Five indie food magazines that could replace your cookbooks (maybe!)

While our living room bookshelves might be getting lighter (every tome under the sun is available via tablet these days!), our kitchen shelves have been getting a bit heavier, thanks to the recent influx of indie cooking magazines. Long live print.

Subscriptions typically cost less than a cookbook, but they’re just as informative -- often detailing recipes with in-season ingredients and featuring a timely who’s who of in-demand chefs.

Here are five indie cooking mag picks, but fair warning: You and your iPad might be spending less time together once the issues start surfacing in your mailbox.

Cereal

Aimed at the reader’s inner child, each issue of Cereal is chock-full of fun illustrations and a new lesson on every page. Like a cereal box, the magazine’s purpose is to entertain and educate, but the adult-friendly version features current food topics and travel explorations. Hailing from the U.K., the premiere issue is void of advertisements and includes notes from Copenhagen, Ravello, Italy, and Westonbirt National Arboretum in England. ($16.77)

Diner Journal

Whether you recognize Diner Journal from a recent Steven Alan jaunt or your latest trip to Brooklyn’s Marlow & Sons, the quarterly magazine comes courtesy of Andrew Tarlow -- restaurateur of the aforementioned Marlow & Sons. Around since 2006, we can’t get enough of the watercolors, photographs and illustrations -- and the essays, recipes and Q&As;, too. ($12)

Gather Journal

If we could tear and frame each and every page from Gather Journal’s bi-annual publication, we totally would. The food styling and graphic design is some of the best we’ve seen, and the layout of the magazine is divided like a traditional meal -- amuse bouches, starters, mains and desserts. ($19.99)

Kinfolk

A far cry from Martha Stewart’s mag, Kinfolk’s entertaining bible is a must for food enthusiasts, artists and anyone who generally enjoys the company of others. Self-titled as a “guide for small gatherings,” the visually stunning quarterly includes personal essays and recipes that will make any Brooklyn co-op look like amateur hour. ($18 to $24)

Lucky Peach

What happens when Momofuku’s David Chang teams with the folks from McSweeney’s? You get a glorious quarterly journal of food with stories and Q&As; centered around some of the world’s best and brightest in the industry. Lucky Peach’s latest theme is the apocalypse, and the end of the world never seemed so promising. ($28)

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