Incredible as it may seem, Madhur Jaffrey literally learned to cook by correspondence. As a young actress in England, Jaffrey wrote to her mother and asked her to send recipes by post. This combination of home and cookery is what the world-renowned chef celebrates in her latest book.

The title, Climbing the Mango Trees, is taken from a springtime custom of Jaffrey and her sisters. They would shin up the mango trees with a mixture of salt, pepper, ground chilies, and roasted cumin in their pockets and, perched on a favorite branch, eat the fruit dipped in the powdered spice.

Rich with arcane family rituals — eating chutney to ward off chicken pox, building bonfires for Holi, taking swimming lessons with a giant watermelon — and sumptuous descriptions of family dinners for 40 and picnics in the foothills of the Himalayas, the 300-odd pages of stories of home dovetail into recipes, culled from the family kitchens, that Jaffrey shares freely with her readers.

Appropriately for a chef, "Madhur" means "sweet as honey." In her family, bestowing this name has a ritual attached — the tracing of a mantra in honey on the newborn baby's tongue. Jaffrey claims that the memory of that sweetness lingered and has colored all her reminiscences, even the sad ones.

What gives the book an importance beyond the merely culinary is that it records a vital period in India's history: New Delhi on the cusp of the Partition, with lives and cultures hanging in the balance — stories of love, loss, and spices, described in vivid vignettes.

-Anjana Basu