Chefs We Love
Chef Andrea Buckett Shares Her Best Cottage Fare
Published on August 1, 2025
If you’re a guest at a country house or cottage this summer, consider The Essential Cottage Cookbook on your quest for a great gift. The recipes are simple, uncomplicated and require minimal tools — they’re what most of us want to eat on lazy, hot summer days. Part nostalgia, often indulgent and, sometimes, very healthy, the recipes include all of the above.
Andrea in cottage country.
If you’re the one cooking, we think you’ll enjoy these recipes, plus the many more from author and serious cottager Andrea Buckett, who you may know from her frequent guest spots on Breakfast Television and Mary Berg’s The Good Stuff.
One favourite chapter is “Make It and Take It,” which offers dishes you can make ahead and then finish off when you arrive at the lake. They’re perfect for those potluck weekends. There’s also a section on being a good host, one for cottage renters and how to stock a cottage pantry. But most of all, the recipes work, and the ones we chose to include are especially delicious.
Grilled Zucchini and Mozzarella Salad with Pesto
“Tossed with a sweet basil pesto and adorned with creamy mozzarella and crispy radish rounds, this salad is a stone-cold stunner!” says Andrea of the Grilled Zucchini and Mozzarella Salad with Pesto.
Steak Fajitas with Chimichurri Avocados
The Steak Fajitas with Chimichurri Avocados is another crowd-pleaser. “Flank steak is a fantastic cut of meat for this recipe, falling somewhere between a marinating and a grilling steak,” Andrea says.
Maple-dijon Chicken Thighs with Snap Pea Salsa
Her Maple-dijon Chicken Thighs with Snap Pea Salsa are for the barbecue, but can be easily adapted to cook in the oven.
Lemon-pepper Shrimp Rolls
The Lemon-pepper Shrimp Rolls are made on the stovetop using small cooked salad shrimp, lemon and mayo, which is piled onto toasted buns.
The cookbook also features plenty of fresh summer cocktails in Andrea’s chapter on the perfect happy hour. As a lifelong cottager in Ontario’s Haliburton region, she has mastered the cottage kitchen and the easy but impressive recipes to match. Enjoy!
Betty Shin Binon
Recipes excerpted from The Essential Cottage Cookbook by Andrea Buckett. ©2025 Andrea Buckett. Photographs by Betty Shin Binon. Published by Appetite by Random House, a division of Penguin Random House Canada Limited. Reproduced by arrangement with the Publisher. All rights reserved