James Beard Cookbook Award winners

The James Beard Foundation announced the winners of its 2022 Cookbook Awards tonight in a ceremony held in Chicago which Jane and Darcie attended (Jenny had to cancel at the last minute and is here working on this post that Darcie set up for her).

EYB is proud to say that Jenny was selected to be on the James Beard Cookbook Awards Committee for four years and was able to select Darcie as a judge this year.

Since the JBF awards were cancelled in 2020 due to the pandemic and due to challenges the JBF faced concerning diversity in the nominees and winners of its various awards, the nominees for 2022 included books from both 2020 and 2021. The JBF revamped the judging process and enacted several other changes to ensure better representation in both the restaurant and chef awards as well as cookbook awards. Now that the hard work of judging is done – it is a lengthy process that involves evaluating a large number of nominees based on a long slate of criteria plus making recipes from the books that make the first cut – the fun part is next, listing the winners in the various categories.

Here are the 2022 winners:

• US Foodways (formerly American): Mosquito Supper Club: Cajun Recipes from a Disappearing Bayou by Melissa M. Martin
• Baking and Desserts: Mooncakes and Milk Bread: Sweet and Savory Recipes Inspired by Chinese Bakeries by Kristina Cho (EYBDigital Preview)
• Beverage without Recipes: Girly Drinks by Mallory O’Meara
• Beverage with Recipes: The Way of the Cocktail: Japanese Traditions, Techniques, and Recipes by Julia Momosé and Emma Janzen (EYBDigitial Preview)
• Reference, History, and Scholarship: Black Smoke: African Americans and the United States of Barbecue by Adrian Miller
• General: Everyone’s Table: Global Recipes for Modern Health by Gregory Gourdet with JJ Goode
• International: In Bibi’s Kitchen: The Recipes and Stories of Grandmothers from the Eight African Countries that Touch the Indian Ocean by Hawa Hassan with Julia Turshen (EYBDigital Preview),
• Writing: Franchise: The Golden Arches in Black America by Marcia Chatelain
• Visuals (formerly Photography): Take One Fish: The New School of Scale-to-Tail Cooking and Eating by Josh Niland,
• Restaurant and Professsional: Mister Jiu’s in Chinatown: Recipes and Stories from the Birthplace of Chinese American Food by Brandon Jew and Tienlon Ho (EYBDigital Preview)
• Single Subject: The Hog Book: A Chef’s Guide to Hunting, Butchering and Cooking Wild Pigs by Jesse Griffiths
• Vegetable-Focused Cooking: The Korean Vegan Cookbook: Reflections and Recipes from Omma’s Kitchen by Joanne Lee Molinaro

• Emerging Voice Award (New Award) Mooncakes and Milk Bread: Sweet and Savory Recipes Inspired by Chinese Bakeries by Kristina Cho (EYBDigital Preview)

• Cookbook Hall of Fame winner – Judy Rodgers, the author of The Zuni Cafe Cookbook: A Compendium of Recipes and Cooking Lessons from San Francisco’s Beloved Restaurant

Congratulations to all of the winners! See our James Beard 2022 page for all the nominees.