This past week, St. Martin's Press sent us a complimentary copy of a soon-to-be-released cookbook to preview, and we enjoyed it so much that we wanted to share our take on it with you. As always, all of our opinions here are our own. 
Julie Taboulie's Lebanese Kitchen by Julie Ann Sageer was a revelation for both of us. There are some modern preparations of dishes that we already knew we loved, like hummus, baba ghanaouj, pita bread, and fattoush, along with a ton of great desserts we're going to make.

Julie's writing is interesting and spot-on, and we really connected with the narrative that she tells in the introduction. She drifted from her roots and then circled back with a new appreciation for her grandmother's cooking and Lebanese classics. We had a similar journey with Southern American food. To us, years ago, Southern food and vegetarian food didn't seem to mesh all that well. As kids, we kind of started to think that Southern food wasn't really for us. We strayed, too, finding curry, stir-fry, falafel, sushi, and a world of possibilities before circling back around to the South, and transforming Southern favorites makes up a part of our cooking today.
We appreciate Julie's amazing new cookbook and really feel that it comes from a true place. We were so inspired that we made a feast the first night after we'd both read it cover to cover. Our table quickly filled up with freshly spun hummus, smoky baba ghanaouj, homemade Lebanese pit...