ONE OF THE BEST COOKBOOKS OF 2025: The Washington Post, The Strategist , Bon Appétit, The Boston Globe , Slate, Serious Eats, and Saveur “Hetty McKinnon doesn’t write great vegetarian recipes, she just writes great recipes.” —Nigella Lawson In her follow-up to the James Beard award-winning cookbok Tenderheart , Hetty Lui McKinnon returns with Linger , a cookbook for those looking to up their salad game. These colorful main-meal salads are inventive and hearty, packed with vegetables and globally-inspired flavors. Linger proves that salads are the most versatile dish, perfect for weeknight dinners, not-sad-desk-lunches, and as a show-stopping celebration meal. From her salad-delivery days in Sydney to her current career as a food writer and bestselling cookbook author in New York, Hetty has long known the power of salads to connect and create community. In Linger , Hetty presents her salads, sweets and stories in twelve vibrant, loosely-seasonal menus -- each of which have their own playlist -- that are the perfect blueprint for gathering and entertaining. Over 100 recipes, including: • Caprese Salad with Grilled Pineapple • Mapo Tofu salad • Cauliflower Larb • French Onion Salad • Curry Potato-and-Pea Dumpling Salad • Potato Salad Tartine • Vegan Dan Dan salad • Roasted Spiced Carrots and Crispy Tofu with Agrodolce • Tomato and Kimchi Pasta Salad • Butternut with Lentils, Olives, and Pickle Sauce • Plus sweets like Hong Kong Milk Tea Tres Leches and Matcha and Ginger Custard Tart! “What fun to sit at Hetty Lui McKinnon’s table again. Here, salads and sweets star in recipes that will make any cook marvel at the fresh combinations that come together with ease. Early favorites include dan dan noodle salad; a potato chip salad with zucchini and jalapeño; potato and scallion flatbread; cauliflower laab; kohlrabi and lentils with preserved lemon and basil; spiced pumpkin mochi cake; and sparkly orange ginger butter cookies.” —G. Daniela Galarza and Aaron Hutcherson, The Washington Post “In her sixth cookbook, Hetty Lui McKinnon focuses on salads. She produced the book in quite an unusual way: The recipes were written, tested, tweaked, and photographed over a year, in real time with the seasons, leading to a refreshingly craveable, unfussy collection.” —Emma Wartzman, The Strategist “The mark of a truly creative recipe developer is their ability to create a cohesive, personal body of work without becoming repetitive: McKinnon puts her unique point of view into celebrating vegetable-based recipes exactly how she prefers them, touching on modern Asian cooking, family-friendly comfort food, and of course, salad. The beauty of writing about salad in 2025 is that there really is no limit to the dish’s definition: Figs, Farro, and Tahini, a hearty but fresh bowl to linger over as summer becomes fall, feels just as natural in the book as Kung Pao Cabbage with Tofu, a punchy sauce-slicked meal in itself.” —Rebecca Firsker, Bon Appétit “There are no sad salads in McKinnon's book; she has a great intuition and understanding of what makes a great mix, and every recipe has bold flavors and textures. If you are in a cooking rut and want to eat more vegetables, Linger is the book for you.” —Genevieve Yam , Serious Eats “The brilliance of [Lui Mckinnon’s] recipes is that she often takes beloved foods—Korean jjajangmyeon, French onion soup, Sichuan mapo tofu, just to name a few in Linger —that I never dreamed could work as a salad and reimagines them, building layers of flavors and weaving in textures in a way that still captures the essence of why I was craving that dish in the first place. I know I’ll be mixing and matching salads from her thoughtful yet not prescriptive menus.” (with plenty of inspired dessert ideas—the one course I would prefer not to be a salad!) for my own feasts for years to come.” —Frances Kim, Saveur “When I heard the vegetable whisperer Hetty Lui McKinnon was coming out with another vegetarian cookbook, this time focused on salads (and sweets), I got my hands on it as fast as I could. Sifting through the pages of Linger, I quickly learned that this was not just a cookbook, but a wondrous collection of McKinnon’s heartfelt essays and composed menus, as well as playlists curated by none other than her daughter, Scout. The inspiration for this book came from a past career, when McKinnon prepared salads and delivered them by pedal (biking, that is) in Sydney, a project under the name of Arthur Street Kitchen. The simple exchange of salad was a way for McKinnon to develop a kinship with her community. The recipes that follow encourage that intimate connection, as well as draw inspiration from McKinnon’s Chinese Australian background. McKinnon’s opinions are tenacious and specific, offering nuggets of wisdom like, ‘salads don’t always have leaves;’ ‘think of fruit as a vegetable;’ and ‘anything can be a salad.’ I, for one, couldn’t agree more.” —N