What Makes a Good Cookery Book?

Mentioning yesterday Anna del Conte's book The Classic Food of Northern Italy got me thinking about what actually makes a good cookery book. 

I have a bad feeling that photography is for many a decisive factor. The bookshops are full of glossy tomes illustrated with images that make the mouth water. But having once looked at the sexy pictures, do people cook from these books? Do they learn anything from them other than how a finished dish, well lit, oiled to glisten, on carefully chosen crockery and perched on perfect furniture, will look? Or do they go to restaurants where such ideally plated dishes can be obtained?

A few years ago I wrote a piece for Lovefood about cookbooks I wouldn't be without. It was easy to choose most of them, as I just went to the shelves and selected the most beaten up, sauce stained, fat splashed volumes. Jane Grigson's Vegetable Book, Alan Davidson's North Atlantic Seafood, Elizabeth David's French Provincial Cookery and HFW's work on meat caught the attention first. Backs broken or even missing; dog-eared pages; forgotten bookmarks poking out; the occasional loose page. The first three of those books have at most pencil drawings; the fourth has some good images, but is text heavy. So I want text.

Food, and food writing, should also at its best and most worthwhile be an exploration of cultures. Davidson and David both do that with great learning, one focusing on a single country (but several cuisines and cultures); the other covering pretty much every country with an Atlantic coastline. As a read David's book is hard to better, full of anecdote, history and literary links, the fruit of half a lifetime's experience. I want to be entertained and educated by a good food book. I want it to be so packed with information that new discoveries are made - noticed - every time the pages are dipped into.

It may seem high falutin', but a bit of philosophical reflection doesn't go amiss either. So HFW scores highly - all his work explores morality and ethics around food, no bad thing. 

Of course, they should also make me want to cook and eat. I still return to all four of those volumes (less so the meat one, given The Dear Leader's (hail the Dear Leader) meatless diet now) for inspiration and for guidance. 

In the end, I guess, a good food book is one that endures - not a beginner's guide to some fad; not all teeth and no knickers as my late mother would have said (I am thinking of two celebrity cooks/chefs when writing those words, one male, one female). They should be destined for the bedside table and the kitchen table, not the coffee table. 

Eggs! Eggs! Damn All Eggs! (But Not All Cookery Writers)

So, as regards the eggs, said Lord Worplesdon, as all right thinking people will be aware. The title is prompted by the number of eggs now in our kitchen, seemingly increasing whenever my back is turned, and how to make the most of them.

For a cook it's actually quite a nice problem to have, if it qualifies as a problem at all. We breakfast on them every two or three days, and have enough for scrambled eggs to be served up as more than a small yellow stain on toast. An omelette or fritatta appears on the dinner menu about once a week; egg mayonnaise sandwiches occur at lunch with the same frequency; eggs boiled or poached are added to green salads with lardons and walnuts. The list of favourites goes on, but it's good to add new ways to use them up.

I was drawn to refer to Elizabeth David for eggy ideas recently. Inevitably an excellent one was rapidly found, and it suited another of our gluts - tomatoes ripening on the conservatory windowsill. Every cook has his or her favourite writers, Ms David one of my sacred quartet along with Jane Grigson, de Pomiane, and HF-W. I am pushed to ponder here, rather appositely, a chicken and egg question: have I chosen those four because they suit my cooking and tastes; or did they create my cooking and tastes?

David and Grigson were the first food writers who entranced me as a callow twenty-something, by which time, however, I was already fascinated by and reasonably adept at cookery; de Pomiane came to my notice rather later; and HF-W is younger than I, which points towards them fitting what I look for in a food writer as the correct answer to the above query. That they write well, or extremely well, comes high up the list; that they are rooted in French, Italian and British cookery before other styles is also important; and that their dishes are about making the most of ingredients, not making a show of them, is vital too.

The Elizabeth David dish by the way (from that holiest of texts, French Provincial Cookery) was an hors d'oeuvre of thinly sliced toms layered in a shallow dish with sliced boiled eggs, each layer of tomatoes seasoned as you go, some finely chopped onion strewn on top, the lot dressed with oil and vinegar. So simple, but so satisfying and tasty. It could be tarted up with chopped parsley, gherkins, capers, or olives and not suffer (though it would be wrong to add more than one or two of these).

How Fast is Fast Food?

With the Dear Leader away at a conference of super villains - she's giving a paper titled 'When Minions Betray Us - Towards a Theory of Creative Executions' - I was only cooking for two last night, Sternest Critic being home for Easter. The temptation was to do steak as we're blokes. Actually, if I understand the TV adverts, real men don't cook even that, they only ring for takeaway.

I made us some Chinese-ish food, (having travelled many a time and oft in China, and worked with Chinese businessmen throughout South East Asia, I know that a) there is no such thing as 'Chinese food', and b) My version of what I've eaten there is not at all authentic) as I'd been busy doing stuff and it was getting to the point that post-gym SC was turning a cannibal eye on me. Dinner was ready in about 15 minutes, 20 tops. On the very rare occasions we do dial for 'fast' food they always say 'about half an hour', and it takes closer to 60 minutes.

Anyone brave enough to have read early posts on this blog will perhaps recall that my favourite ever cookery programme was a dramatised take on de Pomiane's finest work, French Cooking in 10 Minutes. Think Jamie Oliver, but avec charm and sans annoying Essexisms. And half a century before the pukka prat was the first person ever to discover rapid cookery. The book and the programme show how you can produce four and five courses in 10 minutes (charcuterie starter, fruit as pud, cheese, there's three with no cooking needed). You're limited (no roasts, bakes, slow simmers etc), but it's not the idea to do this all the time.

Our two substantial dishes took twice de Pomiane's target, but for something with plenty of healthy protein and veg, and a bit of carb, not one morsel of which remained uneaten, it's still not a bad effort. Thanks for asking, stir-fried chicken with mushrooms and broccoli, and prawn and crab (tinned white meat) with bamboo shoots, water chestnuts, sweet pepper and fine egg noodles. The former had chili added, the latter plenty of garlic, both had soy sauce and sesame oil.

I could have griddled the chicken thighs and served them on tinned lentils perked up with mushrooms and garlic, with a green salad to follow and cut the time down below 10 minutes. Or done a chicken salad in the same time. Or any number of other possibilites.

My point is that to have something toothsome on the table rapidly need not involve a phone call and paying a small fortune for what may well be cook-chill stuff. So to the Just Eat campaign we say Just Piss Off.

Getting There

Normally by this time we are pretty much living off our allotment and kitchen garden. The foul spring has set everything back this year, so however much we look at the beet, turnips and potatoes we should be eating they are not yet ready.

Some produce has made it to the table. Lettuce as per previous posts has been plentiful, along with rocket, land cress, mizuna, mustards various and spinach. So no shortage of green leaves. I pulled a clump of shallots two days ago (still got it) to liven up a salad, and today made a gooseberry cake (brilliant recipe in Jane Grigson's Fruit Book) half of which went in making sure it was alright. We have had a couple of fennel bulbs.

The fact remains, though, that nature is struggling here this year. It brings home the danger that the change of climate (we now seem to have a wet season where once we had a summer) brings to this country and our ability to feed ourselves.

I hope that as regards our own food it is delay rather than disaster. And not just on economic grounds - fresh is so much better. In my opinion nothing in the world tastes as good as a plate of new spuds dug out of the ground less than an hour ago. Salt and butter and an appetite are all that's needed to enjoy them. A Michelin-starred chef would perhaps team them with aniseed, crumbled pumpernickel, banana ice-cream and orange-juice for his restaurant, but at his home would have them as we do.

The Unbuyables

The definition of fraud in this country used to run along the lines of 'gaining pecuniary advantage by deception'. Now it apparently reads 'those who are not rich and powerful gaining pecuniary advantage by deception.' So 'unbuyables' does not refer to British justice.

No, the unbuyables is Sarah Raven's term for the stuff we food gardeners grow that you just don't find in the shops. To which for us now add asparagus chicory, or Catalogna/Catalonia. I read about it in Jane Grigson's Vegetable Book, and fancied trying some as I'd seen it or similar in Mediterranean food shops. I don't for a minute expect asparagus flavour, but those leafy Greek dishes dressed with oil, lemon and garlic enjoyed in some island taverna should be repeatable here. Seeds have now been obtained from Seeds of Italy, and it is hoped the results will be on our plates within a couple of months or so.

There are lots of other things we grow or have grown that you're very unlikely to see outside of Fortnum and Mason's: like asparagus peas (note the recurring use of the enticing word asparagus to propagandize the unusual), which are not really worth the effort; or Par-cel which is - leaf celery, perfect for the stockpot and casseroles. Or Celtuce, a bit like lettuce on a long thick stalk, that stalk the point of the thing, used in Chinese cookery for its crunch; or the incredibly easy to grow hot mustards like Komatsuna, which has the added benefit of self seeding for next year, an easy salad when leaves are young and small, a hot leaf for cooking when older. Too many clauses Martin.

With a bit of imagination and a patch of land then austerity cookery does not need to be restricted to beans and rice. I say again, what a pity we used £13 billion for the big school sports day instead of improving the lives of millions of our citizens with a little piece of land on which to grow stuff. Except this generation of politicians clearly prefers circuses to bread, unless as slang for money. See opening comment on attitudes to fraud.

Bang for Your Buck

A recent piece for Lovefood.com http://www.lovefood.com/journal/opinions/14049/family-mains-course-meals-for-under-3 had me considering the question of maximising flavour for minimal outlay. In that piece I suggested fresh ginger as one of the best ingredients in that light. Garlic is another winner of course. Wild garlic in season, not too far off now, is even better, given if you can find a source where you are allowed, you can pick it for nothing: we are lucky, at the bottom of our garden it grows in wild profusion.

I was pushed to think about this topic again by seeing an advert by the fancy herb and spice bottle people Schwartz. A recipe card series where each includes various herbs etc to make the particular dish is being advertised. Sainsbury's have a rosemary roasted chicken and potatoes one on sale for 99p, down from £1.99, which hopefully means they are failing to take off. In price/weight terms I still think the reduced one will be horrifically expensive for what you get.

If you can't cook, buy a good cookbook - Delia, David, Grigson or pretty much anyone where words are more significant than pictures -  and invest in a few packets of herbs and spices - there is no difference I dare say between own-brand dried rosemary and branded - and learn to cook properly. It is one of life's pleasures, not a chore. Learn the techniques so you don't end up a slave to producers, those recipe cards a reminder of what you'll end up paying for supposed convenience.