Hello, Home Cooking: Do-Able Dishes for Every Day: A Cookbook

by Ham El-Waylly

Use everyday ingredients to create memorable meals with 90 flavorful, unique, and approachable recipes from around the world—by one half of the beloved team behind NYT Cooking’s “Mystery Menu.”

In Hello, Home Cooking, quirky, beloved, fun-loving NYT Cooking video star Ham El-Waylly combines his unique personal heritage—representing the cuisines of Qatar, Bolivia, Brazil, and Egypt—with his fifteen years as a professional chef to bring delicious, global recipes to home cooks. Ham teaches readers how flavors work so that you can swap in local or seasonal ingredients to any recipe.

Deeply rooted in everyone’s nostalgia, Ham's recipes center culture and community with beloved dishes from across different nations that carry a can’t-quite-put-my-finger-on-it hominess, regardless of the origin. He teaches cooks of all experience levels about the base flavors of cuisines around the world, freeing them to mix, match, and alter classic dishes into something delicious and new. From the Macarona Bechamel that parallels American Mac n Cheese and Basbousa (a sweet, semolina cake) that would rival any Blondie, to Egyptian ta’amaya (like falafel but made with fava beans instead of chickpeas) and beyond, Hello, Home Cooking shows you how to highlight your own heritage in familiar recipes by swapping in certain ingredients for others—focusing on affordability and availability. Most people are familiar with the mezze staple muhammara, a dip made of ground walnuts and charred red peppers. Ham’s go-to version isn't red; It's green from roasted hatch chilies and pistachios. The Brazilian icebox cake, pave, is usually made with pricey, impossible-to-find fresh passionfruit—try it with seasonal strawberries instead for a summery treat.

With Ham’s invaluable guidance, you can make any comfort meal an adventure, and any adventurous dish feel like you’ve eaten and loved it a hundred times.

Genres: Cookbooks, Cooking, Food, Nonfiction

288 pages, Hardcover

Published March 24, 2026

Reviews

[Miss✧Pickypants ᓚᘏᗢ]

Of the 26 cookbooks I've read so far this year, this one is my favourite! Honestly, I loved everything about it and am completely perplexed by reviewers here who thought otherwise. To start, the book has a gorgeous retro-feeling design with beautiful photos (kudos to photographer Laura Murray).

Then there are the recipes, they are a well-written, playful collection of fusioned global cuisines with just the right amount of chef-iness . The author is also an excellent writer/storyteller with engaging personal mini-essays between chapters and delightful headnotes for each recipe. Some have complained ingredients are difficult to source but I'd counter that nowadays, the majority of ingredients will be available at local markets and recipes truly are written for home cooks at all levels.

I am looking forward to making Lazy Hummus and Green Beans Braised in Tomato. But the recipe I am most excited to try is the Tomato Dressed in Tomato (on Toast). Sadly, I will have to wait util at the end of August when I have tons of fresh tomatoes available straight from my plants.

[Marie]

Hello, Home Cooking was not what I expected... but also more than I expected.

For me, it fell short of it's subtitle of "Do-Able Dishes for Every Day." The recipes were fairly uniformly involved and many if not most of the recipes called for ingredients you can't pick up at your local chain grocery store. That was a little disappointing.

But I kept reading. Y'all, Ham is a masterful storyteller. I thoroughly devoured (get it? ha ha) his section intros and recipe intros. I feel like I learned a TON about Egyptian and Brazilian foods, culture, and lifestyles. Even if I didn't feel up to attempting most of the recipes, I was still completely sold on wanting to try them. His intros aren't overly abbreviated. It took me a few days to fully read this cookbook.

Here's a quote from the jacket copy that might help sell you on how much you'll learn: "Born to an Egyptian father and a Bolivian mother who lived in Brazil, Ham grew up in Qatar and New Jersey before cooking in Mexican, French, and Italian restaurants, and even a Mongolian grill. He has half the world's cuisines baked into his DNA."

I encourage readers to read the book in full, and to not give up. I felt that Ham came across a little strong and *ahem* overly confident near the beginning, but he either softened as he went or I got used to his manner of speaking. Maybe it's the New York coming out in his writing.

And I also encourage readers to take note of the gorgeous table spreads pictured within. Every recipe is photographed at least once and some more than once. Mouthwatering.

[Stephanie]

2.5 stars

Too “chef-y” for home cooking. Several ingredients are not readily available outside of large markets like NYC. I doubt many people would use this cookbook on the regular.

[Jill]

Chef Ham El-Waylly grew up around food. His father is from Egypt and his mother from Bolivia, and he was raised in Qatar. He came to America on his own when he was 19 and became a restaurant chef. He spent years on the lines of busy, respected restaurants, but he never wanted to cook at home. And then Covid hit, and he realized he didn’t know how to cook at home. He could make soup for 100 or craft a tweezer-perfected plate that he cooked in a pound of butter, but two make a simple dinner for two? That he didn’t know how to do.

But when the restaurants all shuttered and he was stuck at home, he decided to take the recipes his mother had left him and figure out how to cook the food of his childhood. And in revisiting the food he grew up with, he learned how to cook in a home kitchen. Hello, Home Cooking is his blend of professional kitchen expertise mixed with big flavors for home cooks. And this is packed with information.

There are about 100 recipes, from breakfasts to snacks to veggies, meats, pasta, and desserts. And in one of the smartest moves I think I’ve ever seen in a cookbook, each chapter page lists not only the dishes in that chapter, but it has a photo of each dish, right there at the start of the chapter. You can see at a glance what all the desserts look like, to help you decide if you want to make the Spiced Applesauce Bundt, Kinda Ice Box Cake of Canned Peaches, Glossy Chocolate Chunk Cookies, or Labneh-Cherry Cheesecake.

And then there are the pockets of deep information. With the breakfast chapter is a section on how to make eggs. But it’s how to make eggs 12 different ways, with instructions and photos of each type. There is a chart of vegetables from tender to hearty with instructions on how to cook them all. There is a chart on How to Salad. There is a recipe for Mom’s Perfect Pot of Rice. There is a Beef Chart, describing all the different cuts of beef and how to use them as well as instructions on how to buy and store fish.

The recipes vary from Crispy Fried Fish Tacos and Chicken and Rice to a Brazilian Hot Dog Party or a Roasted Chicken Dinner. There is Ham and Cheese Lasagna, Chicken and (Mochi) Dumplings, or Spaetzle and Cheese. Veggie lovers can try the Broccoli and Chamomile Soup, Kale Pesto Pasta, Roasted Eggplant with Chickpeas and Yogurt, or Warm Button Mushrooms and Radishes. And for breakfast, there are Masa Waffles, Maple Glazed Basturma Bacon, Date and Banana Smoothie, or Blueberry Muffins Inspired by Costco.

Throughout the cookbook are photos. Besides the pictures at the start of each chapter, there are photos with just about every recipe, and sometimes extra photos to show how to do something, like how to make the gnocchi in the Parisian Gnocchi with Brown Butter and Crispy Sage. And there is information throughout, so you have the wisdom of a professional chef to help you along each step, from choosing a knife to reading a recipe to kneading dough.

I love how El-Waylly encourages readers to start where they are and make their own way in the kitchen. The recipes don’t come with times for the overall prep, because he doesn’t presume to know how long it takes you to chop the vegetables or gather the ingredients. He encourages readers to start where they are and make mistakes. He calls mistakes the most significant part of cooking because of what they teach us in the kitchen. Hello, Home Cooking offers a fresh perspective on cooking for the family, and I think that people who are tired of being told to cook the same old way will find that this is new and refreshing. It’s smart, sensible, and personal.

Clarkson Potter provided me with a free copy of Hello, Home Cooking, with many thanks, but the opinions are my own.

[Debra]

The cover makes one think of retro and trendy comfort foods from the 70s and 80s with the outdated fonts and the colorful dinnerware. That is totally not the case. The blurb states that El-Waylly is striving for nostalgic ease with his recipes and while that is true, one needs to hang on to their apron strings. Hello, Home Cooking is an inventive wild ride of flavors and cuisines.

This book is another of a long string of cookbooks that has its origins in the pandemic. Prior to the shut-down, El-Waylly was a fine dining chef that looked own on home cooking. Dishes had to be beautiful and artistic and plated with tweezers.

It took me a long time to turn to the foods I grew up eating. i had turned off that part of my brain; I wanted to be a newer, better ham with a blank slate ready to absorb all the culinary techniques coming my way. It was almost as if I felt like I had to replace what I knew about food with a new, modern style to be successful. (8)

And, those foods he knew about growing up? El-Waylly had a "diverse international community; experiencing comforting home cooking from all over the world" (8). His father is Egyptian and mother is Bolivian. Both studied at Howard University. After they married, they moved to Doha, Qatar.

After his mother passed quite unexpectedly, he found her tattered notebook of recipes (ironically in a Madonna notebook). Covid made him transition from cooking food for many to cooking and portioning for just his small family. His mother's collection of recipes helped him discover the joys of home cooking.

El-Waylly possesses a great sense of humor, evident in "The Obligatory 'Basics' Section" (10-17). While it's basic, it is comprehensive---everything from choosing the best knife to kneading dough. (I did find out that I do need a Kunz spoon in my kitchen.)

This is a wild ride of unique combinations and re-inventing traditional recipes. I wanted to point out some of the most crazy-good sounding ones:

From "Breakfast---More than Eggs": Bodega Chilaquiles with Charred Tomato Salsa (served walking taco-style in a Doritos bag ) (44)

From "Dips & Snacks--Dip me baby one more time": Shishito-Pistachio Dip (79)

From "Vegetables----Beet, don't kale my vibe": Bread-and-Butter Pickled Cauliflower (123)

From "Rice, Grains & Pasta---Helping you grain confidence": Toasted Thin Spaghetti, Black Beans, and Parm (185)

From "Meat, Poultry & Seafood---Become a cut above the rest": Tahini-Roasted Swordfish (241)

From "Desserts---The icing on the cake": Frito Ganache Tart (264)

A lot of the cookbooks I've reviewed lately have been organized by seasons or ingredients. It was nice to get back to one that has more traditional sections. I like how he organized the book. The opening two-page spread that introduces each chapter has individual pictures of each of the dishes. And do not miss the essays that preface each section. They are hilarious and also offer lots of tips. (He does a comprehensive riff on all things eggs before the Breakfast recipes). You will also learn about how he is indebted to Johnny Rockets (his diner fix when he lived in Qatar), how Final Fantasy 7 led him to be a snack thief, and how his fixation on WWF in his youth led him to accost his mom's basmati rice.

[Elizabeth]

As heard on The Splendid Table: Conversations & Recipes For Curious Cooks & Eaters (846: Hello, Home Cooking with Ham El-Waylly and Obsessed with the Best with Ella Quittner)

Listen on: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Pandora | Amazon Music | YouTube.

This week, we amp up your home cooking with nostalgic dishes, perfect recipes, and pro cooking techniques. First, we talk with Chef Ham El-Waylly about his favorite dishes that were inspired by his wildly international upbringing and what draws him to comfort foods. From his mom’s cheesy empanadas to his riff on cinnamon toast cereal, he gets imaginative with recipes like his Tahini Roasted Swordfish. Ham El-Waylly is the author of Hello, Home Cooking: Do-Able Dishes for Every Day. Then we dive into the brilliant mind of food writer Ella Quittner, who shares her obsessive search for the perfect techniques to make the very best recipes. She traveled the world to learn how to make buckwheat soba noodles and find the secret to getting the best flavor in tsukune, Japanese chicken meatballs. Ella Quittner’s latest book is Obsessed with The Best, and she left us with her recipe for Crispy Smashed Potatoes with Insurance Cheese.

Subscribe to @TheSplendidTable on YouTube for full podcast episodes and full-length video interviews!

Broadcast dates for this episode:

March 27, 2026 (originally aired)

Generous listeners like you make The Splendid Table possible. Donate today to support the show

When you shop using our links, we earn a small commission. It’s a great way to support public media at no extra cost to you.

https://pdrl.fm/77b781/pscrb.fm/rss/p...

[Jaydub]

I love this cookbook. I purchased a digital copy, and having read through and browsed all of the recipes over the course of a few days, I ended up purchasing a physical copy. This is a great cookbook with a beautiful grid layout for the foods presented in each chapter, and with some backstory and thoughts from Ham.

Some of the recipes can be a bit more involved, while others are so simple. All of them have great payoff in flavor.

I have made so far:

The date fudge--browned butter, toasted flour and medjool dates come together for a simple, fun, rich fudge that tastes better than its sugar counterparts.
Kale pesto pasta--frozen thawed kale becomes a superhero in a simple food processor blitz and toss with cooked pasta.
Soba sharkesya --Egypt meets Japan with a cross-section of a luscious sauce served over soba noodles. Fussier than most but the flavor is outstanding.
Microwave Shiitake mushrooms --mix, nuke in the microwave, let stand and serve. An umami bomb of flavor that took about 10 minutes to make.
Braised Green Beans in Tomato Sauce -- Soft green beans simmered in grated tomato and spices.

I have not cooked as many recipes from one single cookbook in a long time, and I haven't begun to list the other recipes I want to cook from this book. Ham writes clearly and with humor, and has a lot of fun takes and spins on recipes that pull from his Egyptian and Bolivian heritage, as well as just solid classic recipes and spins on them (sausage egg and cheese, cardamom pancakes). This is a cookbook I will highly recommend to any avid home cook. Fantastic!

[Leane]

Apparently an Intstagram sensation, El-Waylly’s take on preparing nutritious and delicious meals at home is both accessible and enticing. With a welcoming Introduction, and the Obligatory “Basics” Section with preferred equipment and ingredients, he also explains his philosophy of cleaning as you go, reading the entire recipe first, and how to sharpen a knife. Divided into chapters on Breakfast, Dips & Snacks, Vegetables, Rice, Pasta & Grains, Meat, Poultry & Seafood, and Desserts, each section begins with a colorful-photographed array of the dishes, and then each recipe is clearly written and includes the expected serving amount, a personal interjection, and the ingredients. Colorful, styled photographs by Laura Murray enhances every section and all the recipes. El-Waylly does deep dives on making the prefect eggs, choosing and cooking produce with a chart, and How to Salad, as well as a mixture of fusion and ethnic approaches from the use of tahini, edamame, Za’atar, shaping gnocchi, and a lovely tribute to his mother and her classics like her Banana Nut Bread and Lemon Loaf Cake. This is a book for newbies and experienced cooks who want to be entertained when instructed and eat delicious food. Readalikes may be Milk Street’s The World on a Plate by Christopher Kimball, Alison Roman, and Nadiya Hussain.

[Charles Eldridge]

Normally I’m very hesitant to read and engage with what I call “kitchen sink” cookbooks - the ones that don’t reflect one cuisine but rather throw a random collection of recipes at the reader. Too often, they seem intended for readers who don’t cook at all and this might be their only cookbook. In my home, the random collection cookbooks are utilized far less than any others that reflect a specific foodway or style. However, this book is one of the rare ones that exceeds expectations.

“Hello, Home Cooking” is like a fun new take on the only other “kitchen sink” cookbooks I own: the excellent Half-Baked Harvest collection. Chef-Author Ham El-Waylly has a fun conversational style of writing that engages with the reader and teaches techniques to both new home cooks and seasoned veterans. The lesson on eggs is especially valuable. Each chapter starts with a two page pictorial spread of each recipe therein. That is a fantastic element that will help myself and others see at a glance what we might want to make from the cross-cultural randomness of recipes. The recipes themselves are well laid out with extremely clear (and humorous) instructions.

I can see this cookbook emerging as a family favorite as we explore the recipes this summer.

[Jared]

This isn't your standard, encyclopedic overview of a single cuisine, nor is it a dry manual on kitchen basics. Instead, it’s a brilliant, unpretentious bridge between professional-grade technique and the messy reality of home cooking. Equal parts recipe collection and memoir, it’s a rare cookbook you’ll actually read cover-to-cover like a novel. Given that Ham is the partner of James Beard Award winner Sohla El-Waylly, the bar for their "household hits" is clearly sky-high—and every recipe I’ve tried so far has been delicious. I especially love the vibrant, saturated photography and step-by-step visual breakdowns; the color-coded pages and engaging table of contents make the book feel truly alive. If you are a fan of the irreverent storytelling and genre-bending spirit of Priya Krishna’s Indian-ish, this belongs on your shelf. While Priya’s book feels like a family memoir, Ham’s is like a masterclass taught by a hilarious friend who just happens to have worked in some of the world's best restaurants.

[Kristen Barenthaler]

The recipes are all super-informative and well-written so that even the busiest chef can take a second to try them. I also love the cheekiness with which Ham El-Waylly writes (check out the subtitles of the recipes). 90% of these are probably ingredients you already have at home, so you aren't planning out how to find some crazy ingredient 5 weeks before actually making the dishes.

[Sally]

So many good recipes, with clear instructions and easily accessible ingredients.

Not a vegetarian cookbook but many vegetable recipes and tips for cooking vegetables.

Highly recommend for regular home cooks.

[Emily Joyce]

I like Ham's book a little more than Sohla's, and I made a great rustic pesto from its pages. but it didn't grab my attention a ton, even though I parasocially loved getting to learn more about him and his life. Still my fave culinary couple!

[Michelle]

Well, the photos were great and I'm sure this is a great cookbook for many, but there is no way I could do any of these every day, and I'm a moderately adventurous Midwesterner in a small town, there are ingredients and flavor combos here that I think I might be afraid of lol.

[Elaine]

I enjoy reading cookbooks but don’t usually read the whole book. I did read just about all of this one though. The introductions to each chapter were so interesting and well written as well as being smooth segues into the topics. I marked a number of recipes too.

[Jenn.]

Borrowed from DC Library. Excellent layout with lots of delicious food photos. Just didn't find anything I thought my family would like.

[Nancy Ross]

Margo brought this home from the library and I couldn't resist. Some good recipes. Sort of along the lines of a simpler Ottolenghi. Some editing would have helped with the use of photos.

[Cindy]

Lots to recipes that are to make

[Mer]

https://hardcover.app/books/hello-hom...

[Andrea Press]

Ginger Scallion Shrimp - So Good

[Claire]

Loved the memoir writing and the recipe notes—he’s got a very dry sense of humor.

Liked the veggie dishes and the mix of “project” recipes as well. Really great international flavors mixed and matched here!

Bought masa harina for the Masaffles—I’m used to a dense whole wheat/rye waffle texture but his description of light and crispy was spot-on.

I’m not a big fan of the photography; the lighting and styling make some of the food look fairly unappealing, which is a shame :/

*******
Before I return to the library, I didn’t get a chance to try these recipes that stood out to me:

•Shishito-Pistachio Dip (two of my favorite things!)
•Eggplant and Tofu Ragú (I know I’ve seen this concept elsewhere but I like his directions and inclusion of white miso)
•Cabbage, Apple, and Fish Sauce Slaw (Thai green papaya salad vibes!!)
•Frito Ganache Tart (I would never have an occasion to make this, but as a salty/sweet dessert person, I heartily approve the combo!)