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7 days ago
Nigel's essential marinades
"little kitchen lifesavers" Nigel Slater This is the last of my Nigel's A Cook's Book Essentials - a group of first recipes, and these...
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Oct 21
Party time in the wilds of Nillumbik
Nillumbik is our local council area. It calls itself 'The Green Wedge Shire' - because over 90% of it's 431.94 square kilometres of land...
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Oct 10
A green sauce for almost everything
"There are no green sauce rules — only what tastes good to you." Margaret Eby/Food and Wine Today I'm back to Nigel Slater's batch of...
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Sep 26
Cool as a cucumber
"Pert as a pear-monger I'd be, If Molly were but kind; Cool as a cucumber could see The rest of womankind" John Gay 1732 I was going to...
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Sep 3
Simple essentials - Nigel's first recipes
"Small details that make a big difference" Nigel Slater It's first recipe time and working my way through my bookshelves I have come to...
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Aug 10
Not quite Pasta alla Norma
"Eggplant is slowly fried until burnished and rich with olive oil, then served with pasta in a garlicky tomato sauce and garnished with...
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Jul 23
My kitchen bit by bit - 2
"Anything can be a lodestar in a person's life, I suppose, and for some fortunates like me, the kitchen serves well." MFK Fisher Which...
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Jul 21
Rambling around osso buco
“the meat soft as the leg of an angel who has lived a purely airborne existence.” Billy Collins This post is all down to a first recipe...
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Jun 28
Stephanie's idea of 'simple'
"A lot is said about simplicity in modern, Fench-influenced cookery. I find it very difficult to find a suitable definition of a simple...
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Jun 7
The first 46 pages before ...
"The introduction is the first and best chance to win the attention of people who otherwise would not care." Martin Lloyd-Jones Inspired...
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May 7
First recipe impact - is it why we buy?
"without naming names, I find that many miss out on the opportunity to sell the casual reader by making your first recipe absolutely...
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Apr 8
Variations - granola
"There is no real recipe for it, as it is made to the taste of the person preparing it." Family Spice Yes I know - this is not granola. ...
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Mar 16
A is for Alexanders, Z is for Zander - A-Z
"Every culinary endeavour begins with ingredients." Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall What a slightly creepy conjunction of names - Alexanders...
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Feb 17
Almost 50 years post Cuisine Minceur
"This was far and away the most influential cookery book of the latter half of the last century. It affected almost everything we eat...
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Jan 29
Cuisine heureuse - two men and a first recipe
"Books are so much more than simply a collection of words. They are glimpses into an epoch and the author's soul." François de...
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Jan 17
Changing the form, but retaining the spirit
“When I opened up my first restaurant it was never to cook Greek food the way most people had seen it.” Peter Conistis The dish at left...
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Oct 18, 2023
A postscript on first recipes
As a self-taught cook, I learned through cookbooks and love them dearly. There's an evolution to learning to cook this way and choosing...
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Oct 17, 2023
Hot sauce - or is it a bath?
"it is a dish which essentially needs the accompaniment of plenty of strong coarse red wine, such as the local Barbera. It is also...
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Oct 1, 2023
Venice leeks and what's for dinner tonight?
"Perhaps no one ever gets to know Venice as much as they remember her, recall her from an episode in some other dream." Marlena de Blasi...
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Sep 19, 2023
Cabbage, potatoes, Portugal, soup - basic
"I have written this book to introduce Portuguese dishes to cooks in this country, rather than to tell them what to eat in Portugal." ...
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