Top Ten Tuesday

TTT – Books Involving Food That Aren’t Cookbooks

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Hello and happy Wednesday! This week’s prompt was submitted by Cathy @ WhatCathyReadNext and Hopewell’s Public Library of Life, and it challenges us to come up with our ten favorite books involving food (that are not cookbooks). I love to read cookbooks, but I also really enjoy when books involve food and aren’t a cookbook. I see this most often in cozy mysteries, but it’s always really cool when food pops up in a book when it is unexpected. Here’s my ten:

  1. Black Cake by Charmaine Wilkerson. This story centers around a food that was not only meaningful in the unnamed Caribbean island the family came from, and it’s so important to the family as well as the plot.
  2. Brie Careful What You Wish For by Linda Reilly. The latest addition to a cozy mystery series, this one stars Carly Hale, owner of a grilled cheese shop, and it always makes me crave a grilled cheese while reading. Bonus points because there are recipes in the back of the book!
  3. Legends & Lattes by Travis Baldree. I don’t usually drink coffee because caffeine doesn’t have any effect on me and I don’t love the taste of it, but I’d totally have a flavored latte with a baked good at this cafe, even just to fangirl over the crew that works and hangs out here.
  4. The Vanishing Type by Ellery Adams. Another cozy mystery series, this latest addition is based on a crime solving bookshop owner and her bookclub besties, one of whom is a highly talented baker that always makes me drool over her baked goods.
  5. Kill the Queen by Jennifer Estep. The foods described in this series starter are absolutely mouth-watering. If you don’t read it for the awesome plot and characters, do it for the foods!
  6. Planning Perfect by Haley Neil. This was the cutest YA ace romance, and there’s even an apple picking scene. I remember going apple picking with my family every year as a kid.
  7. In the Shadow Garden by Liz Parker. Such a great read, but there’s a garden with all this cool produce that’s magical!
  8. The Auschwitz Violinist by Jonathan Dunsky. While this is a mystery, it’s set in a concentration camp full of people who are literally starving to death. These people think about and talk about food like it is their job.
  9. The Matzah Ball by Jean Meltzer. Despite being named for the much-loved soup accompaniment, actual matzah balls don’t factor into the story. But the good news is that so many other delicious Jewish foods are, like rugelach and Chanukah goodies like latkes. 
  10. The Memory Keeper of Kyiv by Erin Litteken. Bringing an often overlooked historical event to life, this book is about the Holodomor, or death by hunger in Ukrainian. It was an artificially created famine in Soviet Ukraine between 1932-1933, and this book shows how these people were eventually forced to spend most of their time scrounging for anything to eat, even non-food items.

Have you read any of these? What books come to mind when you think of books involving food that aren’t cookbooks?

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30 replies »

  1. I don’t know that I’ve heard of any of these though I feel like a couple of the covers are familiar likely because I’ve seen them make the book list rounds. Pretty sure I’ve read lots of books featuring chef characters, too… but remembering what books they’re in, well, that sometimes proves a bookworm challenge. 😉

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    • They really are! I knew almost nothing either famine until well into my adulthood, and that was only because I came across it randomly in a book. The series with Brie Careful What You Wish For is such a fun one!

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