The World Central Kitchen Cookbook is here!

My friends—this one has been a long time coming! I’m so excited to tell you that finally tomorrow we are publishing The World Central Kitchen Cookbook: Feeding Humanity, Feeding Hope! My team and I have been working on it for years, and at last the day is almost here. We have amazing recipes from chefs and cooks in almost 20 countries around the world, plus stories from many, many volunteers and friends who have worked with the organization since 2010.

And we are lucky enough to be able to include the dishes of some amazing people: spicy breakfast tacos from former first lady Michelle Obama; a perfect olive oil lemon cake from Meghan, The Duchess of Sussex; Thanksgiving favorite green beans from Guy Fieri and cornbread stuffing from Tyler Florence; chicken parmesan from Ayesha Curry (Steph’s favorite, of course!); spicy Haitian-inspired fried catfish sandwiches from Marcus Samuelsson; a rare green gumbo from Emeril; daal from superstar Indian chef Sanjeev Kapoor; a beautiful carrot-farro salad from Brooke Williamson; and spicy, rich piri-piri shrimp from Eric Adjepong…I can’t believe the support and love we’ve gotten for this book. Plus chefs and restaurant owners who have been leaders in their own communities—people like Sofia Deleon in Philadelphia, Reem Assil in Oakland, Brian Yazzie in Minneapolis, Aline Kamakian and Kamal Mouzawak in Beirut. And of course Robert Egger, one of my first mentors who started DC Central Kitchen in the late 1980s—he shared his recipe for warming, rich, comforting Green Chile Posole.

Check out the recipes!

I want to share a short passage from the introduction of the book…hopefully it will get you excited:

“The book you are holding in your hands is filled with the heart and soul of the most amazing people you will ever meet. They are from every corner of the globe, and from all walks of life, but when they come together under the same banner, they do something truly amazing…they show that they care. It may sound simple, but in our world, sometimes the simple act of caring is the most important thing a person can do.

And as you will see, they are not them, they are us. You and me. Whoever you are, if you are reading this book, you are now one of us, the proud people of World Central Kitchen.”

So what do you think—are you as excited as I am? One thing I am hopeful about with this book is that it can inspire people…not even just to get involved with World Central Kitchen, but to get involved in their own communities. We have this section at the front called “How to Scale a Recipe,” which is really a step-by-step guide for learning how to take a recipe written for 4-6 and start to scale it up for much larger groups. It takes practice and some math and many, many tasting spoons, but once you get the hang of it, you can be cooking for your own community any time there’s a need. Double a recipe if a neighbor has a baby; make a 10x version if your book group is getting together, and then you might be ready to make a 100x if a disaster affects your community.

So my friends, I invite you to join us, read the book, become a part of World Central Kitchen, and please tell me what you think of it…!