In Bacon: A Love Story, popular bacon blogger Heather Lauer elaborates, pontificates, and explicates the story (and glory) of her beloved “meat candy,” bacon. Oft taken for granted by home cooks as a breakfast side or, at best, the flourish on top of a classic meatloaf, bacon here takes center stage as the source of sophisticated culinary joy. With infectious enthusiasm, Lauer introduces her reader to a deeper level of bacon-savvy than anyone outside the cured-meat industry would normally possess. Providing as much background on bacon as possible, from its production to its consumption, Lauer gives this once banished meat a much-needed publicity makeover. In these days of farm-friendly, sustainable agriculture, this one-stop resource on how best to source and enjoy this once-maligned meat is a timely, tasty arrival.

With seven outposts and counting in his BLT line, it was only a matter of time before Tourondel (Go Fish: Fresh Ideas for American Seafood) wrote a cookbook to codify his credo of American-style French bistro cooking. Many of the dishes come from Tourondel's restaurant menus, but he makes them accessible to the home cook with unintimidating preparations that showcase the quality and flavors of choice ingredients. The opening chapter discusses choosing and preparing different fish and cuts of meat, while brief introductions to each recipe contribute to the pleasantly informal feeling. The cuisine is well-traveled, including Asian salads, a quintessentially American creamy corn soup, Roman-style gnocchi and a hearty, spicy Chicken-Chorizo Basquaise. BLT patrons will be eager to try menu favorites like Giant Cheese Popovers, Marinated Kobe Skirt Steak and Peanut Butter-Chocolate Parfait. Tourondel includes comments on easily substituted ingredients and wine or beer pairings. Both novices and experienced cooks will welcome this comprehensive education in Tourondel's signature style.

In more than 300 recipes, Cheryl and Bill Jamison reveal the tremendous variety of terrific flavors that can come from the primal encounter of food and flame. The Jamison's open up a road map that will guide the griller beyond steaks, burgers, and hot dogs, but they invite us in chapters called "Serious Steaks" and "Hot Burgers and Haute Dogs", to delay our departure and explore the depths of those timeless favorites. Out on the horizon, Born to Grill uncovers alluring new terrain. Salads, pastas, and soups infused with the smoky taste of flame-kissed ingredients; splendid pizzas and tortilla dishes prepared on the grill; vegetables, juicy and crisp, in main dishes and sides; fruits and desserts for a finger-lickin' finish- all these and more make the griller's domain bigger and more delectable than it's ever been.

Perhaps one of the best-known purveyors and practitioners of everything sausage, Bruce Aidells brings his intimate knowledge of the world of cased and seasoned meats to the home cook. From the introduction on, Aidell’s sausage-philosophy bases itself in the myriad ethnic cuisines transplanted to modern America. With the historic influx of cultures and culinary traditions, the variety and availability of quality sausage has only expanded. Aidell provides the finishing touch, bringing sausage-making techniques, with casing, grinding, and seasoning options, to the home kitchen. The second half of the book is entirely devoted to recipes with sausage, where homemade sausage can go on a test run in any number of well-crafted, regional recipes.

This burger bible is based on Chef Hubert Keller’s highly successful “build your own burger” concept at his Burger Bar Restaurants in Las Vegas, St. Louis, and San Francisco. Keller re-imagines the burger from Ostrich Bacon and Double Salmon Tartare to the vegetarian Roasted Squash-Quinoa, and even dessert S’more Burgers¬ and provides tips on grinding meat, shaping patties, ingredient selection, and cooking. Burger recipes are accompanied by chapters dedicated to colorful sides like zucchini fries and beet pickles, and home-made condiments like piquillo pepper ketchup and caramelized shallot jam. To wash down your meal, Keller gives suggestions for burger-and-beer pairings, plus refreshing recipes for cocktails and milkshakes.

Certified Master Chef Fritz Sonnenschmidt taps into the demand for hand-crafted, artisan food with his newly released Charcuterie, a user-friendly guide to the history and creation of sausage and patés. With a full equipment breakdown, animal diagrams, a seasonings chapter and a practical analysis of sausage casing options, Sonnenschmidt presents himself as a kind of liaison between the seemingly rustic tradition of charcuterie and the modern kitchen. In fact, an era of offal-friendly dining and ever-increasing farmyard familiarity (both in and outside the industry), in-house sausage-making may be the missing link between culinary history and its eco-conscious future. With recipes for cooked and poached sausages, spreadable sausages or patés, and more complex raw sausages, Sonnenschmidt speaks at once to the professional and home cook, allowing for varying levels of ability without sacrificing an ounce of technique.

Culinaria Spain bases itself on the premise that Spanish cuisine, though well loved and increasingly sought after, is misunderstood and at least until recently, recognized for only a few of its myriad dishes. While paella and sangria enjoy deserved popularity among conventional diners, they are barely the tip of the iceberg that Spanish cuisine has to offer. Editor Marion Trutter breaks up the recipes of Spain by regions, which is natural as they are topographically responsible for the drastic variations in Spanish cuisine. In Basque and Cantabrian cuisine, for example, fresh fish and shellfish feature heavily, while further south in La Rioja the major sources of protein are the sheep and game of the surrounding mountains. The book teems with hundreds of recipes, complete with history and photographs of Spain’s multitude of micro-cultures. It is the ideal resource for any cook eager to explore the culinary mosaic that is Spanish cuisine.

From well-known cookbook author Joan Schwartz, creator of the delectable Macaroni and Cheese, comes Meat and Potatoes/ a new collection of outstanding recipes from celebrated chefs across the country. Here are the special recipes of celebrated chefs like Anita Lo, Bobby Flay, Mitchel London, and Patricia Yeo. These chefs work their magic with beef, lamb, veal, and pork in combination of a variety of both white and sweet potatoes. Roasted, braised, or grilled, turned into soups, salads, croquettes or stews, these ingredients are the stuff of endless possibilities.

Renowned South American chef Francis Mallmann makes a declaration of his true passion and culinary heritage in this impressive and instructive cookbook. With Seven Fires, Mallmann brings the seemingly marginalized or seasonal practice of grilling to the fore of cooking, elaborating on his eponymous Seven Fires technique as he instructs his reader in the tradition and rich simplicity of fire-roasted, grilled, and coal-kissed food. With succulent visuals of offerings like “7 ½ Hour Lamb Malbec,” “Peached Pork” and “Braided Beef with Anchovies and Olives,” Mallmann entices readers to seek beyond the comfort of the stovetop for their culinary reward. Judging from Mallmann’s international acclaim, every ounce effort is sure to pay off.