Favorite recipes this year
Hummus – My brother and sister in law gave me the Israeli cookbook Zahav for Christmas a couple of years ago and mentioned the hummus recipe was famous. It also looked quite time-consuming, so it took me a while to get around to it. The first time I made it I caught myself rolling my eyes and thinking who would DO this regularly just for hummus? Well. Let me tell you. Once I tasted it, the answer to that question became… Me. I do this regularly for hummus and I can never go back.
Chicken teriyaki burgers (by pinchofyum.com): This is one of my favorite recipe sites, and this recipe is quick, easy, and now on steady rotation at our place (along with red thai chicken stir fry and gochujang noodles). Don’t skip making the slaw or the sauce.
Slow-cooked coconut lemongrass pork: We make this and use it for Vietnamese rice paper rolls with vermicelli, cucumber, carrot, sprouts, mint & coriander. Dip in peanut sauce or sweet chilli. Everyone loves it.
Asian Glazed salmon: This is so yum. Not cheap, because, you know… salmon. But so yum.
Slow-cooked massaman lamb-shanks: Another RecipeTinEats gem and an easy way to make massaman with a twist.
Honorable mention: We’ve been using more Mingle seasoning mixes as they’re guaranteed gluten free so they’re safe for our resident coeliac. Everyone likes their fajitas, butter chicken, and taco mixes.
Favorite Memoirs
I’ll Tell You When I’m Home (Hala Alyan): I adored this book. “A stunningly lyrical and brutally honest quest for motherhood, selfhood, and peoplehood, I’ll Tell You When I’m Home is a powerful story of unraveling and becoming, of destruction and redemption, and of homelands lost and recreated.” Particularly perfect for any third culture kids (or grownups)
The Smallest Lights In The Universe (Sara Seager): An MIT astrophysicist with two young children navigates the death of her husband and discovers the power of connection on this planet, even as she searches our galaxy for another Earth. This book is so clearly the product of a towering and relentless intellect. I felt like the first 2/3rds of this book were better than the end. I was particularly surprised by the lack of reflective depth with regards to the subject of her own late-in-life autism diagnosis given the acuity of her other insights, but was so impressed by that first 2/3rds it earned a spot on the list.
You Could Make This Place Beautiful (Maggie Smith): Poet Maggie Smith explores the disintegration of her marriage and her renewed commitment to herself. The way this memoir was structured was a revelation and the writing is luminous.
Awake (Jen Hatmaker): Awake is a story about the implosion of Jen’s marriage and a critical analysis of the story given to women raised in the evangelical Christian sub-culture—the story of gender limitations, religious subservience, body shame, self-erasure.
**Sidenote: Don’t read anything into the fact that two of my favorite memoirs of the year are about menopausal women navigating a marriage breakdown and Miranda July’s All Fours is showcased in the profile picture for this post. Mike gave me All Fours for Christmas last year (🤯 🤣). July’s book is most definitely not on this year’s list of favorites, but I was reading it on the beach in Tasmania on New Years Day while Dominic fished and that photo was too beautiful not to use. Despite what literary leanings may suggest, we are not in crisis.
Favorite Essay Collections
The Wrong Way to Save Your Life (Megan Stielstra): Megan is facilitating the StoryStudio Essay Collection In A Year cohort I’m in this year – a cohort I applied to join primarily because of the power of Megan’s own work. In this collection, Megan explores fear and what has value in our lives. To get a taste of her work, I highly recommend you read her essay An Axe For The Frozen Sea.
A Paper Orchestra (Michael Jamin): Michael Jamin is a noted screenwriter, so it’s no surprise that these personal essays are both tightly scripted and by turns poignant and funny. But in addition to enjoying the collection, I found interviews about his process fascinating. Reading this interview gave me important ideas for my own writing.
Favorite Novels
The Briar Club (Kate Quinn) Set in 1950’s America, this matched an edgy cold-war story with the beautiful theme of how kindness can bring people together.
Circe (Madeline Millar): I read this for book club and it was not a quick read but it was rich, rich, rich.
The Wedding People (Alison Espach): “Propulsive and uncommonly wise novel about one unexpected wedding guest and the surprising people who help her start anew.” I picked this up on a whim from the library and loved it.
Fourth Wing (Rebecca Yarros): When the foreign aid freeze was unfolding early in 2025, I reread this to prepare for the release of the third in the trilogy and because my brain needed a break from anything too sad or real-life. I’m generally a “once and done” type with books, so I was delighted to find rereading this simultaneously absorbing and soothing. It gave me the intensity and the pacing of dystopian without any extra adrenaline because I (mostly) remembered what was coming next.
Where He Left Me (Nicole Baart): Nicole is a writer friend I so admire, and I’m in awe of her ability to craft pulse-pounding stories about meaningful relationships and write them so beautifully. This is her latest, released this year.
Emily Henry books: Emily Henry predominately writes romances involving writers or book lovers and they are great brain candy or word-lovers when you’re all tired out.
(I’ve probably forgotten about a dozen more novels that should be on this list but in the spirit of “posted is better than perfect” let’s press on.)
Favorite Non-Fiction
A Measure of Intelligence: One Mother’s Reckoning With the IQ test (Pepper Stetler): In a quest to advocate for her daughter with Down Syndrome, Pepper Stetler uncovers the dark history of the IQ test, leading her to question what exactly we are measuring when we measure intelligence.
Favorite book I read with the boys
The Martian (Andy Weir): Dominic has been incredibly resistant to reading and even listening to audiobooks for years now, but this one got him hooked and kept us all engaged during 8+ hours in the car during our mid-year road trip.
Favorite TV
Disclaimer, I’ve only watched two TV series this year, but I liked them both. Coming in at the top of the list is…
One Day: I loved this series that follows two people who become friends. Each episode showcases one day in their lives, and each of those days is separated by at least a year. I thought it was brilliant – so well cast, acted, and the character development through the series was remarkable.
North of North: Really enjoyed this Netflix miniseries set in the Arctic. They could have done with a cringe-inducing moment at the end of episode 1, but otherwise this was a really enjoyable watch.
