Bread and How to Eat It: A Cookbook

"What happens when an all-important subject like bread is tackled by one of the most talented chefs and one of the most engaging food writers in the country? Magic." --Mark Bittman, author of How to Cook Everything

"Rick is a brilliant baker working with such intellect and care at every step of the process. Finally the world will have a glimpse into his world of bread." --Dan Richer, New York Times best-selling author of The Joy of Pizza

"I'm a regular patron of Easton's legendary Bread and Salt, where I gobble focaccia sandwiches and Italian pastries rarely seen in this country. Now he and Melissa McCart have collaborated on a cookbook that's not really a cookbook but an appreciation of the plebeian eats that all of us love, but are rarely found in restaurants." --Robert Sietsema, critic, Eater New York

"Getting to sit at Rick's table is a marvelous experience. This book is the next best thing--an elaborate invitation, a manual and manifesto, a menu for us all to re-create that magic in our own hearths and homes." --Daniela Galarza, staff writer at The Washington Post

"Rick Easton has written an entire and entirely wonderful book all about bread and the many ways to cook with and eat it. This is a very fortunate thing for all of us, and I'm grateful. But I would instruct you to pay attention to the stuff in here that is NOT bread, too. Because no one makes better beans, for instance. Beans with greens, bean soups, fava bean puree (or, one of the greatest things on earth), a most comforting porridge of chickpeas and leftover bread . . . because the bread is what ties it all together, of course. P.S. Don't sleep on the Torta di Pane." --Charlotte Druckman, editor of Women on Food

"By now, we have a ritual: We get a haul--more than any reasonable person would need--from Bread and Salt. Then, over the course of the next few days, maybe as long as a week, we eat it little by little, observe it, take comfort in its company. When the bread first arrives, it is in its spring. We like to cut and carve it with the reverence we bestow on meat or tuna, registering the different emotions and personalities in every layer; you immediately see, for instance, that the bottom eats differently than the sides or the top. For most bread, that would be that--common wisdom is that every second that goes by is a second closer to stale. But Bread and Salt's work, technique, and depth make it so you're watching a piece of craft evolve, naturally--watching it and tasting it age, like a bottle of the finest Burgundy. It's really something to experience." --Frank Castronovo and Frank Falcinelli of Frankies 457 Spuntino, Franks Wine Bar, and F&F Pizzeria

RICK EASTON is a baker and co-owner of Bread & Salt Bakery in Jersey City, New Jersey. He lives down the street from the bakery with coauthor Melissa McCart and their dog, Lucy. MELISSA McCART is a food journalist who has worked for Mark Bittman on Substack and Medium; and for Eater.com and the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. You can also find her work in Bon Appétit, Saveur, The Washington Post, and elsewhere.