Michael Harlan Turkell’s book Acid Trip celebrates the most under-utilized ingredient in your kitchen: vinegar. Turkell’s obsession began after he forgot to cork an unfinished bottle of wine. The ‘spoiled’ wine turned into such tasty vinegar he began making his own, and eventually used everything from maple syrup to coffee to produce complex, acidic delights.

In Acid Trip he tells vinegar’s story, from the ancient Persian drinking vinegars to the spoiled wines abandoned on the banks of Loire River that led to Orleans vinegar to the modern acetators used to crank out industrial vinegars. Vinegar-centric recipes from around the world and instructions for making your own make the book an essential volume for any cook who wants to know how to make food taste better.

The Italian approach to eating can be boiled down to “get the best ingredients you can find and do just what you need to make them delicious.” In the spring and summer, when vegetables are at their best, that often means pinzimonio, glorious produce dipped into a bowl of lightly salted extra virgin olive oil brightened with a bit of red wine vinegar. The word is a combination of the word pinze, or tweezers, and matrimonio, or marriage. referring to how you pinch the vegetables between two fingers (the tweezers part) and ‘marry’ it to the seasoned oil.