As you may guess while reading any of my blog posts, I like creative cooking. I like to create my own recipes and work with different ideas, techniques and ingredients. Creativity isn’t generally plucked out of thin air. Most, if not all good ideas and inventions are the fusion of existing concepts or principles into something new. My principles of cooking are largely based upon researching, experimenting and tasting. I’m not afraid to admit that much of it can be close to revolting, such dishes as “coot curry” and “pan fried moorhen” will never be repeated again but without trying you’ll never know.
Good reference is however vital when trying out new ideas. I don’t really go in for recipe books per se; I prefer to read books about food. It’s actually one of my favourite parts of the cookery process to go out and buy/find/pick/shoot some particular ingredient and then research its cooking times and temperatures and what flavours it might work with, then come up with something myself. Below are my top five and from them I hope you too can get some of the same pleasures of an evening, raw ingredients on the worktop, book open and glass of wine on the go, ready to make something new, distinctive and your own. Here are my desert island books...
It will be no great surprise to see this great encyclopaedia of cookery at the top of my list. There is virtually nothing edible that isn’t written about in this great book (perhaps the lack of coot or moorhen in it should have made me think twice). It gives great advice, recipe snippets and practical as well as aesthetic information on virtually everything. It is occasionally a little Franco-centric as you might imagine but who’s to complain when the French make such good food?
This is a fantastic gem of a book for creative cooks. It has all sorts of information, recipes and techniques but its greatest asset is an amazing reference section which for any given ingredient gives you a number of complementary ingredients to go with it. This is invaluable in those situations where you may have A, B & C in the fridge and X, Y and Z in the cupboard and you’re wondering what you could do with them. Hey presto you can have a good if not magical combination.
I’m appalling at presenting food well but I do realise how important it is. I would love to be better at it and I think it’s probably one of those things gained either through an intrinsic artistic talent or a stint at a professional cookery school, neither of which I am lucky enough to have had. This book does however make some really great presentation techniques available to the clumsy handed chef such as me. Even if you’re not a really keen cook and just want to impress friends at a dinner party, there are some great ideas to get people eating with their eyes as well as their mouths.
You can be the best creative chef with all the new ideas in the world but there are some classic things you just have to know about. This book deals with virtually every one of them in detail and without any frills or subjectivity. It is really a manual for professional chefs and very much based upon the classic French repertoire. You can’t help but love a fillet de sole “bon femme”, a consommé, a sauce béarnaise or indeed any of the multitude of staples included. The quantities are occasionally mammoth with “serves 16” or “makes about ten litres” not uncommon but with a little work you can scale it down to your requirement. Be wary that it is very French so for “rare” read “still mooing”.
I’m afraid I have to eat my words a little on my last selection. I used to somewhat look down my nose at this book which has always been my wife’s cookery bible. Being a little superior in the kitchen department how could I possibly take notice of this mother’s favourite recipe book? It is indeed full of really basic pies and pastas and crumbles with all oven cooked recipes having microwave equivalents but it is absolutely brilliant for so many basics. I don’t have a catalogue like memory for weights and proportions for things like Yorkshire puddings, custard, meringues and pastry but this book is guaranteed to have any basic staple included. I genuinely think this is like a modern day Mrs Beeton and with so many cookery books out there concentrating on foreign food, fancy food, fish, meat, puddings, healthy food or whatever else, it’s so refreshing to have something about basic, boring, wonderful food. Over the years I have found myself using it more and more. It is so simple and our own copy bears “new edition for the nineties” proudly on the front cover and shows a good deal of wear and tear.
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