Ree Drummond Shares Her Greatest Hits in 'The Pioneer Woman Cooks — The Essential Recipes'

When you’re a big fan of a singer or musician, you want everything your favorite artist puts out. It’s no different when you’re following author, food writer and TV personality Ree Drummond, the host of Food Network's popular show The Pioneer Woman.

The Pioneer Woman Cooks ― The Essential Recipes: 120 Greatest Hits, New Twists, and Perfected Classics (William Morrow, Oct. 28, 2025) is the latest in Ree's series of popular cookbooks. It’s packed with tweaks and tips to make her must-have comfort foods easier to prepare and more delicious than ever ("I'm thrilled to present to you the very best grilled cheese sandwich I have ever made," she writes), along with fun new recipes (don't miss the peanut butter cookies with crunchy sugar toppings).

What Else Is New in The Essential Recipes?

When Ree wrote the blog that led to her first cookbook, she was raising four biological kids; later, she and her husband, Ladd (she calls him "Marlboro Man" for wearing cowboy hats and jeans), added a foster son. When their kids grew up, the Drummonds became empty nesters. But life changed in December 2024, when their daughter Alex and her husband, Mauricio, gave the couple their first grandchild, Sofia.

Ree's so in love, she dedicated this cookbook to the new baby and included a handful of sweet pictures. Ree told Southern Living that she picked "ReeRee" as her grandmother name.

We caught up with Ree to learn more about ranch life, the recipes she relies on again and again, the pantry items she always stocks and the dessert she calls "the best chocolate cake you'll ever make." She also tells us where she wants to go on her dream vacation (hint: it'll involve lots of food).

What inspired you to write this new cookbook?

I'll be honest that when I set out to write this cookbook, I had in my mind that it was going to be my last and final one! So, I really reflected on what I wanted to say to the world, from a food standpoint, in my very last cookbook on earth. (I jokingly said I was going to call it "The Last Supper." I still like that idea!) What I kept coming back to were the recipes I've made for almost 30 years for my family and friends. They're timeless classics, and because I've made them for upward of three decades, I realized that I have naturally made tweaks and adjustments through the years to make them utterly divine … but I had never gone back and updated the original recipes I shared years ago. So, this cookbook is filled with all of the recipes I consider essential — much like essential workers. I could not have a cooking life without them.

How do you define 'essential' and choose which recipes to include?

Essential to me meant that I couldn't imagine never making them again. I couldn't imagine removing them from my rotation. My pot roast, which has taught countless home cooks how to master the time and tenderness factor. My meatloaf, my mac and cheese (it's actually a new one!), my chocolate sheet cake. I'm calling this my recipe bible, because it not only has the best version of all my favorite (essential!) recipes, it has them all in one place.

How has ranch life influenced your cooking?

My mom was a wonderful cook when I was growing up. We lived in a town of 35,000, and she had a Julia Child/Helen Corbitt elegance to her cooking. She made dinner every night, and she entertained effortlessly. I watched and learned so much from her. But then I married a cattle rancher and met his mom. My mother-in-law was also a fantastic cook, but instead of elegance, she taught me abundance. She could cook beef tenderloin and twice-baked potatoes for a room full of cowboys with one hand tied behind her back. She could make biscuits and gravy for 30 people in less than an hour. She was great at assembly-line cooking and prepping things efficiently. So, I had my mom's sensibilities and my mother-in-law's practicality — both influenced my cooking in countless ways!

Please talk about the new recipes in this book.

There are new recipes I've never shared before, and those were fun to dive into. The chocolate chip cookies are sort of an amalgam of a few versions I've made in the past, but I endeavored to finalize that recipe for the book. The peanut butter cookies are new, too, and they are delightful. There are other new ones, but there are also big updates to some recipes that I first shared back in 2009 when I published my first cookbook (The Pioneer Woman Cooks: Recipes From an Accidental Country Girl). Breakfast burritos, for example: The difference between the old and the updated versions is night and day! I've become a better cook through the years, as most home cooks do!

What are a few of your tried-and-true favorite recipes (even if they’ve been updated for this book)?

My eternal favorites are cinnamon rolls, tomato soup with grilled cheese (the grilled cheese is amazing in the book!), chicken fried steak, pancakes (the updated version is phenomenal!), lasagna, chicken spaghetti (a from-scratch version of my mom's) … and my pecan pie, which is to die for!

Are there some recipes every home cook should learn to make?

I think pot roast has stumped more home cooks than not. I would get emails from readers saying they could never make a pot roast because they always overcooked it. So, I posted my pot roast method, which I'd figured out years earlier, and stated simply that if a pot roast is tough, it doesn't mean it's overcooked — it means it hasn't cooked long enough. Just that simple piece of advice cracked the code for a lot of people who had struggled with the dish through the years. If you can figure that part out, it opens up a whole world of recipe possibilities, from braised brisket to short ribs. The hollandaise sauce in my book is another great basic how-to. It's great for eggs Benedict, roasted asparagus or a medium-rare steak. Can't go wrong!

And I always say, if you can make a chocolate cake from scratch without looking at the recipe, you can do most things in life. My chocolate sheet cake is that cake for me. (I accidentally added more butter to the cake and icing years ago when I was using my mother-in-law's recipe, and it turned out to be a miracle!)

What do you make for dinner when you need to get something tasty and filling on the table ASAP?

I love cooking some kind of steak or chicken in a skillet, then making a quick pan sauce with the drippings. Take the protein out of the pan, deglaze with wine or broth, add a little cream, salt and freshly cracked pepper, then you can reduce it to thicken and add a little something extra to send it in different directions. Dijon mustard, sun-dried tomatoes, pesto, fresh sage, Parmesan, even crumbled blue cheese (yum). Then, just pour the sauce over the protein, and it feels special even though it took 10 seconds (give or take).

What are some ingredients or pantry items everyone should have on hand for essential dishes?

Oh, great question! I love my pantry. I always have good jarred marinara, plenty of canned tomatoes (whole and crushed), tomato paste, ranch-style beans (for chili or taco meat), a million different pasta shapes, different varieties of rice (don't judge, but the microwavable stuff in bags now is so good! And quick. You can get basmati, jasmine and multi grains now, so handy.)

What’s a recipe from the book that you find yourself making over and over?

The Marlboro Man Sandwich is a family favorite. They're putty in my hands when I make them! And my chicken pot pie — it is absolutely delicious.

Ree's Planning a Dream Vacation

Next up: Ree and Ladd are planning what she calls her "dream trip” to Italy. She says it’ll include “food, food, and food, with a lot of walking and a lot of historical sites. Ladd and I love European history, and it's very sad we've never been! We may need to stay a year! I want to go to Vatican City and buy a nativity set because I don't have one. And I want to buy gorgeous dinner napkins somewhere, eat all the pasta I can find and stay in pretty hotels. And walk everywhere.”

Are there any other dream destinations, whether in the US or abroad, that are on your travel wish list?

I'd love to go to the UK and really dig in. I want to go to Monterey, Mexico, where my son-in-law, Mauricio, is from. I'd love to go to Maine, as I've never been. Beaches don't appeal to me because I'm a fair-skinned redhead, but other than that, there are plenty of places I'd love to try! I recently asked someone who's traveled a lot where her favorite places are that she's ever traveled, and she said Japan. So, that's on my list too!

How will you and your family celebrate the holidays this year?

We will ALL (granddaughter Sofia included) be on the ranch for Christmas this year! She was born right before Christmas last year, so they were down in Dallas, and this year will be a blast on the ranch. The matching Christmas pajama pic is going to be epic! Food-wise, I'm going to be making cinnamon rolls for everyone I know this year. I'm in the mood!