My Pantry: Homemade Ingredients That Make Simple Meals Your Own

by Alice Waters, Fanny Singer

In this collection of essays and recipes,  Alice Waters showcases the simple building-block ingredients she uses to create gratifying, impromptu meals all year long.

In her most intimate and compelling cookbook yet, Alice invites readers to step not into the kitchen at Chez Panisse, but into her own, sharing how she shops, stores, and prepares the pantry staples and preserves that form the core of her daily meals.  Ranging from essentials like homemade chicken stock, red wine vinegar, and tomato sauce to the unique artisanal provisions that embody Alice’s unadorned yet delightful cooking style, she shows how she injects even simple meals with nuanced flavor and seasonal touches year-round.  From fresh cheeses to quick pickles to sweets and spirits, these often-used ingredients are, as she explains, the key to kitchen spontaneity when combined with simple grains, vegetables, and other staple items.  With charming pen-and-ink illustrations by her daughter, Fanny and Alice’s warm, inviting tone, the latest book from our most influential proponent of simple, organic cooking ensures a gracious, healthy meal is always within reach.

Genres: Cookbooks, Cooking, Food, Nonfiction, Food Writing, Food and Drink, Reference

144 pages, Hardcover

First published April 14, 2015

About the author

Alice Waters is a chef, author, food activist, and the founder and owner of Chez Panisse Restaurant in Berkeley, California. She has been a champion of local sustainable agriculture for over four decades. In 1995 she founded the Edible Schoolyard Project, which advocates for a free school lunch for all children and a sustainable food curriculum in every public school.

She has been Vice President of Slow Food International since 2002. She conceived and helped create the Yale Sustainable Food Project in 2003, and the Rome Sustainable Food Project at the American Academy in Rome in 2007.

Her honors include election as a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2007; the Harvard Medical School’s Global Environmental Citizen Award, which she shared with Kofi Annan in 2008; and her induction into the French Legion of Honor in 2010. In 2015 she was awarded the National Humanities Medal by President Obama, proving that eating is a political act, and that the table is a powerful means to social justice and positive change.

Alice is the author of fifteen books, including New York Times bestsellers The Art of Simple Food I & II and The Edible Schoolyard: A Universal Idea.

Reviews

[Melissa · Rating 2 out of 5]

Alice, I love you, but I'm not making any of this stuff.

[Ivonne Rovira]

As a reviewer, I cannot in, all fairness, assign a rating to My Pantry: Homemade Ingredients That Make Simple Meals Your Own. Alice Waters is a goddess in the restaurant and cookbook worlds; however, I had never read a book by her, and, to be honest, I bought My Pantry because I confused Alice Waters of Chez Panisse with vegetarian restauranteur Mollie Katzen.

How can you know if this cookbook is for you? Easy! If your reaction to the following excerpt is delight, this is a five-star read for you:

I’ve been making my own red wine vinegar for the past thirty years. Once a year, I fill a 10-liter oak barrel (you can get this online or at a winemaking supply store) with vinegar mother [vinegar starting scum] and all of the unfinished bottles of wine that I’ve accumulated over the past six months — a lot of red, but also rose, white, sparkling, whatever I have.

Alice Waters then lets it ferment in that oak barrel for a year. If your response to this is perplexed horror, Alice Waters’ My Pantry is not for you. Actually, it’s really not for the faint of heart at all. Using the cookbook requires you to befriend a bean farmer and track down peach leaves, fresh anchovies, Marash peppers, fennel pollen, ghee, red quinoa, buckwheat groats, amaranth seeds — well, you get the picture.

In addition to vinegar, Alice Waters makes her own apéritifs, cheese, yogurt, almond milk, tahini, hummus, vanilla extract, gravlax, corn tortillas, salted fish, pickles, spices and more. And more power to her! However, my life is so busy that, when I need ricotta, tortillas, tahini, hummus or any type of vinegar, I think of my local grocery store or Costco, not a DIY job. If you’re like me, this book is not for you. There’s two or three recipes you can make visiting the Kroger, Safeway or Publix; however, unless you get it from the library or as an Amazon Kindle Deal, I wouldn’t bother.

[Mary · Rating 3 out of 5]

My pantry, Alice Waters
I did learn several things in this small volume, but I’m not sure they will ever be put to use. I had never heard the term “vinegar mother”. My taste is not so refined that I will ever invest in a 10 quart oak barrel and make my own vinegar....although I may seek out a farmers market that offers homemade vinegar. Not simple. Not easy, IMO. Buying a few bottles of vinegar is infinitely easier. I also don’t like seeking out all the necessary starters and other unusual ingredients. I will try the recipes for pita and flat bread, but there were no photos to tempt me to make anything else. Photos for me are essential in a cookbook.

[Chloe · Rating 4 out of 5]

Short and sweet. I don’t know how much of this I’ll be able to use in my own kitchen, but it gave me some wonderful ideas and goals, and her lyrical writing and the beautiful illustrations make it worth a read.

[Vishal Katariya · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fun book. I liked Alice Waters' metaphors in the introduction.

[Tricia · Rating 5 out of 5]

I enjoyed reading about Alice Waters' homemade pantry staples. So far I've made the chili salt and oat pancakes--both delicous!

[Jessica · Rating 4 out of 5]

A pleasant and inspiring read with lovely little illustrations (done by Alice Water's daughter!)

It was the time for me to redo my pantry & cellar foods, and this was the ideal book to pick up. I love the organization of the book: Spice Mixtures & Condiments, Nuts, Beans & Other Legumes, Savoury Preserves, Whole Grains, Preserved Fish & Meat, Cheese, and Sweet Preserves - my favourite chapters were those on savoury preserves (though not necessarily mindblowingly unique recipes, it was a nice selection of mostly pickled things) and whole grains (a great collection really focused on whole grains specifically, which was one of the things I'm trying to improve in my own pantry).

I've already made the Quick Garlicky Dill Pickles, though I won't taste them for another month or so as they set. I will say this recipe was drastically lacking in brine - there was less than half the brine I needed to fill all the jars, based on the recipe (I had to frantically boil up some more to get them filled). Alice Waters does tend to be a do-EVERYTHING-yourself chef, so I knew what I was getting into when I picked up this book, but I still found some suggestions a bit amusing. No, I don't have a kitchen hearth where I could cook beans over the fire. And what if I want to make the hummus recipe but I don't have any preserved lemon? Or is there an alternative to a crepe pan for the buckwheat buttermilk crepes? (I wish there were alternate options listed for some of these).

I do have a few more recipes flagged that I intend to try out before I need to return my copy to the library:
- That previously-mentioned Hummus with Preserved Lemon, except without the preserved lemon
- All-Purpose Pickling Brine (to throw in whatever little veg I have!)
- Whole-Wheat Flatbreads
- Oat Pancakes
- Ricotta (which I've made before, but I like the directions here)
- Farmer's Cheese

[Patti · Rating 4 out of 5]

I like to cook and I like to read cookbooks. Some I know I will never use and others I use until they fall apart.

Alice Waters has been around the cooking scene for awhile now and this is the first book I've read by her. I plan on making some major changes to my pantry and boy did I learn a thing or two.

The way she writes about food makes me want to get in my car and drive to her house for dinner. She knows what herb can go with what food and then ten other ways to use it. I can't wait to implement all that I learned!

[Isabelle✨ · Rating 4 out of 5]

I probably wouldn't have time to make any of these, though I definitely want to try making yogurt and ricotta one day. Definitely an educational, informational read on making things from scratch instead of store bought. Calling it self sufficiency doesn't really make sense, but maybe just natural and homemade pantry items. All of the recipes sound really cool but I feel like in reality most people wouldn't have time or money to make them.

[Ariel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Will I make even 50% of the recipes in this book? Probably not. But, Alice Waters is lovely. I admire her approach to food, honoring simple ingredients and desiring to maintain the integrity of whatever ingredients she’s working with.

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

Accessible and #able for most of us who want to undertake these kinds of things.

[Janel Gradowski · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a lovely, in so many ways, little book about some of the staples in chef Alice Waters’ pantry. While my pantry has far less sophisticated ingredients, I can’t wait to add more gourmet fare using this cookbook. Recipes range from spice blends to homemade cheese. Some recipes, such as the Espelette Hot Sauce, add to your pantry stash. Others, like Lebanese-inspired lentil soup and whole-wheat flatbreads, use ingredients from the pantry. I have a feeling the multigrain porridge, containing brown rice, millet and quinoa, will be a mainstay breakfast for me this winter. For adventurous cooks there are instruction for accomplishing tasks such as making wine vinegar in oak casks, salt-preserving kumquats, and curing gravlax.

This book is like a cookbook jewel. Small in size. Charming illustrations, the full-page pantry drawing before the Table of Contents is wonderful, all drawn by Waters’ daughter – Fanny Singer. Many of the recipes have variations, which I greatly appreciate. Everything is woven together with Alice’s thorough instructions. It’s a book that would be right at home on a pantry shelf, next to the vinegars and flours, to be called on like a trusted friend.

I received this book from Blogging for Books for this review.

[Cissa · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is so inspirational! I was reading it at night when I had insomnia, and it was all I could do to stay in bed and not get up and cook stuff!

The recipes and text are both very straightforward- not at ALL fussy!- but complete, and all of them have exciting variations both in making them and in ways to serve them. Almost all of them can be done with minimal kitchen equipment, and they're designed for lasting- I think the shortest-lived ones would last maybe a week, refrigerated, but much last far longer.

It's definitely worth reading all the text rather than just diving into the recipes. Waters's thoughtful context makes the recipes themselves even more exciting.

Very recommended indeed for cooks who like some straightforward DIY that allows us to bring unique flavors to even simple dishes, made with excellent ingredients.

[Kimberly · Rating 5 out of 5]

Oh my, I love this book. I have preserved food from my garden every year. I have even made some of my own mixes but this book takes it even farther. The book includes spice mixtures like cumin salt (yum) and Nico's Pork Seasoning (so good).
There were also recipes for Nuts, such as Almond Paste and Almond Milk; Legumes, Preserves, Whole grains - corn tortillas and the uses of cooked brown rice (so helpful); Preserved fish and meat; cheese and, of course, sweets in the form of Sweet Preserves. This last one had so many that I loved such as raspberry syrup (this from someone that does not like raspberries off the brambles), and so much more.

I can see this as a resource in my kitchen for years to come.

Thank you so much for sharing this book with me Blogging for Books who gave this book to me in exchange for my honest review.

[Short Sorceress · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was sent a copy of the book by Pam Krauss Books for review purposes. As always, all opinions are my own.

It's always been a personal goal of mine to learn to use every last scrap to its fullest potential and this book has given me a number of tips to help me reach this goal. I've never quite been sure what to do with the mound of apple peels and cores I face after making 50 pints of applesauce or the huge bag of peach pits that are currently taking up valuable real estate in my freezer. Instead of composting my leftovers I could be making apple peel cider vinegar (page 24) from my leftover apples or noyau extract (page 32) from my peach kernels. Of course some of the recipes in this book are more practical than others, but I really enjoy the variety Alice's latest book has to offer.

[Joe · Rating 3 out of 5]

I admire Alice Waters. So I wish I could say I read this and thought, oh, I could do that! But mostly I thought, wow, that really seems like a project. My worry is that by the time I shopped, prepared, and stored these homemade ingredients, the meals they contributed to would no longer feel so simple. The red wine vinegar, yes, once I get an oak barrel. The cheeses and yogurts, maybe. But the rest—see, for instance, the recipe for hummus—I'm not sure that I'd ever get to preparing an actual meal.

[Correen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Alice Waters presents her esoteric tastes combined with some common sense ideas. She argues the worth of her diet in terms of environmental responsibility, nutrition, and economy then goes on to make some foods that would likely have a limited appeal. I am certain that the food is delicious but I would not have the time, resources, or desire to attempt most of it. It is an interesting book anyway.

[Claire · Rating 4 out of 5]

In this pretty little volume, Alice Waters offers several handfuls of recipes for stocking a pantry. Although I'm eager to try many of the recipes--za'atar, Nifouler's Masala, Apple Peel Cider Vinegar, Tomato Confit, and Mia's Vin d'Orange--it is really the "pantry principle" Waters proposes here that inspires my attention. The basic idea? With a few simple, flavorful staple pantry items one can always prepare unique, flavorful, and uncomplicated meals at a moment's notice.

[Donna Azure · Rating 5 out of 5]

Alice Waters is the has had tremendous influence on the way food is sources and prepared in our country today. She has been a promoter of "food to table" since the 1960's. In this book, Alice tells how to cook, really cook, with good, fresh ingredients and basic techniques . A must have for any "foodie" as well as anyone interested in really understanding the process of putting great meals on the table. Stellar!

[Holly · Rating 4 out of 5]

Only Alice Waters could make me read and enjoy a book about what's in her pantry.

[Debra · Rating 4 out of 5]

I received an email alerting me that I could purchase the Kindle version of My Pantry by Alice Waters for only $2.99. I jumped at it. This is a slim volume (I'm assuming) because I read it and skimmed the recipes in that setting. I will revisit this book again and again if simply for the spice section with recipes for Za’atar, Cumin Salt, Chile-Lime Salt, and Niloufer’s Masala. I can't wait to try Fanny’s Superfood Granola (included in the whole grain section) which combines buckwheat groats, red quinoa, nuts, sesame seeds, chia seeds, sunflower seeds along with warming spices and honey.

I loved that Waters has a 10-liter oak barrel in her kitchen that she makes wine vinegar in. She dumps in all the leftover wine, no matter what color or region. She even dumps in sparkling wine. She also includes directions on making your own apple cider vinegar with peels and apple cores.

Other sections in My Pantry includes "Nuts," "Beans and Other Legumes," "Savory Preserves," "Preserved Fish and Meats," "Cheese," and "Sweet Preserves." I do have to say that I found some of her preserving instructions a bit suspect. I'm not sure I would actually can anything from this book but I would certainly make some to store in the refrigerator.

[Nina Leung · Rating 5 out of 5]

Normally, I don't read cookbooks as I would a regular book, but this one is different, it reads like a novel. There are great descriptions, little side notes about how she came about certain types of foods and how to prepare them, reminisces about favorite recipes. I definitely plan on using about half the recipes in the book. I'm a little intimidated by canning and fermenting, but I think I might try making my own yoghurt and ricotta cheese. Sounds fun and easy.

I especially enjoyed her suggestions on how to use all of the essentials she uses in her pantry. Sprinkling cumin salt on eggs in the morning, for instance. Of course there are many more good ways of using these essentials. It's written very casually and makes all the instructions seem easy. We'll see when I actually make some of this stuff, but from someone who has written so many books, I don't doubt it will be easy to follow.

[Jacqueline M. · Rating 3 out of 5]

What a strange little book. 3.5 stars rounded down. I thought this would be a helpful guide to a well stocked pantry. This is perhaps true if you're the type of person who routinely makes a stew with preserved lemons and homemade tahini when you "return home from your travels". Also helpful if you're interested in buying a 10gal oak cask for fermenting your own vinegar. Listen, I'm crunchy. Like I make my own vinegars crunchy. But I've never been the level of crunchy that needs 10gal of home fermented vinegar in a year let along multiple 10gal casks of different varieties home fermented vinegars.

All that said did I make ricotta cheese last night with the leftover buttermilk I didn't know what to do with? Yes. I did. Her recipe was great. So maybe I should invest in a 10g oak cask instead of my great grandmother's 1g stoneware fermentation crock. I enjoyed the prose and the 1 recipe I tried. I just don't know how to feel thus this star rating.

[Udine · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's good to know I have been doing it right all along. I hope to think that Ms Waters would love my pantry. I have been making all my own spice mixes, condiments, sauces, etc since the 70s - hated processed food even then. My spice cabinet has grown so full that I actually found an antique cabinet with 3 shelves contained behind a glass door on top and 2 larger, more open shelves on bottom. It takes up an entire corner in my kitchen. I had wanted one of those old fashioned corner hutches but could not find one so I got this at an antique shop and love it. I still have my own wall hanging cabinet (from the 70s when I started my culinary journey) and my Mom's old "Spice Islands" set which was what I worked from when she was teaching me the family kitchen magic. Good spices are like traveling by aroma.

[Mandy Crumb]

I am not going to give this a star rating because it is a nice book with lovely illustrations but I am not the target audience.
I am all for making things at home but this book takes it a bit far for me. The time involved, sourcing the ingredients, and the recipes themselves are just not to my tastes. There's nothing here that I would ever make or have any interest in making if I had an extra year to do so.
My kitchen and palate are different than yours, so you do you. If you are interested in making your own spice blends, cheese, vinegar, and sugared rose petals please be my guest. Don't invite me over for dinner though!

[Shelby Stevens · Rating 5 out of 5]

make no mistake--this book is a loving cookbook that explains the what, a bit of the how, and a bit of why concerning made-at-home alternatives to common pantry items plus some things alice keeps in her pantry that you may not. it's an accumulation of techniques gathered throughout years of reading cookbooks that alice has listed at the end of her book--all lovingly illustrated by her daughter. this book is gorgeous and practical and soon-to-be my new bible. it's not just a collection of recipes, it truly is a way of life & a value system; which is something that many cookbooks claim to be though few leave the kind of indelible mark that this book has left on me.

[Sue · Rating 3 out of 5]

Love Alice Waters' philosophy and approach to cooking. This is an informative book about the staples that she has on hand. Suffice to say that her pantry and mine have very little in common. I think I'm more likely to seek out her restaurant than to make these myself, but for a moment I can pretend that I'm a scratch cook.

[Deb Nielsen · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a quick little read with enjoyable illustrations. It’s mostly recipes with a few words from Alice at the beginning of each section. At this point I wouldn’t want to make a lot of the recipes, but there are some I’d definitely like to try, and overall it still stoked my renewed interest in cooking with fresh foods.

[Paula ϟ · Rating 4 out of 5]

An enjoyable read by the renowned Californian chef with exotic, yet simple taste. Alice Waters is the renowned chef of Chez Panisse which is arguably the restaurant that sparked the "farm to table" movement. I loved her approach to use raw and in-season ingredients. Her section on mixing your own seasonings was really cool and something I'd love to do more. I will say that a good handful of the recipes seemed a little out of reach for me, but I liked reading about her approaches to cooking and some of the stories behind the recipes.

[Cameron Toney · Rating 3 out of 5]

Do I think I will be making my own vinegar, or canning my own preserves? No, I cant honestly say that I expect to do that.
But this book does express the love of ones own kitchen that I really understand. I may not stock my pantry with these exact foods, but I see the point here. Fill your kitchen with things so that you can always make what you really like.
A philosophy I can get behind.