'Fancy Desserts' Wins Food52's Annual Cookbook Contest

Piglet tattoos from Tattly. Photo: @morgan.hedden/Instagram

Not all cookbooks are created equal. That’s why we pick the best in our Cookbook of the Week column, and that’s why our partner, Food52, holds an annual cookbook contest adorably named The Piglet. It’s an NCAA-style tournament in which Food52 editors seed the 16 best cookbooks from the past year into brackets and face them off against each other. Judges, who include chefs and food writers—this year, for example, Eater’s Ryan Sutton and Iron Chef Alexandra Guarnaschelli were among the esteemed group of 15—cook through the books and deliver their verdicts until one winner remains.

The steps leading up to the party at Haven’s Kitchen. Photo: @mylastsupper/Instagram

That winner was revealed at the Piglet party at New York City’s Haven’s Kitchen last night.

Congrats to Brooks Headley, Del Posto pastry chef and author of Fancy Desserts, which was also one of our Cookbooks of the Week! The New Yorker columnist Bill Buford made the final call, writing that the book “will deepen your love for vinegar,” among other things. Ultimately, the reason it won: “It is humble. It is brave. It is extreme. It is wacky. It is by far and away the best anti-cookbook cookbook I have ever read,” wrote Buford. “I will be reading it again and again. It is genius.” In true Headley fashion, the chef last night simply said “desserts” when he accepted his duct-taped trophy. Then he handed the mic back to Food52 founder Amanda Hesser and went back to cooking burgers for the crowd.

"Humbled and stoked and honored for Fancy Desserts to get the @food52 #ThePiglet trophy this year.” Photo: @workingpastry/Instagram

“Brooks Headley is my favorite kind of artist,” writes seminal punk rock artist and producer Steve Albini in the foreword to Fancy Desserts. “He does his thing, his beautiful, unique thing, and presents it to you with no fanfare. You’re going to love it of course, but what he’s doing isn’t only for you. He does it because he’s found his thing, the thing that animates him uniquely, and screw it, might as well devote his life to it. Other people—you—get to enjoy it, and he takes his responsibility to you seriously.” Read more about the book here.

Headley served “superiority burgers.” Photo: @hwautelet/Instagram