I reviewed Ben-Ishay’s earlier cookbook, Come Hungry, back in 2024. I was anxious to pick up her newest one, Come Eat: 100 Nourishing Recipes to Eat Every Day.

About the Book:

INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

A vibrant, flavor-packed collection of delicious, nutritious meals that make it easy to nourish your family every day, from the New York Times bestselling author of Come Hungry and co-founder of Baked by Melissa.

At Melissa Ben-Ishay’s house, mealtimes are filled with nutritious dishes that satisfy everyone at the table—without sacrificing time. In Come Eat, Melissa invites you to pull up a chair to enjoy the delicious recipes her busy family loves (even the pickiest eaters).

Packed with stunning photography and colorful, mouthwatering recipes that focus on fresh produce and big flavors, Come Eat features a variety of Melissa’s favorite weekly go-to recipes, from lunch to dinner to dessert—and all the snacks and sides in between—including:

• Greek Lentil Salad
• Healing Chicken Soup
• One-Pot Golden Chicken & Rice
• String Beans with Almonds & Tahini
• Snickerdoodle Chickpea Cake
• Salads, salads, and more salads!

With helpful tips and easy-to-follow instructions, Melissa shows you how to easily adapt meals for your family, from breaking down the components of the perfect salad to making soup with ingredients you have on hand. Whether you’re a novice cook eager to gain confidence in the kitchen or a seasoned pro looking to save time and effort, Come Eat makes creating and planning meals easy every day—one perfect bite at a time.

With Melissa, food is love, food is nourishment, food is health, and Come Eat is a joyful celebration of real food for real life. And when you’re at her table, there’s always room for dessert.

About the author:

Melissa Ben-Ishay is the co-founder and CEO of Baked by Melissa, a New York-based dessert company celebrated for its bite-size treats. Since it was founded in 2008, Baked by Melissa has opened 14 retail stores in the New York City metropolitan area and beyond, and ships its products nationwide. In 2020, Melissa gained popularity on TikTok with videos of her salads and everyday meals, each of which was developed to give you the perfect ratio of flavors in every bite—just like her namesake cupcakes. For recipes, follow her @bakedbymelissa or check out her blog at www.bakedbymelissa.com/blog.

What I thought:

I still do LOVE her Green Goddess recipe and I make it all summer. I’ve made it with all sorts of herbs and different greens like spinach, arugula and kale. Basically, I use whatever I have on hand. I have never made the full blown salad; I just use the dressing as a dip. I did do a riff on this recipe for a pasta sauce, too.

When I went back to read my review of Come Hungry, I noticed I didn’t post a recipe or dish from her book. (That seemed to be a trend with me back then; I think I was worried about overdue books at the library and was rushing to post.)

I tried to take my time with Come Eat. In my opinion, the salad section is the best, especially the Golden Girl Salad. In the hednote, she states that this recipe was one she created for Delish, one inspired by summer produce. It is delicious, a mix of sweet corn, cabbage, bell pepper, onions, chives, cherry tomatoes, and Sungold tomatoes. The dressing uses some corn kernels, garlic, garlic powder, turmeric, lemon juice, vinegar, and olive oil. She recommends serving this salad as a dip with tortilla chips.

Here’s what I did. I used some of the few cherry tomatoes from my garden along with a pint of mixed colored cherry tomatoes from the store. I could NOT find any scallions that were not less than $5.99 a bundle so I used chopped red onion. Instead of only chives, I threw in some basil. I think that was an improvement. Instead of serving it with tortilla chips, I crumbled Fritos on top! usually don’t post specific recipes from the cookbooks I review, but this is so good and I do think I have enough changes to do a “based on” recipe. If you or Melissa disagrees, forgive me.

Summer Corn and Cabbage Salad

Based on Golden Girl Salad from Come Eat by Melissa Ben-Ishay

Ingredients

For the salad:

• 2 T. Kosher salt
• 3-4 ears sweet corn, shucked and cleaned (one cup reserved)
• ½ head green cabbage, finely shredded
• 1 bell pepper (red, yellow, or green), diced
• 1 c. red onion, diced
• 2 T. chives, chopped
• 1/2 c. basil, chopped
• 2 c. cherry tomatoes, halved
• Fritos

For the dressing:

• 1 c. corn (reserved from above)
• 2 garlic cloves
• 1/2 c. extra virgin olive oil
• 1/3 c. fresh lemon juice (about two lemons)
• 2 T. white vinegar (I used some spicy herb vinegar.)
• 1 t. Salt
• ½ t. black pepper
• 1 t. garlic powder
• ½ t. turmeric 

Instructions

1. Fill a large pot with cold water and add the 2 T. salt. Add the corn, Bring to a rolling boil, then remove from heat and cover with a lid. Set aside for about 20 minutes. Remove from water and cool enough to cut off the kernels. 
2. In a large bowl, combine the corn, cabbage, bell pepper, onions, chives, basil, and tomatoes. 
3. Place all the dressing ingredients in a high powered blender and process until smooth. 
4. Pour the dressing over the salad and toss to combine. Refrigerate at least 30 minutes before serving. Top with crushed Fritos before serving.

We loved this! The recipe makes a large serving so we had it for a dinner for two with some grilled pork chops, served the leftovers again with some burgers for a dinner for five, and we finally ate the last two portions with some sliced tomatoes for dinner one night. It keeps well.

I also tried her Taco Slaw (32) with some modifications. I used just 1/2 head of green cabbage but I did the full amount of the dressing. If you make this as she specifies (1/2 head of green and 1/2 head of red cabbage), then I would double the amount of dressing. It was good too, just very mustardy so be advised. (The dressing utilized nutritional yeast just like her Green Goddess dressing.)

Her Green Goddess dressing appears a couple of times in the book with Green Goddess Chicken Salad (78) and Green Goddess Potato Salad (82). I didn’t try these but I am sure they are delicious.

It’s way too hot for soup, so I admit I skimmed over this section. I did peruse the “What’s for Dinner?” section closely because I was trying to find a grilled dish to go with that corn salad. Most of the recipes here are total meals like Stewed Chickpeas over Rice (148), Veggie Stir-Fry (151), Sheet Pan Salmon (152), and Chicken Fajita Lettuce Wraps (155). You get the idea. I did try her Moo Shu-ish Chicken & Rice (156) for another meal. I’m not posting this recipe but it is pretty darn good. The Hubs loved it!

There are few stand alone dinner entrees and she always promotes serving steamed broccoli as a side.

“Sides & Snacks” is full of dips, sauces, and veggies with one chicken wing recipe thrown in for good measure. Her hummus recipe was pretty standard but I love the way she presents it, ringed with a combo of whole chickpeas, chopped cukes, halved cherry tomatoes, and olives.

“Desserts” offers a couple of basic recipes (M & M cookies & sugar cookies), some super simple-kid friendly ones (like S’more Bites and 3-Ingredient Crunch Bar), and a couple of intriguing ones (Pumpkin Donut Muffins and the Snickerdoodle Chickpea Cake mentioned in the blurb). I had just made a huge batch of brownies so I didn’t try any of her sweet recipes.

All in all, I would recommend this book. It is full of eclectic recipes. I am glad I found that corn slaw!!!

I’m linking up with Foodies Read for August.