Just because we’re deep into the dark days of winter, surrounded by cold and snow and ice, that doesn’t mean you can’t still enjoy great homemade food. Roast Figs Sugar Snow by Diana Henry is geared to show you just how great cold-weather cooking and eating can be.

Henry has brought together a collection of ideas and winter recipes from the Northern Hemisphere including northern Italy, France, Russia, Vermont and the Scandinavian countries. The emphasis is on food that stores well for the winter – apples, pears, root vegetables, squash, nuts – and hearty meats – pork, beef, smoked fish. Dishes reflect the regions they are adapted from such as Mussel Chowder from Quebec, Swedish Thursday Soup, Danish Christmas Kringle and Russian Cheese Pancakes.

Scattered throughout are essays on the unique pleasures of winter food (including, yes, a discussion of sugar-on-snow parties, familiar to many from reading Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Little House in the Big Woods and which still take place in Vermont today) The overriding theme of this beautiful book is that winter isn’t necessarily a time to endure, but a season to be enjoyed and savored.