Michael Solmonov and Steve Cook – the chefs behind Zahav and other CookNSolo restaurants – are releasing a new cookbook filled with Israeli and Levantine recipes they make at home for their families.
"Zahav Home" includes 125 recipes based on dishes served at Zahav, the James Beard Award-winning restaurant in Society Hill. But they can be made with a single pot or other timesaving strategies that make them ideal for lunches and weeknight meals. The cookbook, published by HarperCollins, becomes available Sept. 10 and costs $40.
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Readers can find recipes for Tehina Caesar Salad, Cauliflower Chraime, Butternut Squash Baba Ganoush, Phyllo Borekas with Swiss Chard and Feta, Braised Lamb Shanks with Sour Cherry and Cola, Eggplant T’Bit and Pistachio Sticky Buns, among others.
The cookbook also contains various guides to bolster one's home cooking – like what items to stock in the pantry and the best ways to utilize the freezer. There are visual guides for cooking methods and techniques, too.
The idea for the cookbook stemmed from the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, when Solomonov and Cook had little to do but cook at home. Every dish included was cooked from start to finish in Solomonov's home kitchen – and they washed the dishes themselves.
"Restaurant cooking is not home cooking – unless you happen to have a battery of trained chefs in your kitchen," they write in the cookbook's introduction. "And even then (because we are trained chefs) we needed to figure out how to bring the flavors of Zahav to our home kitchen without all that labor. In other words, even though we know how to do it, we don't always want to do it."
This is the fourth cookbook Cook and Solomonov have put out together, following "Zahav," "Federal Donuts: The (Partially) True Spectacular Story" and "Israeli Soul."
Since opening Zahav in 2008, Solomonov and Cook have opened 23 restaurants, including Dizengoff, Federal Donuts, Goldie, K'Far and Laser Wolf. They're also the team behind forthcoming oyster spot Jaffa Bar in Kensington.
