Books I’ve read recently.  All non-fiction this time.

Kachka: A Return to Russian Cooking, by Bonnie Frumkin Morales with Deena Prichep

I haven’t been to this restaurant yet, but I’ve heard a lot about it. I stumbled across this book on a “featured books” shelf at the library, and decided to check it out. Russian cuisine is one of my least-researched modern cuisines, and one of the more interesting to me, especially how it overlaps with European and Asian cuisines, along with being steadfastly its own.

The Bees in Your Backyard: A Guide to North America’s Bees, by Joseph S. Wilson and Olivia Messinger Carril

A fantastic reference on bees, with beautiful photography, extensive comparisons & contrasts with similar-looking insects such as wasps and flies, and fabulous descriptions of each of the subspecies of bees. This one was from the library – I may have to buy a copy, so we can start learning the bees in our yard.

Cod: A Biography of the Fish That Changed the World, by Mark Kurlansky

I kind of love Mark Kurlansky’s writing. I’ve also read Salt: A World History and The Big Oyster: History on the Half Shell. I’m a huge fan of teaching through food – everyone can related to food on some level or another. Kurlansky weaves economics, geography, geology, history, culture, language, and pretty much every other possible study together, using a single a single food item as the focal point. I’m very much looking forward to finding Milk: A 10,000 year Food Fracas.