When people say they have nothing to wear, it usually doesn’t mean they have nothing to wear. It means they have nothing to wear that they feel like wearing at that moment. I have a similar thing with cooking. When I stare at the produce in the market and cannot think of anything to cook, it doesn’t mean I have suddenly forgot every recipe I know. It just means everything I am able to cook seems boring and uninspired and I cannot bring myself to make any of it.

This is when a new cookbook comes in handy. One of these days, I’ll do a post on my staples, but these four are all recently bought (yesterday, to be precise). This of course means I haven’t been cooking from them much, but I’m certainly going to.

1. Mediterranean/Middle East/North Africa: Crazy Water Pickled Lemons by Diana Henry. Southern Mediterranean and Middle East are some of my absolute favourite places when it comes to cooking: figs and dates and pomegranates, tagines and pilaffs, herbs and floral waters, I love it all. My favourite cookbooks on this region come from Greg and Lucy Malouf, but I already own everything they have published. Diana Henry’s Roast Figs Sugar Snow is one of my favourite cookbooks, so I’m very excited about this one. Her writing is very atmospheric and recipes are interesting and not too complicated. I plan to make the lavender, orange and almond cake tonight and date stuffed mackerels sound good, too.

2. American: Thug Kitchen: Eat like you give a fuck. America, on the other hand, is not a place I gravitate towards when it comes to food inspiration. Although I do in fact find Creole cuisine very interesting and love things like pecan nuts and sweet potatoes. Thug Kitchen is somehow very American, while not being stereotypically American at all. It makes a point about being macho while also being vegetarian and very healthy. I have followed the blog for some time and learned for example to make caramel sauce with coconut milk. It’s a really good guide to healthier eating for someone who is generally more interested in motorbikes or tattoos. It is also a refreshing read for everybody else, unless you really don’t like swearing.

3. Baking: The Violet Bakery Cookbook by Claire Ptak. I’m a decent cook, but not much of a baker. I guess partly because it’s much harder to improvise while baking and partly because I have no energy left after cooking the first course and the main dish, so I just bring out the chocolate. But honey and rose water madeleines? Pistachio, hazelnut and raspberry friands? Toasted black figs? I knew I had to have that book as soon as I laid my eyes on it. The pictures are lovely and anyone who uses violets in their cooking is going to be alright in my book.

4. Nordic: NOMA: Time and Place in Nordic Cuisine by René Redzepi. Somewhat surprisingly, I own hardly any Scandinavian cookbooks. Maybe because my own background is Nordic and I don’t feel like I need any guidance: I know perfectly well how to make an open sandwitch with herring, thank you! René Redzepi is not exactly a herring sandwich kind of a guy, as he happens to be the owner and chef of the best restaurant in the world and one of the biggest food innovators of our time. His book is not the place to go for 30-minute everyday meals, but it is truly gorgeous and a fascinating read. From the eccentrically minimal (pork neck and bulrushes with violets and malt) to the strangely austere (snails and moss), it is clearly Nordic, but also totally unique. And some bits of this fantasy world can be recreated without crazy effort. I think I’m going to try the prettiest thing in the book, the flower dessert (below).