Home Style Cookery: A Home Cookbook by Matty Matheson (Review)

Title: Home Style Cookery:
A Home Cookbook
Author: Matty Matheson
Type: Nonfiction
Genre: Food, Cooking, Cookbook
Publisher: Abrams
Date published: September 29, 2020

A complimentary physical copy of this book was kindly provided by Canadian Manda Group in exchange for an honest review.

Matty returns with 135 of his absolute favorite recipes to cook at home for his family and friends, so you can cook them for the people you love.

Home Style Cookery is his definitive guide to mastering your kitchen, covering everything from pantry staples (breads, stocks, and pickles) to party favorites (dips, fried foods, and grilled meats), to weeknight go-tos (stews, pastas, salads), and special occasion show-stoppers (roasts, smoked meats, and desserts). It starts with basics like Molasses Bread in an Apple Juice Can, Beef and Bone Marrow Stock, Kitchen Sink Salad, Thanksgiving Stuffing Butternut Squash, and the tallest Seven-Layer Dip you have ever seen.

Next it covers comforting recipes like Littleneck Clam Orecchiette, Pho Ga, Sichuan Newfoundland Cod, Double Beef Patty Melt with Gruyere and Molasses Bread, and Matty’s take on the ultimate Submarine sandwich. And it closes with bangers like Fish Sticks with Kewpie Tartar Sauce, Salt Crust Leg of Lamb and Yukon Golds with Creamed Spinach, Texas-Style Prime Rib, T-bone Steak and Fine Herb Chimichurri, and Lobster Thermidor with Bearnaise and Salt and Vinegar Chips. It even has desserts like his wife Trish’s Chocolate Chip Cookies and Creme Caramel.

In Home Style Cookery, Matty shares his bold style of cooking. Along with beautiful photographs of Matty’s dishes and his farm, this book is filled with signature recipes that are equal parts approachable and tasty. Matty’s first book shared his culinary story, Home Style Cookery will help you build yours.

⤖ My Review ⬻

Do you use cookbooks when cooking at home? In our household, we have a small collection of cookbooks that we like to turn to when we feel like switching things up with our home cooking. We’re definitely fans of Matty Matheson’s recipes, so when I saw that he had release a new cookbook, Home Style Cookery: A Home Cookbook, I knew that we definitely wanted to dive into it for new recipes to try as well as ideas for spicing up recipes that we use regulary.

Where to start? I guess I could focus on the cover and then work my way into the cookbook. Home Style Cookery is a hardcover cookbook, which those of you who have read past cookbook reviews of mine will know I always appreciate. They’re just more sturdy, especially if you used them often (and in a kitchen environment at that).

Home Style Cookery is well organized and filled to the brim with mouth-watering recipes ranging from simple dishes to complex ones. The pages are not glossy but matte. While I normally prefer glossy, because they’re more resistant to spills and tears, I think that in this case they add to the vintage-ish look of this book. The font and contract also make the recipes easy to read, and the formatting make them easy to follow.

The matte pages, as well as the style of photography, give Home Style Cookery more of the home-y vibe (which I think is quite fitting and was also deliberate). I also like that Matheson mixes traditional Western dishes with recipes for foods from all over the globe–which fits our tastes and lifestyle quite well. All in all, I know that this is a cookbook that we’re turn to time and again for ideas and inspiration.

⤖ About the Author ⬻

Matthew James Matheson is a Canadian chef and internet personality. He was the executive chef of Parts & Labour, a restaurant located in Toronto, Canada which permanently closed on 1 January 2019. Matheson regularly appeared on Vice’s show Munchies.