Andrew Rea (Eat What You Watch)--creator of the Babish Culinary Universe on YouTube--presents Basics with Babish: Recipes for Screwing Up, Trying Again, and Hitting It Out of the Park, his third cookbook and a charming and eminently usable kitchen guide.
Rea shares his firm belief in becoming a better cook by making--and being willing to talk about--mistakes. His standard sections for bread, pizza, vegetables, etc. diverge from the mold in three key ways: each recipe starts with brief context and an explanation of his own experience, the mistakes he made while preparing it, and preemptive troubleshooting for home cooks. With step-by-step photos by Evan Sung, and sections that include kitchen terms, spices, and tools, there's more than enough here to make home cooks fall in love with Babish and--perhaps even better--help those you feed fall in love with him, too. --Kristen Coates, editor and freelance reviewer