Review: Love from Scratch by Kaitlyn Hill

*We received this book in exchange for an honest review.*

Reese Camden can’t wait to start her dream marketing internship at a cooking channel in Seattle, Washington. She loved watching the channel Friends of Flavor back home in Kentucky and now she gets to spend her summer before college doing the behind the scenes work.

When an emergency happens at the network and they need someone to be on a cooking show for amateurs, Reese and the only other intern are forced to be filmed with little notice. Benny Beneventi, the annoyingly charming culinary intern and her main competition for staying on for the fall, annoys Reese right away. 1. He won’t stop calling her nicknames. 2. He’s way more popular with the FoF audience. 3. For some reason he’s constantly trying to be her friend.

Not wanting to risk getting attached to someone or forgetting about battling it out for the job, Reese does her best to keep her distance from Benny. But the more time they spend together, the more he seems to breakdown her walls. Plus, after their videos go viral, Benny and Reese become America’s new favorite ship. Being on her own for the first time, Reese has to handle the spotlight, her first job and falling for the person she least expected.

We scrolled through YA books on NetGalley and found Love from Scratch. Since we’re obsessed with cooking shows like Top Chef and Chopped, Hill’s debut novel looked like the perfect romcom set in the culinary world.

First, let’s start with the characters. We really liked Reese from the beginning. She was ambitions, strong and fun. We felt bad for her as she dealt with negative online feedback and sexism in the workplace. But she gained the confidence to stand up for herself and really made a difference for other women at the network.

Benny was a sweetheart from the beginning! We get that Reese found him too silly at first, but his nicknames for her were adorable. He kept showing her that he was a good guy and we cheered when she finally started opening up to him. Plus, he was a strong ally for her about dealing with a sexist CEO. We found it super cute when he planned dates and opened up about his past as well.

We also really enjoyed the setting. Hill clearly did her research and took us all around the Seattle. Plus, the Friends of Flavor studios were really cool. It felt like Hill had the inside scoop on how culinary shows were made. It had us wanting to go see how our favorite Food Network and Bravo shows are done.

The plot moved at a solid pace. While there weren’t too many surprises, we found ourselves excited to get Benny and Reese scenes and see who would end up getting the fall job. The ending wrapped things up nicely and left us completely swooning.

Overall, we loved this creative and fun YA book set in the culinary world. If you like cooking shows and romance, you won’t want to miss Love from Scratch when it debuts on April 5, 2022.

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐/⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐