Kitchen Arts & Letters
Kitchen Arts & Letters has sold food books on Lexington Avenue since 1983, and it will tell you what is wrong with one. Most of the descriptions on its site are the shop's own opinion, weaknesses included, and where nobody there has read the book yet it says so and runs the publisher's copy instead. So ask at the counter and let them talk you out of it.
Why go
The stock is the reason: more than 12,000 titles, from all over the world and in many languages, with the food history and scholarship the part the shop is proudest of. They will also chase down an out-of-print title for you, and they say there is never an obligation to buy it. The shop says Julia Child, James Beard and Laurie Colwin were among its early customers, which is its own account of itself, and that its regulars now run from Michelin-starred chefs to people trying to get dinner on the table.
Order this / avoid
- Do this: ask. The website's own line is that its descriptions exist to tell you
Why is it a good choice, and for whom? Does it excel at something? Does it have a weakness?
1 - Avoid: rushing it.
What locals & experts say
- Ruth Rogers (The River Cafe, London), 2026-05:
I love Kitchen Arts & Letters on Lexington Avenue. It's a cookbook shop, and for someone like me, that's heaven. You can spend hours there.
2 Her framing is that it is a place where people care about food in a deeper way. - The shop, on its own method:
We often have very strong opinions about books. We're more likely to tell you about the books we think are great than complain about the ones which are not.
1
Good to know
- Getting there: Lexington Avenue between 93rd and 94th, in Carnegie Hill.
Verdict
should-visit — Ruth Rogers loses hours here; give it at least one, and expect the staff to argue. It is a bookshop, so nothing here is dinner.