“I was 32 when I started cooking. Up until then, I just ate." Who else can relate to food and TV icon Julia Child’s epic quote? If you love cooking, baking or just eating, we’ve rounded up the best foodie films to watch as the new year kicks off. If we find ourselves ceremoniously cutting back on calories this January, at least we can dream about them with the help of some award-winning films, listed below. Some are intimately nostalgic, while others interpret our relationship to cooking and meals in a new creative light. But wherever they fall on that spectrum, these are the movies to turn to when you’re craving something to feast your eyes on.

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5 Julie & Julia (2009)

     Columbia Pictures

Speaking of the icon—Julia Child’s story of her start in the cooking profession is intertwined with blogger Julie Powell’s 2002 challenge to cook all the recipes in Child’s first book in the 2009 hit Julie & Julia. Though separated by time and space, both women are at loose ends—until they discover that with the right combination of passion, fearlessness and butter, anything is possible.

MOVIEWEB VIDEO OF THE DAY

MOVIEWEB VIDEO OF THE DAY

MOVIEWEB VIDEO OF THE DAY

Nora Ephron’s screenplay is based on two books: My Life in France (Child’s autobiography) and a memoir by Powell, Julie & Julia: 365 Days, 524 Recipes, 1 Tiny Apartment Kitchen. Powell’s book was based on her blog The Julie/Julia Project, where she documented online her daily experiences cooking each of the 524 recipes in Child’s cookbook Mastering the Art of French Cooking. The film is the first major motion picture based on a blog.

For those not familiar, Child was an American cooking teacher, author and TV personality recognized for bringing French cuisine to the American public as well as her subsequent TV programs — the most notable of which was The French Chef, which premiered in 1963. The recent documentary Julia about her life is also an insightful treat, by the way.

4 Ratatouille (2007)

     Disney

A rat named Remy dreams of becoming a great French chef despite his family’s wishes — and the obvious problem of being a rat in a decidedly rodent-phobic profession. What a unique foundation for a story, even for a groundbreaking studio like Pixar.

When fate places Remy in the sewers of Paris, he finds himself ideally situated beneath a restaurant made famous by his culinary hero. Despite the apparent dangers of being an unlikely visitor in the kitchen of a fine French restaurant, Remy’s passion for cooking soon sets into motion a hilarious and exciting rat race that turns the culinary world of Paris upside down.

Ratatouille grossed over $623 million at the box office and received widespread critical acclaim. It won the Oscar for Best Animated Feature and was even nominated for Best Original Screenplay. It’s a Pixar gem that ranks with the studio’s finest, without a doubt.

3 Babette’s Feast (1987)

     Via Nordisk Films

During the late 19th century, a strict religious community in a Danish village takes in a French refugee from the Franco-Prussian War as a servant, Babette, to the late pastor’s daughters. After winning the lottery, Babette wants to repay the daughters for their kindness and offers to cook a French meal for them and their friends on the 100th anniversary of their father’s birth. It proves to be an eye-opening experience for everyone.

Babette’s Feast was the first Danish film to win the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film. The film premiered in the Un Certain Regard section of the 1987 Cannes Film Festival. In 2019, it was announced that acclaimed Sideways and The Descendants filmmaker Alexander Payne would direct a remake of this timeless classic.

2 Chef (2014)

     Via Open Road Films

Jon Favreau returns to form with this more intimate effort that even spawned its own Netflix series. In Chef, Carl Casper—whose name’s alliteration is perhaps a nod to the superhero films Favreau has also directed—is an acclaimed chef with a family life that seems as decaying as his artistic freedom. Those frustrations boil over into a raucous public confrontation against a restaurant critic who panned his cooking that his boss ordered him to do against his own instincts. Now with his career ruined, Carl’s ex-wife offers an unorthodox solution in Miami: Refit an old food truck to offer quality cooking on his own terms. Now with his young son and an old colleague helping, Carl takes a working trip across America with that truck to rediscover his gastronomic passion.

Favreau wrote the script after directing several big-budget films, wanting to go back to basics and to create a film about cooking. Food truck owner and chef Roy Choi served as a co-producer and oversaw the food prepared for the film. The end result was well received by critics and grossed $46 million against a production budget of just $11 million.

1 Big Night (1996)

     Via The Samuel Goldwyn Company

You can never go wrong with Italian food. Big Night brings us back to New Jersey in the 1950s, where two immigrant brothers (played by the delightful Stanley Tucci and Tony Shalhoub) run an Italian restaurant. Business isn’t going well, as another Italian restaurant run by their rival (Ian Holm) is out-competing them. In a final effort to save the restaurant, the brothers plan to put on an evening of incredible food.

Co-written by Tucci himself, the film was met with largely positive reviews and grossed $14 million worldwide. It was also nominated for the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance. “It ended up heightening my interest in all things culinary and catapulted me into places, relationships, and experiences I never thought I would have,” writes Tucci about Big Night in his latest book Taste. “To this day, restaurateurs, chefs, and food lovers all around the world tell me how much they like and are inspired by the film.”