Brava is now showcasing new cookbook recipes as Custom Cooks — from the cookbook authors themselves. We are debuting this new initiative with Cortney Burns, a seasoned chef and award-winning Bar Tartine cookbook book author.

Cortney is back with a new title from Chronicle Books: Nourish Me Home ($35). To celebrate the release of the season-centric cookbook, Cortney has partnered with us to Bravatize some of the new recipes and feature them as Custom Cooks. We interviewed her recently to share her experience with Brava and to tell us more about Nourish Me Home.
You got a Brava recently! What have been your favorite things to cook in it? “It’s been our go to for morning toast and bagels, roasting the overabundant garden harvest such as zucchini, summer squash, eggplant, and peppers, as well as, slow cooking all the tomatoes that seem to be multiplying by the minute.”
How has your life changed since having a Brava? “Breakfast for the kids is way faster in the cooking and the cleaning process. So I’ve gained valuable time for reading, tea drinking and for yoga.”
What’s the story behind your cookbook? “It’s a book about uprooting in order to reroot. It’s about self-discovery, the search for home, and nourishing one’s heart and soul. From the garden to the kitchen, and everywhere in between, shadows and all, it exemplifies the methods and recipes that make me feel healthy, strong, and nourished no matter my locale.”
What are your favorite recipes? “I love the alchemy section. As a flavor chaser I really embrace infusions and tinctures; not only for their inherent magical aromas, but [also] for their medicinal properties as well. My favorite savory dish is the Berkshire Hot Pot… satisfying, based in love, and a perfect template to sate your autumnal food cravings. In the sweets, I make the Maple Halva on repeat, and right now I’m craving the Chilled Apple Soup as I await the falling leaves and the exhale from summer.”

Tell us about the cookbook recipes you have Bravatized. “I have used the Brava to make the Chicken Wings in Garlic Butter – an ode to flavors of an escargot compound butter with poultry pride & my Mom’s Pot Roast…a dish she made for me every birthday until I flew the coop.”

Get the cookbook:
- Nourish Me Home ($35)
Get the recipes:
Adapted from Nourish Me Home: 125 Soul-Sustaining Elemental Recipes by Cortney Burns. Text copyright © 2020 by Cortney Burns. Published by Chronicle Books. Photographs copyright © by Heami Lee.