At Read Local BC, we’ve always been all about championing local artists, producers, and businesses. In the same spirit, we bring you a list of books that celebrate fresh local ingredients and sustainable products. These BC titles will give you the same comfort and satisfaction of going to your neighbourhood’s farmers’ market and getting to know the local growers, makers, and bakers who produce the things you love to enjoy.
Arab Fairy Tale Feasts, tales by Karim Alrawi, recipes by Tamam Qanembou-Zobaidi and Sobhi al-Zobaidi (Tradewind Books)
Arab Fairy Tale Feasts captures the age-old magic of how food brings people together and enriches a culture.
Award-winning author and master storyteller Karim Alrawi joins forces with Tamam Qanembou-Zobaidi and Sobhi al-Zobaidi (who together opened the first Palestinian restaurant in Vancouver) to create these magical tales that all feature food or feasting and conclude with an iconic recipe. They are accompanied by intriguing anecdotes illuminating Arab culture and culinary traditions.
Out now!
The Deerholme Foraging Cookbook: Wild Ingredients and Recipes from the Pacific Northwest, Revised and Updated by Bill Jones (TouchWood Editions)
You can go even further than buying fresh produce from the farmer’s market. How about foraging wild ingredients and transforming them into delicious dishes? This cookbook is filled with recipes for local ingredients you can find in the wilds of BC.
Award-winning chef and author Bill Jones’s recipes feature local mushrooms, edible plants, sea vegetables, and shellfish. Linking to traditional uses for wild foods and future possibilities for our diet and wellbeing, as well as enhancing our appreciation of the environment around us, the recipes are richly enhanced by the author’s photography of wild foods and dishes, and his own foraging stories.
Out now!
The Antiracist Kitchen edited by Nadia L. Hohn (Orca Book Publishers)
What if talking about racism was as easy as baking a cake, frying plantains or cooking rice? In this anthology featuring stories and recipes from 21 diverse and award-winning North American children’s authors, the authors share the role of food in their lives and how it has helped fight discrimination, reclaim culture, and celebrate people with different backgrounds. They bring personal and sometimes difficult experiences growing up as racialized people.
Out now!
The Science and Spirit of Seaweed: Discovering Food, Medicine and Purpose in the Kelp Forests of the Pacific Northwest by Amanda Swinimer (Harbour Publishing)
Related to the most ancient living organisms on earth, seaweeds are incredible and unique life forms. In The Science and Spirit of Seaweed, sustainable Pacific Northwest-based seaweed harvester Amanda Swinimer describes the ecology, culinary uses, evidence-based health benefits and climate change-resisting potential of seaweed and shares highlights from her remarkable life beneath the waves. Complemented by vibrant underwater photography, beautiful illustrations and chef-inspired recipes, this volume provides identification, harvesting guides, medicinal purposes and recipes for west coast seaweeds.
Out now!
The Davison Orchards Cookbook: Favourite Recipes from the Farm and Family by Rachel Davison, Tamra Davison, Laura Shaw (TouchWood Editions)
From their multigenerational family farm in the heart of British Columbia’s Okanagan region, Rachel, Tamra, and Laura bring you a beautifully photographed collection of fruit- and vegetable-forward dishes and home-style treats. These 100 recipes from Davison Orchards in Vernon, BC all focus on seasonal and local produce found in the region and are accompanied by beautiful photographs of produce, finished dishes, and farm life. The family’s cooking expertise is delivered with a sense of humour and lessons the trio have learned from each other and the land. (Nana’s advice? Make your bed, then plan dinner.)
Out now!
Fleece and Fibre: Textile Producers of Vancouver Island and the Gulf Islands by Francine McCabe (Heritage House Publishing)
The fast fashion industry is one of the most unsustainable and exploitative industries on the planet. This book shows how local small-scale textile production can offer an alternative.
A BC Bestseller and shortlisted for the 2024 BC & Yukon Book Prize’s Bill Duthie Booksellers Choice Award, Fleece and Fibre presents the many fibre types produced along the Salish Sea—including sheep wool, llama, alpaca, mohair, cashmere, linen, flax, and hemp—and explains where and how they are currently being grown, processed, and used. Part sourcebook, part stunning coffee table book, and part call to action, this book creates new connections between farmers, raw materials, makers, designers, dyers, and wearers.
Out now!