Malouf and Lucy Malouf
Malouf has every modern Middle Eastern recipe one might hope to find. This cookbook packs in more than 300 recipes, all filled with exotic ingredients and complex flavors. The book is organized into sections like soups, side dishes, bakery and dessert—plus everything in between. It’s the perfect inspiration for a dinner party!
Notable recipe: Goat Cheese in Vine Leaves. This simple dish calls for only a handful of ingredients—vine leaves, goat cheese, olive oil, mint and pepper. It comes together in moments, too.
Vegan Recipes from the Middle East
by Parvin Razavi
Middle Eastern cuisine is known for its variety, with recipes that cater to all different diets. In this vegan cookbook, Vegan Recipes from the Middle East, the author shares recipes from Iran, Armenia, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Egypt, Morocco and Turkey. From soups to pilafs to pickles to pastries, this book has it all.
Notable recipe: Stuffed Aubergines (Eggplant) with Walnuts & Pomegranate is a colorful, flavorful dish that we can’t resist.
Palestine on a Plate
by Joudie Kalla
Bring Palestine home with Palestine on a Plate. The cookbook is filled with traditional recipes using regional ingredients, woven together with beautiful stories and stunning visuals. Through this book, Joudie Kalla takes us on a journey through Palestine with recipes like zingy fattet hummus, spiced makloubeh and decadent awameh.
Notable recipe: Makloubeh, an upside-down dish made with rice, vegetables and meat.
Israeli Soul
by Michael Solomonov and Steven Cook
Israeli Soul is a glimpse into the culture, people and food of Israel. The recipes have been created through in-depth research at the hole-in-the-wall food joints and market stalls, where recipes are passed on through generations. Michael Solomonov and Steven Cook scoured the streets of Tel Aviv, Jerusalem and Haifa, along with sleepy towns on mountaintops, to find the finest recipes.
Notable recipe: Goldie Falafel, Michael Solomonov’s signature recipe, uses dried chickpeas instead of canned.
Persiana
by Sabrina Ghayour
Persiana is a must-have peek into the Persian kitchen. The cookbook is filled with flavorful, authentic Persian recipes as well as tidbits about cooking and tricks to speed up prep work. Sabrina Ghayour walks readers through step-by-step recipes and how-tos, and even gives a close-up look at the finished recipes—so in a way, she’s cooking along with you.
Persiana is definitely a guide worth having if you plan to explore Persian cooking!
Notable recipe: Marinated Feta is what Sabrina serves on salads—add an extra squeeze of lemon juice to turn the marinade into salad dressing. You can also scoop up the chunks of feta with flatbread.
Originally Published: October 08, 2021
