Five Marys Ranch Raised Cookbook

June 1, 2020
In this delightful debut, Heffernan, a Northern California rancher and owner of Five Mary’s Burgerhouse restaurant, celebrates cowboy cuisine with a twist. Offering a “glimpse into our free-range life of dirt and sunshine and animals and community,” the meat-focused cookbook showcases dishes from the ranch’s humanely raised livestock (black Angus beef, Berkshire pigs, Navajo-Churro sheep), and chapters feature breakfasts, mains, sides, cocktails, and desserts. Breakfast burritos or strawberry-lemon jam buttermilk biscuits make for bold starters, and stunning photos of the landscape and dishes accompany such hearty, straightforward fare as western-style cowboy chili; barbecue smoked spare ribs; a cast-iron tamale pie; braised lamb steaks in red wine sauce; and porterhouse steak with a mushroom shallot sauce. Sides include deviled eggs with bacon and jalepeños, and shaved steak carpaccio with pickled onions, pine nuts, and arugula. Among the cocktail highlights are lemon-bourbon sidecars, while on offer for dessert are a rhubarb cheesecake and bourbon-soaked butterscotch brioche bread pudding. Heffernan’s accessible volume on ranch living and cooking transports and inspires.