Joe Yonan’s Favorite Cookbooks

Take a peek at the shelves of The Washington Post’s food editor

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As the food editor of The Washington Post as well as the author of several cookbooks, including Cool Beans, Joe Yonan writes that he “came out” as a vegan more than a decade ago. His latest release, Mastering the Art of Plant-Based Cooking (Ten Speed Press) arrived this fall and is a comprehensive guide to vegan cooking. As with other “mastering” titles, this one is full of building blocks for success and is written for anyone who wants to either add more plant-based meals to their lives or has fully adopted a vegan lifestyle. We checked in with Yonan to learn more about this new vegan bible and which cookbooks have inspired him along the way. 

The Local Palate: What’s one big takeaway you want readers to pick up from your cookbook?

Joe Yonan: That plant-based cooking is a cuisine just like any other, with its own techniques and best practices, so you can want to learn about it without needing to make it part of your identity. Think about it: If you want to learn how to get the flakiest biscuit, do you actually have to move south of the Mason-Dixon line for the rest of your life? Maybe that’s not the best example, because in the case of biscuits it would probably help! Try this instead: If you want to learn how to get the perfect crispy bottom on your paella, do you have to renounce your US citizenship and seek asylum in Spain? Of course not. By that same token, you don’t have to declare yourself vegan in order to learn how to make a wonderful dairy-free ice cream.

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TLP: Tell us about one or two of your favorite recipes. 

JY: Well, since I brought up ice cream, let me brag about the Dreamy Nut or Seed Butter Ice Cream. It’s really a master recipe with countless variations, and I love the concentrated flavor and creamy texture that results. You basically start with some raw nuts or seeds, turn some into milk and some into butter, then heat that up with some sugar, salt, and vanilla. You process it in an ice cream maker, folding in some more chopped nuts or seeds when it’s almost finished, and that’s it! It scoops—and eats—like a dream. 

I also love how some of my recipes demonstrate that you don’t always need an egg substitute: My Classic Cornbread, for instance, gets leavening from baking powder, as you would imagine, and structure from the extra gluten created by using higher-protein bread flour. If you make it with my Tangy Coconut Cashew Buttermilk, it’s even better, of course.

TLP: What have you learned from working on previous books that made working on this book a little smoother or more enjoyable?

JY: That in order to be my most creative and efficient and productive, I need help setting up structures and systems that can prevent me from feeling overwhelmed. I worked with a fantastic project manager on Cool Beans, my friend Sheri Codiana, and I didn’t even write the proposal for Mastering until I knew she would be back for another spreadsheet adventure. This one was so much more complex—and just plain bigger!—that I knew I couldn’t do it without her.

TLP: Aside from your own recipes, what was your go-to snack or meal after a day of recipe testing for the book?

JY: My holy trinity is, and probably always will be, beans, greens, and grains. With hot sauce, of course.

TLP: What cookbooks did you turn to (or inspired you) when researching this cookbook and why?

JY: At Home in the Whole Food Kitchen (Roost Books) by Amy Chaplin. She is my north star of plant-based cooking, and everything about this book inspires me to slow down, enjoy cooking, and savor eating.

To Asia, With Love (Prestel) by Hetty McKinnon. The flavor combinations! The creativity! The imagination! I love how Hetty thinks, about what’s on the plate and what’s not, and am always inspired by her seemingly effortless ways of coaxing powerful tastes from sometimes a short ingredient list.

Vegetable Revelations (Harper) by Steven Satterfield. He’s one of my favorite chefs, anywhere, and seeing the way he balances freshness and indulgence always makes me think: Go bigger!

Vegetable Kingdom (Ten Speed Press) by Bryant Terry. He took the baton from Deborah Madison’s Vegetable Literacy in this book and explains how plants’ relationship with one another affects how you cook with them. How cool is that?

World Vegetarian (Clarkson Potter) by Madhur Jaffrey. She is one of the world’s best sources of inspiration about Indian cooking, of course, but in this book Madhur shows just how central to so many cuisines around the world vegetables are. I aspire to the same breadth in my work, so she’s a must-read.

TLP: What is your go-to / favorite / most beloved cookbook on your shelf and why? (If you can’t pick one, mention a few!) 

JY: Oh, God, this is by far the hardest question I could ever be asked. My favorite seems to change by the month. But here goes nothing. Right now, if I narrowed it down to three, it could probably be:

Essentials of Italian Cooking (Knopf) by Marcella Hazan. There doesn’t seem to be a week that goes by when I don’t wonder: WWMD? Her opinions are strong, her recipes flawless.

Asian Tofu (Ten Speed Press) by Andrea Nguyen. I’ve learned almost everything I know about tofu from my friend Andrea, and still, every time I pick up the book I discover something new.

The Cuisines of Mexico (William Morrow Cookbooks) by Diana Kennedy. This was the first book that proclaimed that Mexico’s cuisine is anything but monolithic, and it’s where I always return when I want to recalibrate my palate and get back in touch with its complexities.   

I can’t stop at three! 

The Taste of Country Cooking (Knopf) by Edna Lewis. I’ve found myself rereading and re-cooking from this treasure of a book again in recent years. I remain moved by Edna’s lyrical prose and way of capturing her childhood community’s traditions, and I adore how almost elemental her recipes are.

TLP: Favorite cook-friendly bookstore in the Southeast and why?

JY: Plott Hound Books in Burnsville, North Carolina, because Ronni Lundy owns it, and she’s one of the best food writers around, so you know her taste in cookbooks is top-notch.

Find Joe on book tour this fall; an updated schedule is available at joeyonan.com/events