Relish Austin: 25 gift-worthy food books, magazines for just about everyone in your life

1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour

2 Tbsp. sugar

1/4 tsp. salt

1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, chilled and cut up

1 large egg yolk

1/4 tsp. vanilla extract

2 to 3 Tbsp. ice water (or more as needed)

For Orange Custard Filling:

3/4 cup plus 6 Tbsp. whole milk

2 large egg yolks

1/3 cup sugar

2 Tbsp. cornstarch

2 Tbsp. all-purpose flour

1 Tbsp. butter

1/8 tsp. salt

1 vanilla bean or 1/4 tsp. vanilla extract

3 medium navel oranges (1 1/4 lb.)

2 Tbsp. apple jelly

2 tsp. triple sec

Red currants for garnish

Make crust: In food processor with knife blade attached, pulse flour, sugar and salt until blended. Add butter. Pulse until mixture resembles coarse meal. Add egg yolk and vanilla; pulse until combined. Add ice water, 1 tablespoon at a time, pulsing until mixture holds together when pinched. Gather dough into ball; flatten into disk, wrap disk in plastic, and refrigerate until firm, at least 1 hour or up to 2 days.

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. On lightly floured surface, with floured rolling pin, roll disk into 12-inch round. Gently roll dough to drape over rolling pin to transfer to 9-inch tart pan with removable bottom. Gently press dough onto bottom and side of pan. Run rolling pin along top of tart pan to trim away excess dough. Freeze 30 minutes or until very firm.

With fork, pierce dough all over. Line tart shell with foil and fill with pie weights or dry beans. Bake 15 minutes. Reduce oven temperature to 350 degrees. Remove foil and weights. Bake crust another 15 to 20 minutes or until golden. Cover rim with foil if browning too quickly. Cool in pan on wire rack.

While crust cools, make filling: In 2-quart saucepan, heat 3/4 cup milk to simmering on medium. In heatproof medium bowl, whisk together egg yolks, remaining 6 tablespoons milk, and sugar until blended; whisk in cornstarch and flour until smooth. Slowly whisk hot milk into egg mixture. Return to same saucepan.

Cook mixture on medium 4 minutes or until very thick, whisking constantly. Remove from heat. Whisk in butter and salt until smooth. With knife, cut vanilla bean lengthwise in half; scrape out seeds and whisk into milk mixture (or whisk in vanilla extract). Transfer mixture to small bowl. Place plastic wrap directly on surface to prevent skin from forming. Refrigerate until cool, about 45 minutes. (Can be refrigerated up to 1 day; remove from refrigerator 30 minutes before using.)

With sharp paring knife, cut peel and white pith from oranges. Thinly slice crosswise. Spread pastry cream evenly in cooled tart shell. Arrange orange slices in one layer on pastry cream, overlapping slightly. Can be refrigerated, covered, up to 2 hours.

In 1-quart saucepan, combine jelly and triple sec. Heat on medium until melted, whisking. Cool slightly and brush fruit with jelly. Garnish with currants. Serves 8.

— From "The Good Housekeeping Christmas Cookbook" (Hearst, $30)

Phat Khanaeng (Stir-fried Brussels sprouts)

A favorite vegetable common in stir-fries is khanaeng, which looks like a cross between a Brussels sprout and bok choy. You can’t find it in the U.S., so at Pok Pok, I sub regular old Brussels sprouts, which turn out great, and I call for them here. Of course, you can apply this method of cooking and saucing (a Chinese-Thai merging of oyster sauce and fish sauce) to almost any vegetable to delicious effect. Briefly blanched, broccoli, green beans, cauliflower or a mix of several types all work well.

— Andy Ricker

2 cups (about 10 oz.) Brussels sprouts, bottoms trimmed, outer leaves removed, halved lengthwise

Kosher salt

2 Tbsp. Thai oyster sauce

1 tsp. Thai fish sauce

1 tsp. Thai thin soy sauce

Small pinch ground white pepper

2 Tbsp. vegetable oil

1 Tbsp. minced garlic cloves

4 fresh Thai chiles, preferably red, thinly sliced

1/4 cup Sup Kraduuk Muu (Pork stock, page 268 in Ricker’s book), or water

1 tsp. granulated sugar

Bring a large pot of water to a boil, and add enough salt to make it taste slightly salty. Add the Brussels sprouts and cook just until they’re no longer raw but still crunchy, 30 seconds to 1 minute, depending on their size. Drain them well. If you’re not stir-frying them right away, shock them in ice water.

Combine the oyster sauce, fish sauce, soy sauce and white pepper in a small bowl and stir well. Heat a wok over very high heat, add the oil, and swirl it in the wok to coat the sides. When it begins to smoke lightly, add the garlic, take the wok off the heat, and let the garlic sizzle, stirring often, until it’s fragrant but not colored, about 15 seconds.

Put the wok back on the heat, and add the Brussels sprouts and chiles. Stir-fry (constantly stirring, scooping and flipping the ingredients) for 30 seconds to infuse the sprouts with the garlic flavor. Add the oyster sauce mixture (plus a splash of water, if necessary, to make sure nothing’s left behind in the bowl), and stir-fry until the Brussels sprouts are tender but still crunchy and the liquid in the pan has almost completely evaporated, about 45 seconds. Add the stock, then add the sugar and stir-fry until the Brussels sprouts are tender with a slight crunch and the sauce has thickened slightly but is still very liquidy, about 30 seconds. Transfer the vegetables and sauce to a plate in a low mound, and serve. Serves 2 to 6.

— From "Pok Pok: Food and Stories from the Streets, Homes, and Roadside Restaurants of Thailand," (Ten Speed Press, $35) by Andy Ricker

Dulce De Leche Brownies

Dulce de leche literally translates to “candy of milk.” In layman’s terms, it’s a caramel-like concoction made from boiling sweetened condensed milk until it becomes … well, pretty much an eighth deadly sin. What I love most about dulce de leche is that it has the beautiful color and deep flavor of caramel, but not the chewiness, so you don’t have to expend needless energy flexing your jaw muscles.

I have a hard time controlling myself around a can of dulce de leche, and I’ve been known to spoon it into coffee, spread it on cookies, plop it onto ice cream, and yes, swirl it through big fudgy brownies like these.

— Ree Drummond

Nonstick baking spray

5 (1-oz.) squares unsweetened chocolate

1 cup (2 sticks) butter, softened

2 cups sugar

4 eggs

1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour

1 Tbsp. vanilla extract

7 oz. (about 1/2 can) dulce de leche

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees. Generously spray an 8-inch square baking pan or an 8-by-10-inch baking pan with nonstick baking spray.

Place the chocolate in a microwave-safe bowl and microwave it in about 45-second intervals, stirring each time, until it’s completely melted. Set it aside to cool for 20 minutes or so.

Add the butter and the sugar to the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Cream them together until they’re light and fluffy. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. With the mixer on low, slowly drizzle in the chocolate until it’s all combined. Add the flour and vanilla, and mix it until it’s all combined, scraping the sides of the bowl halfway through. Spread the batter into the greased pan.

Next, crack open the can of dulce de leche, and place half of it in a glass bowl. Warm it in the microwave for 30 to 45 seconds, just to make it a little more stirrable.

Drop large dollops of dulce de leche on the surface of the batter, then use a knife to slowly swirl it through the brownie batter. Don’t drag the knife sideways through the batter; hold it so the thin side of the knife leads the way.

Bake the brownies for 45 to 50 minutes, or until the center is almost totally set. Let the brownies cool in the pan for 15 minutes, and then carefully turn them out of the pan and let them cool completely. Use a very sharp serrated knife to cut the brownies into squares, and place them on a pretty cake stand. Makes 16 brownies.

— From "The Pioneer Woman Cooks: A Year of Holidays" (William Morrow, $29.99) by Ree Drummond

It’s amazing to see the variety of cookbooks and food books that hit my desk each year.

They seem increasingly creative and diverse, from memoirs about life on the farm or in some far-off country and investigative books about food policy to cookbooks for penny-pinching college students and coffee-table tomes filled with stunning photographs and impossible recipes.

I love picking through the stacks of books I’ve held on to all year just for this gift guide. (Some were too good to wait and were featured in the food section this year.) Here are 25 books, and a few magazines, worthy of a spot under the tree:

Buying a gift for a host who really loves the holidays? "The Good Housekeeping Christmas Cookbook" (Hearst, $30) will tickle the fancy of just about any tinsel-fanatic, but Pioneer Woman fans will really get a kick out of Ree Drummond's latest, "The Pioneer Woman Cooks: A Year of Holidays" (William Morrow, $29.99). Like her other projects, the book makes you feel like you're in the kitchen of the blogging queen's Oklahoma ranch.

Of all the celebrity entertaining books I've seen come out this year, however, none can top Daphne Oz's newest book, "Relish: An Adventure in Food, Style, and Everyday Fun," (William Morrow, $27.50) in which the co-host of "The Chew" offers advice and insight on everything from what to serve at a party and how to keep the conversations going to how to take care of yourself mentally and physically so you're ready for everyday challenges. She shares lots of recipes, too, but it's her holistic (and personable) way of helping you figure out how to iron out the kinks of all aspects of life, from your relationships to home decors, that I really liked.

For the person in your life who is homesick for the Deep South, you have a few options. "Southern Casseroles: Comforting Pot-Lucky Dishes" (Chronicle, $24.95) by Denise Gee features recipes for updated classics such as baked spaghetti, chicken pot pie, bread pudding, cheese grits and, of course, cornbread. Gena Knox's second book, "Southern My Way: Food & Family," puts a Garden & Gun magazine-style spin on life in the South, a decidedly more luxurious version than what you'll find in Gee's book.

If you know someone who likes to think critically about the ways in which regional foodways are depicted and the narratives we use to describe them, look no further than "The Larder: Food Studies Methods from the American South" (University of Georgia Press, $24.95), a compilation of 16 essays edited by John T. Edge, Ted Ownby and Austinite Elizabeth S.D. Engelhardt. You won't find any recipes for cornbread here, but chances are you have an academic-minded person in your life who'd appreciate this book anyway.

As a Midwesterner, I'm particularly excited to see some attention directed at foodways from the middle of the country, and Minnesota native Amy Thielen's "The New Midwestern Table: 200 Heartland Recipes" (Clarkson Potter, $35) came out just as her Food Network show, "Heartland Table," debuted earlier this fall. So, what is Midwestern food? Food that reflects the kind of ingredients that grow well from Ohio to Nebraska and the style of cooking of the people who settled the land: pickled everything, butters made out of fruit, slaws, krauts, milk-braised vegetables, Ritz cracker-crusted panfish, barbecue spareribs, pot roasts, meat-filled pastries, and lots and lots of variations on potatoes. Thielen likely won't ever gain the kind of fame that her celebrity peers from the South have, but she's a pioneering woman of a different sort.

If you're looking for a magazine to gift that isn't already on your radar (Fine Cooking, Bon Appetit and Saveur are among my favorites), check out Lucky Peach (lky.ph — yes, that's the URL) and a new regional magazine out of Houston called Sugar & Rice (treadsack.com/sugarandrice). Similar in price and subject matter, these non-traditional publications take a more avant-garde approach to food, featuring long-form pieces from some of the most thoughtful writers in the country about everything from where Topo Chico really comes from to the complex, gut-wrenching reality of North Korea's food system.

Kinfolk is another one of those new food periodicals that takes food (and itself) pretty seriously, and this year, founder Nathan Williams published a cookbook, "The Kinfolk Table: Recipes for Small Gatherings" (Artisan, $35), which has the same softly lit, rural dinner party feel of the magazine. Perfect for the Pinterest-loving hipster in your family.

Let's admit it, though: Highbrow, hard-thinking magazines might not be at the top of many cooks' list, which is where the new print magazine from Allrecipes (allrecipes.com) comes in. Launching a print product is a smart move from this web titan, which has built a dedicated following through its website and apps, including my grandmother, who used to only use her phone for solitaire.

We all know someone who is as much a scientist in the kitchen as a cook, and unlike several other books on molecular gastronomy, Jozef Youssef's "Molecular Gastronomy at Home: Taking Culinary Physics Out of the Lab and Into Your Kitchen" (Firefly, $29.95) won't set you back a few car payments. After all, once he or she masters sous-vide and spherification, you might get an invitation to a dinner that otherwise would cost the price of a plane ticket to Chicago or New York.

Speaking of those pricey molecular gastronomy books, former chief technology officer of Microsoft and Modernist Cuisine author Nathan Myhrvold has released a 12-pound coffee-table book called "The Photography of Modernist Cuisine" (The Cooking Lab, $120) that features his stunning macro-photographs of foods you might not recognize up close.

Christopher Boffoli also takes up-close pictures of food, but his specialty is using miniature figurines of humans to turn them into spirited, often humorous scenes. His debut book, "Big Appetites: Tiny People in a World of Big Food" (Workman, $12.95), is an absolutely charming stocking stuffer.

For the Paul Qui or Ramen Tatsu-Ya fan in your life, consider gifting one of the following books from chefs who are changing how we think about Asian food: "Ivan Ramen: Love, Obsession, and Recipes from Tokyo's Most Unlikely Noodle Joint" (Ten Speed Press, $29.99) by Ivan Orkin, a New York native who now runs a noodle shop in Japan; "L.A. Son: My Life, My City, My Food" (Ecco, $29.99) by Kogi food truck founder Roy Choi; "Pok Pok: Food and Stories from the Streets, Homes, and Roadside Restaurants of Thailand" (Ten Speed Press, $35), the highly anticipated debut cookbook from Portland's Andy Ricker; and "Japanese Soul Cooking: Ramen, Tonkatsu, Tempura, and More from the Streets and Kitchens of Tokyo and Beyond" (Ten Speed Press, $27.50) by Tadashi Ono and Harris Salat, who bring home one of the hottest food trends of 2013.

For an even deeper look into the cult of celebrity chefs and what life is like on the other side of our fascination with "ethnic" food, consider Eddie Huang's memoir, "Fresh Off the Boat" (Spiegel & Grau, $26), a profanity-laced, button-pushing book that will likely offend you as often as it delights with Huang's keen insight into the truth and consequences of chasing the American Dream. Huang runs the New York restaurant Baohaus, but he grew up in his parents' restaurants in Florida, where he did everything he could to reject the "model minority" stereotype society thrust upon him. He hustled his way through school, which ultimately included a law degree, before figuring out how to beat the system and stay true to his roots without being defined by them.

You won’t find a single curse word in a trio of vegetable-focused books that, led by revered food leaders Alice Waters and Mollie Katzen, fall solidly on the other side of the food book spectrum.

Waters' book, "The Art of Simple Food II: Recipes, Flavor, and Inspiration from the New Kitchen Garden" (Clarkson Potter, $35), isn't strictly vegetarian, but the recipes are categorized by vegetables and clearly reflect the locavore ethos her restaurant Chez Panisse is credited with popularizing. Katzen, who wrote some of my favorite hippie cookbooks, including "The Enchanted Broccoli Forest," is back with her first new book in four years, "The Heart of the Plate: Vegetarian Recipes for a New Generation" (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, $34.99), which, unlike Waters' book, includes photographs of some of the recipes.

Filled with photography, Tara Duggan's "Root-to-Stalk Cooking: The Art of Using the Whole Vegetable" (Ten Speed Press, $22), feels more modern than the new books of her predecessors, and she also wisely capitalizes on the newest spin on so-called nose-to-tail eating. Stalks, leaves, peels, husks and seeds are often just dumped into the compost pile. Duggan's inventive techniques for making things like apple peel bourbon and creamy asparagus and celery heart soup will make you wish you hadn't.

If you're an Alice Waters fan, then you are likely familiar with Marion Nestle's work. She's a food policy and nutrition expert who has written a number of influential books, including "What to Eat" and "Safe Food." The wordsmith also knows the power of imagery, which is why for her latest book, "Eat Drink Vote: An Illustrated Guide to Food Politics" (Rodale Books, $18.99), she teamed with some of the country's top cartoonists to convey her message of why eating is a political act.

It's been more than five years since Jeff Hertzberg and Zoë François published their bestselling "Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day," and fans will flock to the completely revised edition "The New Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day: The Discovery That Revolutionizes Home Baking" (Thomas Dunne, $29.99), which includes new recipes and a chapter on gluten-free baking.

For more than just a chapter on baking without gluten, check out Ellen Brown's "Gluten-Free Bread: More than 100 Artisan Loaves for a Healthier Life" (Running Press, $23). Brown, the founding food editor for USA Today and author or more than 35 books, knows her cookbooks, so all of the recipes, like maple walnut breakfast rolls and spiced raisin bread, are appealing in and of themselves, not just because they happen to be gluten-free.