People who work in hotels and kitchens are hard to buy for at the holidays, mostly because they are working through them. A book is the one gift that waits. Choose by the person’s station in the work. A cook in her second year wants a different book from the chef who has just opened his third restaurant, and a front office manager wants a different one from the general manager who hired her. The list below is sorted by that, with a line on who each book suits. Print editions should be ordered by mid December for delivery before the holidays, since a hotelier’s one free week tends to be the one after.
My own book is on the list and is marked as such.
For the person just starting
Kitchen Confidential, by Anthony Bourdain (Bloomsbury, 2000). Still the book that tells a young cook what the life is, with no softening. For the culinary student, the new commis and anyone who thinks they might want this and has not yet been through a Saturday service.
32 Yolks, by Eric Ripert with Veronica Chambers (Random House, 2016). Ripert’s memoir of a childhood in the south of France and Andorra and of his years under Joël Robuchon, ending before Le Bernardin. For the young cook who needs to know that the hardest kitchens are survivable, and for the chef who wants to remember.
For the person leading a team
Setting the Table, by Danny Meyer (HarperCollins, 2006). The book on enlightened hospitality and on putting staff first. For the new restaurant manager, the chef who has just become an employer, and the hotelier who somehow has not read it.
Unreasonable Hospitality, by Will Guidara (Optimism Press, 2022). Running the dining room at Eleven Madison Park and the gestures that took it to the top of the world rankings. For the maître d’, the front of house manager and the general manager who wants her lobby team to read something over the holidays.
Excellence Wins, by Horst Schulze (Zondervan, 2019). The co-founder of The Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company on how a service culture is built and held. For the department head who has just been given a department, and for anyone outside hotels who wants to know how a great one works.
Four Seasons: The Story of a Business Philosophy, by Isadore Sharp (Portfolio, 2009). The founder’s account of building the standard that luxury hotels still measure themselves against. For the general manager, the owner and the hotelier who is thinking about what comes after operations.
The Luxury of Attention, by Rahim B. Kanani (Black Truffle Press, 2026). This is my own book. It is drawn from eighty first person interviews with thirty-six general managers of the world’s finest hotels and forty-four Michelin-starred chefs, and it treats the lobby and the pass as two stations of the same craft. For the hotelier or chef who has read the single operator memoirs and wants to hear many of their peers in one conversation. Chefs will go first to The Creative Act and In Pursuit of Perfection; hoteliers to Knowing Your Guest and The Recovery.
Cookbooks by chefs in the book
Several of the chefs interviewed in The Luxury of Attention have written cookbooks, the best gift for a cook who wants to see how a particular kitchen thinks.
Central, by Virgilio Martínez with Nicholas Gill (Phaidon, 2016). The book of the Lima restaurant that organizes its menu by altitude, from the sea floor to the high Andes, with the ingredients and the thinking behind each dish. For the ambitious cook and for anyone fascinated by Peru.
El Celler de Can Roca: The Book, by Joan Roca, Josep Roca and Jordi Roca (Librooks, 2013). The three brothers’ account of their Girona restaurant, with the dishes, the techniques and the family story that holds them together. For the chef who leads with family, and for the serious home cook with a large table to set it on.
Seafood Simple, by Eric Ripert (Random House, 2023). Le Bernardin’s chef on cooking fish at home, with the techniques explained plainly and the recipes kept short. For the home cook who is afraid of fish, and for the professional who wants to see restraint done well.
Zaytinya, by José Andrés (Ecco, 2024). The cookbook of Andrés’s Mediterranean restaurant in Washington, with dishes from Greece, Turkey and Lebanon. For the host who cooks for crowds and for anyone who has eaten at one of his restaurants and wants to understand the generosity behind them.
Tetsuya, by Tetsuya Wakuda (Ten Speed Press, 2005). The book of the Sydney restaurant that brought Japanese precision and French technique together before that was common. For the cook who wants to see a signature style laid out dish by dish.
Guy Savoy and Albert Adrià have cookbooks in English as well: Savoy’s Simple French Recipes for the Home Cook (2004) for the home cook who wants Paris on a weeknight, and Adrià’s Tickets Evolution for the chef who collects books on creativity.
A note on choosing
If you know only one thing about the person, let it be where they are in the work. Someone still learning the craft usually wants a story, which points to Bourdain or Ripert. Someone leading others wants a method, which points to Meyer, Guidara, Schulze or Sharp. Someone who has done both for a long time tends to want the company of peers, and for them I would choose a cookbook from a kitchen they admire, or my own book, where eighty of their colleagues are already in conversation.