Your Summer 2026 Edible Reading List
I invite you to enjoy some escapism through bibliophilia. Whether by novelty or nostalgia, words have a way of transporting you to another place. Food does that, too. Here are some recent publications that encourage you to experience an exquisite bite or a full-blown feast the analog way: by first reading about it. The next steps—going to the market, reaching out to friends, or simply dreaming of what can come next—are up to you!
Revel: A Maximalist’s Guide to Having People Over
By Mariana Velásquez
Retail: $36
Mariana Velásquez presents the novel idea that we do not need to be a part of the loneliness epidemic. This cookbook proudly acknowledges the wisdom of knowing your best guest to have at the party is yourself. Revel is here to inspire the kind of party you want to be invited to. The kind you wish you had been invited to. Velásquez provides the inspiration and templates to be that host who makes it happen.
The table of contents reads like a day planner, bursting with busyness. Each page is drenched in color and ideas for good eats and a good time. Planning, for example, isn’t just about sending the invitations, but “summoning your guests.” It’s not so much lessons in etiquette (which we all need more of), but providing the blueprint for good communication to ensure positive outcomes. Velásquez credits her Colombian roots for hosting with boldness and generosity. She offers this option: to unapologetically take up space. The recipes may initially come off as precious to the home cook, but consider this: Perhaps it’s you who deserves to be precious, and your food should reflect that. Her debut cookbook is that guide.
Recipes that inspire us: chilled honeydew tarragon soup, sumac and vinegar-marinated tomatoes, and cherry-cardamom ricotta cake.
Vitamina T: Your Daily Dose of Tacos, Tortas, Tamales and More Mexican Street Food Classics
By Jorge Gaviria & Fermín Nuñez with Allegra Ben-Amotz
Retail: $35
Jorge Gaviria is just down the Southern California coast in Los Angeles, inspiring us with his Masienda lineup of heirloom corn and related products and his Masa cookbook (we have the tortilla press and the cookbook). Masienda works with family farms and artisans in Mexico to bring quality products with a regenerative and fair trade ethos. While Masa had a focus on corn, Vitamina T is the celebratory step up, showing just how delectable Mexican street food titillates our taste buds. You only need to walk by a taqueria and smell the sizzling onions and roasted masa to get drawn in. This cookbook is bursting with recipes to re-create at your home. Gaviria has teamed up with his friend Fermín Nuñez, who operates a series of popular restaurants in Austin, Texas, that champion modern Mexican cuisine. They are the excited cheering squad and teachers, playing off each other to promote the classics and many creative new recipes. Because Santa Barbara County is deeply influenced by Mexican food and culture, every recipe and every photo already activates your gustatory sensations. Any page you open to is a recipe you can already anticipate making. Yet it’s casual and fun, just how so many of us want our summer parties to go.
Recipes that inspire us: Beet avocado tostadas, sweet potato costra tacos, cauliflower ceviche, and the entire section on salsas and condiments.
Riviera: Recipes from the Coast of France & Italy
By Mélanie Masarin
Retail: $40
The recipes tell the stories of the author’s childhood on the Mediterranean coast, to be re-created in the home kitchen (her New York apartment, to be exact). Cherished and memorable to her, now novel to us. Her cookbook stands out because it aligns so well with our own Mediterranean climate.
For those with small kitchens, limited time but an eagerness to entertain, this is for you. Masarin offers what’s already familiar: produce you already see at our farmers markets and preserved goods you’d find at our specialty shops. Her family philosophy: the market decides the menu, make unfussy food people will want to eat, follow recipes loosely and adapt them a lot, and share food generously. Her recipes are simple and approachable, letting the quality of the ingredients shine. Masarin is also the person behind the Ghia line of nonalcoholic aperitifs (spotted at the Eddy in downtown Santa Barbara) and it follows that her recipes encourage you to enjoy yourself in a way that suits you best. This is her first cookbook and if her fresh takes and words of encouragement inspire another generation to step up to the plate, share and socialize, then we are all here for it.
Recipes for summer inspiration: Wax bean and haricot vert salad with feta dressing, pasta al limone, yogurt and fig cake.
A Feast for Santa Barbara: Poets Celebrating Food & Drink
Edited by George Yatchisin
Retail: $20
Hyperlocal to the Santa Barbara food and drink scene, Poet Laureate George Yatchisin has spent the last year compiling an anthology of poems to hold aloft the commentary of our bountiful area through any combination of written rhythm and rhyme. There is beauty in language and beauty in form, so it follows that A Feast for Santa Barbara offers layers upon layers of delicious poems to digest in a diversity of ways.
From a red booth at Harry’s to the aisles of the farmers market, you’ll find words about places you know, things you’ve eaten and people—the poets—you’ve probably passed by in this small yet remarkable piece of the Central Coast.
These feasting fans who have experienced a place, a time, a morsel they found good, have taken the time to put those words within reach. They range from romantic, to starkly real, with whimsy and wit. The poet’s joy of lex can be a winding path or go straight to the nub, and the combination of it all is now a chorus of food and drink lovers beckoning to be heard. If you’re a part of the Edible community, this one might just be your jam.
Find copies at Chaucer’s Books in Santa Barbara, Clean Slate in Solvang, or order direct from Gunpowder Press, a Santa Barbara publishing company. GunpowderPress.com
Hello, Home Cooking: Do-able Dishes for Every Day
By Ham El-Waylly
Retail: $35
Up your cooking game with flavorful recipes, professional tips and inviting stories from Ham El-Waylly. Middle Eastern flavors add a twist to delicious dishes to make at home. Entertain your friends or simply your own taste buds. If the surname El-Waylly sounds familiar, he is the partner of Sohla, who rose to fame during the lockdown era of the pandemic and has produced her own popular cookbook Start Here. Both have such a friendly and inviting way of educating readers that you not only learn new recipes, you pick up practical techniques and advice that truly help you understand more about cooking and make you a better and more intuitive cook. Hello, Home Cooking brings a lot to the table.
Recipes that inspire us: Chawanmushi, better than Boursin, broccoli and chamomile soup.
