Magnolia Table, Volume 2

April 6, 2020
Gaines, HGTV host and cofounder of Texas restaurant Magnolia Table, builds on her bestselling Magnolia Table cookbook with this solid, breezy sophomore outing. The book opens with sections devoted to foods made from scratch, such as pizza dough, gnocchi, and rosemary focaccia. Later chapters are primarily composed of popular crowd-pleasers such as Cajun shrimp sheet pan dinner, chicken Florentine, and steak tacos with Mexican crema. Other classics include arancini with marinara sauce, chicken noodle soup, and Philly cheesesteaks. Fans will be delighted to find anecdotes throughout the book (“For Chip and me, this soup always takes us back to one of our first dates,” she reminisces as she introduces creamy chicken poblano soup) as well as recipes from her Magnolia Table restaurant and Silos Baking Co. bakery, most notably zucchini bread, blueberry sweet rolls with lemon glaze, and oatmeal cream pies. Gaines also includes an in-depth guide to fresh herbs, noting their flavor profiles and common pairings, as well as a list of reliable ingredient substitutions. Given Gaines’s huge fanbase, this looks like a surefire bestseller.