Bibliocook: All About Food

It was only a matter of time before Kieran Murphy's entertaining Ice Cream Ireland made it to the printed page. The Book of Sweet Things, written by Kieran and his brother/business partner Seán, tells the story of how two Americans got into the ice cream business in Dingle a few years ago. Now Murphys' Ice Cream is sold from two shops - one in Dingle and the other in Killarney - and their distinctive blue and white containers are stocked in delis and foodstores throughout Ireland. I got my first taste of their wares by picking up a tub of vanilla (or fanaile) in Morton's of Ranelagh; now, fortunately, I'm never too far from a freezer-full of varieties at work in Urru.

The history of Murphys' Ice Cream - from meetings in Paris to work out a business plan, painting the first shop, expanding to Killarney and setting off nervously to Dublin, trying to break into the luxury ice cream market - would give any budding entrepreneur hope but the proof of this book is truly in the pudding. Recipes are divided into categories covering basic ice creams, Irish and international influences, sorbets and sauces, ice cream deserts, candy and baking and topped off with a section on coffee and hot chocolate. Tales of Kerry cows, ice cream innovations and decent coffees sit side-by-side with snippets of history, kitchen tips and Seán's Favourite Pairings (think warm brownie with Irish Cream Liqueur Ice Cream and hot chocolate sauce or even Toffee Ice Cream and Pecan Pie). The importance of using first class ingredients - quality chocolate, in-season soft fruits, free range eggs - is rightly emphasised and there are plenty of useful notes at the bottom of the recipes to keep you on track.

The traditional (Vanilla, Chocolate, Mint, Brown Bread Ice Creams) sit happily alongside the more intriguing varieties. Who could resist trying Honey Lavender, Cinnamon Latte or Chocolate Whiskey Ice Creams? What about Mulled Wine Sorbet or Gelato alla Crema? All yours for the making - if you have an ice cream machine. If you don't (and believe me, you will want one after spending time with this book), try wandering into the baking section. Toffee, Honeycomb Candy and Sachertorte are just some of the treats on offer or, if you're into ice cream toppings, recipes for Caramel Sauce and Hot Fudge Sauce will give you something to think about next time you pick up a tub of Murphys' Ice Cream. As for me, I've heard that you can get an ice cream attachment for the KitchenAid...

The Book of Sweet Things by Seán and Kieran Murphy is published by Mercier Press.

Could Portugal be the new Spain? Reading Tessa Kiros' Piri Piri Starfish and its references to petisco (tapas, Portuguese-style), chourico (substitute chorizo), port instead of sherry and salt cod (in Portugal - bacalhau, in Spain - bacalao) you could be forgiven for wondering if things are moving that direction. This, the follow up to Kiros' acclaimed parent-and-child-orientated Apples for Jam, is a more straightforward cookbook. As with Apples..., colour is very important, although the chapters are laid out in a more clear-cut way - Essential Recipes, Petisco Plates, Starters and Soups, Mains and Side Plates, Deserts and Cakes - than that book's rainbow bright colour-coded sections. Here the tone is more grown up, with lots of muted blues and greys, beautifully designed page titles and a thick white and blue ribbon for marking your way through the book.

For Piri Piri…, Kiros and her family lived in and travelled around Portugal and the book is written in the form of a travel diary, entries dated as she writes of her impressions of that country - the place and the people - as well as about the food that she encounters there: Maria Alice's Chorico Cake from Chaves in the North of Portugal; a one-pot recipe for Caldeirada a Portuguesa (Portuguese Fish Stew) from Albertina in Lisbon; Passionfruit Crème Caramel inspired by the dishes eaten in San Miguel in the Azores. Photographs of food sit alongside tourist-style images of children playing on the streets, a Portuguese girl looking down from her washing-laden window, men's hats in a shop window.

The recipes are typically Kiros, typically inviting - my list of things to try includes Peas with Eggs and Chorico, Caramel Cake, Roasted New Potatoes with Tomatoes and Red Wine and Pan Fried Fish with Vinegar. Green Peppers, port, piri piri peppers and salt cod are reoccurring ingredients - some of them a little difficult to source from North Cork but I'll know what to go looking for when - rather than if - I visit Portugal.

Also reviewed on Bibliocook: Apples for Jam by Tessa Kiros
An interview with Tessa Kiros on Who Wants Seconds?

I love experimenting with and learning different cooking techniques, especially if they involve playing with yeast. No Knead Bread? Yes please! Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day. Made that. Sourdough from my own starter? Still bubbling quietly away in the fridge. But grilled or barbequed pizza? Not yet - that was until I got my hands on a copy of Craig Priebe's Grilled Pizzas & Piadinas. Craig developed his grilling technique, using a barbeque, when he ran his own pizza restaurant in Atlanta and this book explains it in detail. When we did the pizza day in Ballymaloe, Darina cooked one of her creations on the barbeque outside the demo theatre door but, more fascinated by the wood-fired oven, I didn't hang around in the rain, instead directing my attentions indoors so I never got to investigate the barbequed pizza properly.

Wanting to put this cookbook to the test (sometimes, when piles of cookbooks start stacking on the stairs, next to the bed, all over the kitchen counter and on the dining table, the Husband asks why I don't spend less time reading cookbooks and more time actually using them) I decided to make some dough on Sunday morning for a Sunday night pizza fest. It took minutes in the KitchenAid, although I had to add a lot of extra flour - perhaps something to do flour stored in American kitchens being much drier than in Irish cottages at the end of a long, damp winter. After a couple of hours on a warm window sill, the dough was landed into the fridge and sat there all afternoon, firming up enough to handle.

When we got home that evening it was raining too much to pull out the barbeque so I dragged out my big, heavy cast-iron frying pan and heated it up while the Husband mixed some of Craig's Herbed Grill Oil. The pan is not quite big enough to cook 12-inch pizzas so, instead of two 12-inch pizzas we made three 10-ish-inch rounds out of the dough - next time I'd make four thinner ones. As everything came together faster than expected - Craig did warn me, I just hadn't read that piece! - there was a bit of juggling with temperatures on the pan, topping ingredients on the counter and finishing off under the grill but, much faster than expected, we finally had a selection of decent pizzas to sit down to.

I discovered that basil pesto and marinated feta, combined with Craig's Herb Oil, makes for an overly greasy pizza but goat's cheese, roasted red pepper and Caramelised Onions are a winning combination. Hegarty's Cheddar, with thinly sliced salami (Gubbeen, for preference) and Tomato Chilli Jam also worked out well. Next time I may even be organised enough to try a few of Greg's own ideas for toppings - spinach, pesto, mushrooms and feta sounds good, as does sausage, pepperoni, artichoke hearts and peppers. The book also includes a selection of salads (I've already got my eye on Baby Lettuce with a Citrus Peppercorn Dressing) and deserts (Cinnamon Churros, grilled pizza style) to accompany the pizzas, alongside recipes for the Italian-style flatbreads called piadinas - something to try out for next Sunday, perhaps.

Grilled Pizzas & Piadinas by Craig Priebe is published by DK Publishing

Super Natural Cooking: Five Ways To Incorporate Whole and Natural Ingredients into Your Cooking by Heidi Swanson (Ten Speed Press)
Blogger, photographer, graphic designer and passionate cook Heidi Swanson demystifies unfamiliar health shop ingredients in Super Natural Cooking, a cookbook that drags the world of whole foods very firmly into the 21st century. Nothing is complicated, all is creative and original and Heidi is an encouraging teacher. This is a satisfyingly chunky book, designed with love and attention to detail. Must Cook: Giant Crusty and Creamy White Beans with Greens

Chocolate and Zucchini by Clotilde Dusoulier (Marion Boyars Publishers)
For fans of her food blog, Clotilde needs no introduction and the warm and friendly tone of her writing translates as well on to the printed page as it does online. There are lots of entertaining tips, French-style, from choosing a decent cheeseboard to thoughtful wine notes and many of the recipes come with invaluable suggestions for cooking ahead. A charming insight into 21st century French home cooking. Must Cook: Pain d'Epice

Nobody Does it Better: Why French Home Cooking Is Still the Best in the World by Trish Deseine (Kyle Cathie)
An Ulsterwoman who now lives in France, Trish Deseine is a well-known cookery writer in her adopted country, with five bestselling cookbooks under her belt. In this attractive book, her official English debut, she explains how to cook comme une femme Française. Trish places great emphasis on simple - but very high quality - ingredients, successfully demystifying French attitudes to food. Must Cook: Cream of Puy Lentil Soup with Hazelnuts

Cheat's Cuisine by Aoileann Garavaglia (Curragh Press)
Based on her Saturday column in the Irish Independent, Aoileann Garavaglia's Cheat's Cuisine is a selection of dinner menus that can be put together in just 60 minutes. Divided into seasons and occasions - North African Twist in Winter, Mother's Day Lunch for Spring - Aoileann gives a detailed and colour coded time plan (oh-so-familiar to me from school!). Some of the colours aren't the easiest to see so make sure you prop up the cookbook in a bright corner of your kitchen. Nothing is difficult, ingredients are easy to source and you will get plenty of ideas even from just looking at the index in this cookbook. Must Make: Baked Cheese in a Walnut Crust

2007 was definitely the year of food bloggers' cookbooks - next year I'm particularly looking forward to the ice cream book from Kieran Murphy of Ice Cream Ireland. A good excuse, methinks, for picking up the ice cream making attachment for my KitchenAid?! Happy Christmas to all, I'm off to make this year's batch of Cranberry Orange and Port Relish...

Although I've been immersed in study, there is (somehow!) always time for reading cookbooks. Here are a few recommendations for Christmas.

Cook Simple by Diana Henry (Mitchell Beazley)
I'm a fan of Diana's Crazy Water, Pickled Lemons and last year's Roast Figs, Sugar Snow so I was looking forward to reading Cook Simple and it's remained on top of the pile ever since. Here you'll find brilliant ideas for dinners, and plenty of them, with influences from Sweden, Sicily, Turkey and Georgia. Divided into chapters based around easily available core ingredients - pasta, fish, sausages, leg of lamb - with seasonal vegetables and fruit in their own sections, Diana gives lots of recipes and ideas to make mealtimes easier. Must Make: Roast Squash, Feta and Black Olive Salad.

Food From Friends edited by Kate Fraser for the Matthew Fraser Motor Neuron Charitable Trust
When I lived in Christchurch, NZ, I would always pick up The Press every Thursday for Zest, Kate Fraser's weekly food section. When her son was diagnosed with Motor Neuron disease, the Matthew Fraser Motor Neuron Charitable Trust was set up and this book of recipes is a fundraiser to help provide for his care needs. Charitable cookbooks are only worth picking up if they actually have decent recipes; with contributors ranging from Paris-based American food writer Patricia Wells and European Peasant Cookery author Elizabeth Luard to homegrown writers like Ray McVinnie, Fiona Smith, Peter Gordon and Lois Daish this is not a problem with Food From Friends. Great recipes - and a good cause. Food from Friends is available here. Must Make: Roasted Vegetable Flatbread Pizza

The Creators: Individuals of Irish Food by Dianne Curtin (Atrium)
Fifteen producers are featured in Dianne Curtin's The Creators, a wonderful picture of the artisan food available throughout Cork city and county. Profiles of people like organic beef farmer (and the woman behind our favourite Brown Envelope Seeds) Madeline McKeever, chocolatier Eve St Ledger and fisherman Cornie Bohane are all followed by Dianne's own recipes, chosen to make the most of that producer's ingredient. As well as the chocolate, cheese, beef, poultry, vegetables and fish featured here, Dianne includes a directory of other producers so that readers have the chance to discover even more local delicacies. Must Make: Carrot and Gin Soup (with Cork Dry Gin!)

Wild Garlic, Gooseberries… and Me by Denis Cotter (Collins)
Denis Cotter's third cookbook is an enthusiastic insight into his creative process and the symbiotic partnership he has with the growers who provide the local produce that he uses in Café Paradiso. This is a journey through stories about and recipes for vegetables both familiar - cabbages, kale, watercress - and the more unusual varieties, like oca or yams, salsify and scorzonera. Wild Garlic... is a book to whet the appetite and stimulate the brain. Must Make: Damson Membrillo

Breakfast, Lunch, Tea by Rose Carrarini (Phaidon)
A tempting role call of recipes that includes six different types of scone, five soups, four variations on pancakes and a substantial selection of sweet and savoury tarts, cakes, biscuits and tray bakes. Must Make: Brownie Cheesecake

Time to Eat by Gary Rhodes (Penguin)
I've never been a fan of Mr Rhodes but Time to Eat is great. Organised according to the amount time that you have, from No Time to Cook to Cooking for Pleasure - When Time Doesn't Matter, there are plenty of simple and tasty ideas to try out. The pictures of beautifully plated food were also surprisingly useful when I was trying to concentrate on presentation for school, could have done without all the photos of Gary in his tight white t-shirt, though! Must Make: Fiery Mushrooms on Toast

More to follow...

Watch out on television tonight for a programme called Home which features none other than finger-lickin' Monica Sheridan! I discovered Monica or, rather, one of her cookbooks, in a second hand bookshop in Athlone last year and Monica's Kitchen is a treasure indeed. As well as useful recipes it is full of entertaining opinions - my favourite is her take on boned chicken: "Frankly, I wouldn't recommend it, but, if you want to see green in the eyes of the women and hear the praise of gluttonous men ringing in your ears, well, here goes." - and ahead of her time recipes and ingredients (anyone for foie gras and risotto in 1960s Ireland?).

The website for the show is here and there is a little more information on Ireland's first - and now almost forgotten - celebrity chef in the Meath Chronicle. I wonder if her other cookbooks are as full of character? Maybe we should start a Monica Sheridan revival here!

Home is on at 7pm on RTÉ One tonight at 7pm.

The new Bridgestone Irish Food Guide didn't see the Husband and I wrong on a brief trip to Carlow this weekend. Just released, it is a compendium of food producers, delis, markets, cafés and restaurants up and down the length and breath of the country. This is Sally and John McKenna's eighth edition - the last one was published in 2004 - and it is a lovely chunky book, rammed full of great eating and an essential companion for any trip around Ireland.

Along with the favourites that I've written about in the past, including the Cake Café, Ardagh Castle Goats Cheese, Al-Khyrat, Country Choice, Glebe Gardens, Fallon & Byrne and Sowan's Organic Bread Mixes, it's great to see that there's also a lot of blogger involvement. Val of Val's Kitchen is a contributing editor and, while you're flicking through the book, watch out for Murphy's Ice Cream, La Cucina, Bubble Brothers and Ummera.

We took our copy with us on the train down to Carlow on Friday night and, after quickly dumping our bags at Barrowville Townhouse, it led us to Lennon's Café Bar for dinner, a duck liver salad for me, monkfish wrapped in Parma ham for himself. The food was tasty, definitely above average Irish pub grub standards, although finishing with an underwhelming and over-chilled cheese plate may not have been the best move. The next morning, after a very substantial breakfast, we tackled the Bridgestone-noted Farmers' Market in the town centre. Not wanting to carry loads back on the train, we limited ourselves to two types of cheese - sundried tomato and basil Carlow Farmhouse Cheese and Coolattin Cheddar - cherry jam, beetroot chutney and raspberry tonic from Malone Fruit Farm and a bag of the most divine fudge from The Truffle Fairy. Small, but very well formed, the Carlow Farmers' Market has a lot to recommend it, not least the fact that it's situated right in the town centre where no one can forget about it - unlike the now abandoned Fermoy Farmers' Market. Wandering around town, we also spotted Bosco's but unfortunately the Carlow Craft Brewery was closed - the Husband is a big fan of their O'Haras Celtic Stout.

There are far too many chancers in the food industry in Ireland. I really don't think that there can be any excuse for a muffin served, still in its packet, as happened me yesterday in Lemon Jelly on Joyce Street. Although I wouldn't necessarily agree with the McKenna's assessment of Munchies in Fermoy, for finding great food in out of the way places, it's difficult to beat the Bridgestone Irish Food Guide.

This is the book for anyone who has ever gone to Paris seeking French food and been completely waylaid from their Coq au Vin by the rich variety of ethnic restaurants in the city. With a far-flung variety of former colonies and protectorates, Paris is a melting pot for people and cuisines from all over North Africa, Asia and the Middle East. When we were there last year we spent a lot of time exploring the food available at places like the café at L'Institut du Monde Arabe, grabbing pastries from a spectacular Algerian bakery called La Bague de Kenza (subsequently written up in the New York Times, with recipes, and there's also some great photos on Lulu Loves London) and trying to find a much-recommended restaurant called l'Afghanistan in the 11th arrondissement.

Part guide for your next trip to Paris and part recipe collection, authors Charlotte Puckette and Olivia Kiang-Snaije mix stories of immigrant experiences in Paris, information about ethnic restaurants and interviews with their proprietors/chefs, with well-chosen recipes and delightful drawings - just take a look at the cheery cover to get an idea. It is illustrated by Paris-based Lebanese artist Dinah Diwan and her vivid images are full of fun and energy.

Separated by nationality - Morocco/Algeria/Tunisia, Vietnam/Cambodia/Laos/China, Japan, Cameroon/Senegal/The West Indies, Lebanon and Syria - each chapter has the makings of an entire meal, from Green Papaya and Moroccan Carrot Salads, Shrimp Rougail and Pork Colombo, to Saharan Almond Cake with Orange Coulis or Coconut and Lime Flan.

It may be a slightly rose-coloured picture of French colonial and immigrant history, but this picture of a vibrant multicultural Paris and its associated food makes for fascinating reading. Information on the more obscure ingredients - my favourite argan oil, for instance - is always useful and the recipes are encouragingly straightforward. I've already dog-eared more that a few of the Moroccan and Lebanese recipes to try. A colourful addition to your cookbook shelves.

The Ethnic Paris Cookbook has also got its own blog here, where you can read about the adventures of the authors on the book promotion trail.

It being Anzac Day this week - and no, I still haven't got around to making Anzac Biscuits, due to the local shops all selling out of desiccated coconut on the day in question - I was delighted to hear from Slow Food in Christchurch that the 1914 edition of the essential Kiwi cookbook, the Edmonds Cookery Book, is now available online.

Like the Stork margarine-sponsored McDonnell's Good Food Cook Books in Ireland, the Edmonds Cookery Book was designed to promote a product - Edmonds "Sure to Rise" Baking Powder. Although I love and use them regularly, the McDonnell's Cook Books are now very dated; the Edmonds Cookery Book has gone from strength to strength since its 50-page beginning in 1907 and is still being published. I have my own vintage copy, I think from the 1950s, courtesy of the Boyfriend's aunt who has an eye for the perfect classic cooking present (I also have a family of tin jelly moulds - two sizes of rabbit and a tortoise - and a satisfyingly heavy earthenware one courtesy of the same lady). Even though this edition is over 90 years old, the Edmonds Cookery Book has recipes for classics like Raspberry Buns, Bread and Butter Pudding and Cornish Pasties although, alas, none for Anzac Biscuits - perhaps it was too early in the First World War for them to have been invented?

Read more about it below.

Continue reading "Edmonds Cookery Book" »

I recently got a mail from a New York PR company about a Nextbook podcast featuring one of my favourite cookbook writers, Middle Eastern food enthusiast Claudia Roden. Nextbook's interviewer, Hugh Levinson, visited her kitchen in London and talks to her while she prepares Poulet aux Dattes (Chicken with Dates) and Salade de Tomates et Poivrons Grillés (Grilled Tomato and Pepper Salad), both from her last publication, The Book of Jewish Food.

It is a lovely, relaxed interview with Claudia cooking and talking about how she became involved in food writing, her own family's food history and the importance of understanding how food and culture are intertwined. A word of warning though - don't listen to this at work. It will just make you much too hungry! The interview is online here and the same page also has copies of the great-sounding recipes that she cooked while talking to Hugh.

In yet another of my infrequent series of alerts about Irish food programmes, a new RTÉ Radio 1 show called Boiled, Baked & Basted started on Saturday night. It features chefs talking about the favourite and most inspirational cookbooks in their collection (Bibliochef, perhaps?!) and the first show has Paul Flynn of the acclaimed Tannery Restaurant in Dungarvan talking about books by Marco Pierre White, "scary hero" Elizabeth David, the esteemed list-topping Roast Chicken and Other Stories by Simon Hopkinson and two books that speak directly to my love of Middle Eastern food - The Moro Cookbook by Sam and Sam Clark and Arabesque: A taste of Morocco, Turkey and Lebanon by Claudia Roden. If you, like me, are interested in cookbooks (in my house you'll find piles of cookbooks by the bed, on the dining table, in the living room, and a row to reference on the kitchen counter) you'll find this programme very interesting.

Boiled, Baked & Basted is on RTÉ Radio 1 on Saturday nights at 8.30pm and the Paul Flynn show is also available to listen to online here. Incidentally, Paul Flynn is also the author of two cookbooks himself, An Irish Adventure with Food: The Tannery Cookbook and Second Helpings: Further Irish Adventures with Food, both published by the Cork-based Collins Press.

While at last year's Savour New Zealand, Australian chef Greg Malouf was just back from a month spent travelling and eating in Lebanon and Syria and he spoke enthusiastically about the book that he was writing with his former wife, Lucy, based on the time they spent there. Saha is the gorgeous end result. A beautifully designed book which is equally comfortable on your coffee table as in your kitchen, it comes across as a pure labour of love.

While Greg explores flavours from his childhood and finds new inspiration for his cooking, Lucy documents their travels and relates stories about the craftspeople they meet, the food culture and the history of both countries. He supplies the recipes - Green Beans Slow-Cooked with Cumin and Tomatoes; Grilled Tiger Prawn Shish Kebabs with Spicy Cracked Wheat Salad and Tomato Dressing; Crunchy Sesame-Pistachio Biscuits - while she furnishes the context.

Lucy writes in a very personal and honest way of their experiences, occasional misgivings and adventures in places like the Roman remains at Baalbeck and Palmyra, the legendary desert kingdom of Queen Zenobia. Her stories and the evocative images by photographer Matt Harvey are complimented by Greg's recipes, in chapters that range from Mezze Dips and Meat Mezze to Sweet Treats and Beverages. There are new ingredients - desert truffles, mastic, barberries - and some complex recipes but many of the dishes are easily managed and, after my success with Greg's yoghurt instructions, that recipe is set to become a staple in my kitchen.

Saha depicts a Lebanon still scarred, but recovering, from the ravages of the civil war that ended in 1990. People are hopeful about the future, Beirut is nearly reconstructed, tourists are starting to investigate the beauties of the country. Sadly, after this summer's shameful Israeli invasion, it is impossible not to wonder what has happened to the people and places that Greg and Lucy met and visited.

Also reviewed on Bibliocook: Moorish by Greg and Lucy Malouf

Congratulations to New York-based blogger Julie Powell whose book, Julie and Julia: 365 Days, 524 Recipes, 1 Tiny Apartment Kitchen, has just been nominated for two Quill Book Awards. The book - based on the online diary that Powell wrote, documenting her attempts to cook her way through Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking - is in competition in both the Debut Author of the Year and the Cooking categories.

Strangely enough, one of her fellow shortlisted authors in the Cooking section is none other than Julia Child (with Alex Prud'homme) for her memoir, My Life In France. Other nominees in that category are the much-hyped Heat: An Amateur's Adventures as Kitchen Slave, Line Cook, Pasta-Maker, and Apprentice to a Dante-Quoting Butcher in Tuscany by The New Yorker's Bill Buford; home cooking from the Food Network's Rachael Ray in 365: No Repeats: A Year of Deliciously Different Dinners; and last year's default Christmas present for the cook in your life, Italian cookbook bible The Silver Spoon.

These awards are chosen by the public so you can vote for your favourite nominees at www.quillsvote.com and the winners will be announced on 10 October. Go Julie!

There's no nonsense about Judith Tabron. Starting in the restaurant industry as a 16-year-old apprentice, she worked her way up to become the co-owner of Soul, an acclaimed, successful bar and bistro situated at the Viaduct Harbour in Auckland. On stage at last year's Savour New Zealand - she co-presented Greg Malouf's class on Middle Eastern Magic - her straight talking, take-no-prisoners attitude was very refreshing. She is, as she says herself, a leader rather than a follower, and her interest in new trends and different cuisines came through strongly at the symposium as it does in this, her first cookbook.

Tabron is an enthusiastic advocate of the practice of bringing other chefs into the kitchen and the book showcases the most popular dishes served at Soul alongside recipes from a selection of visiting guest chefs - Melbourne-based Bill Marchetti, Greg Malouf and Stephanie Alexander; Chicago's Charlie Trotter; Soul maitre d' and TV presenter Geeling; and Philip Johnson of e'cco in Brisbane. Beautiful photographs by Stephen Robinson illustrate recipes using a variety of unusual combinations and techniques - Caramelised Belgian Endive filled with Goat's Cheese with Crisp Almonds and Dates, Potato and Goat's Cheese Terrine with Rocket Salad and Lemon Vinaigrette, Tea Petal-Rubbed Akaora Aalmon served alongside Rhubarb and Orange Salad with Mirin and Sake Dressing. Tabron comments on each dish, whether about suppliers (Tom Bates of Akaroa Salmon), influences (trips to San Francisco, other chefs) and stories about the restaurant.

Soul is a bit more cheffy (by which I mean that many of the dishes have far too many components for my home kitchen) than I normally like but the ideas here are exciting and the recipes can easily be broken down to their constituent parts. Worth more than just a quick look, especially if you get caught - as I have - on the Greg Malouf-influenced recipe for John Dory on Parsnip Mash with Lentil, Shallot and Olive Vinaigrette. Time to dig out that Ras el Hanout again!

Soul by Judith Tabron & Friends is published by Random House New Zealand.

It's the colour that catches your eye first. The bold pink and red cover of Tessa Kiros' Apples for Jam is immediately distinctive, particularly with its eye-catching photo of a pair of red, well-worn children's shoes. And colour is hugely important in this book as Tessa and her colour-coded recipes explore the spectrum of childhood through chapters that include gold and monochrome, pink, yellow and red.

From simple, wholesome dishes like Broccoli Soup (green), Wholemeal Apricot and Apple Pie (orange) or Potato and Yoghurt Salad (white), Tessa also covers decadent-looking Brownies, sandwiched with whipped cream, strawberries and iced with a simple chocolate ganache (brown), an easy pre-made Pandoro Birthday Cake (multicolour) and Chocolate Toffee Nut Squares (stripes). Each coloured chapter comes complete with a childhood memory - a belief in toys coming awake at night, the ice cream man and his "sweet, chocolatey music", water-drinking competitions - just one of the many things that make this cookbook so sweetly evocative. The recipes are no less attractive, without being too difficult, and my copy of the book is flecked with a host of little post-its, marking the dishes that I'm intent on trying in the near future.

As she detailed in her first book, the lovely Falling Cloudberries: A World of Family Recipes, Tessa is half-Finnish and half-Greek-Cypriot. Her upbringing in South Africa and travels throughout the world, cooking in London, Sydney, Athens and Mexico, have all informed the food that she presents here. She now lives in Tuscany with her Italian husband and two daughters, hence her second seasonal book, Twelve: A Tuscan Cookbook, and the Italian influence is strongly evident, particularly in the tomato- and pasta-heavy red section.

As with all Tessa's cookbooks, Apples for Jam is a lavish production. It's a satisfyingly chunky book (400-plus pages) with mouthwatering (yet realistic) photos of food, children's drawings reproduced in full colour, bright wallpaper designs and a useful pink satin bookmark. Charming and down-to-earth, this is a book with both style and substance.

Apples for Jam by Tessa Kiros is published by Murdoch Books.

This is the perfect book for any foodie who's ever spent hours puzzling over unfamiliar ingredients in their local delicatessen or ethnic food shop. Glynn Christian, originally from New Zealand, has been a food writer and broadcaster in England for many years, and as a result, has a rare international perspective. His breadth of experience also includes setting up the legendary Mr Christian's Delicatessen in London's Notting Hill in the 1970s.

With a cover quote from Nigel Slater - "one of the only ten books you need" (I'd be interested in finding out the names of the other nine!) - Real Flavours does live up to its subtitle: The Handbook of Gourmet and Deli Ingredients. From possum to pine nut oil, goulash to grockle (an obscure sea vegetable), this book has information on all the foodstuffs you could imagine - and plenty that you haven't even come across yet. You could comfortably spend a few weeks wandering around the riches of the herbs, spices and flavourings chapter.

But be careful. You may open Real Flavours to look up a particular item but soon find yourself sucked in by this greedy gourmet's no-nonsense, opinionated and entertaining writing. An essential addition to every epicurean's kitchen.

Real Flavours: The Handbook of Gourmet and Deli Ingredients by Glynn Christian is published by Grub Street Publishing.

Not long after food blogging first cropped up on my radar, I discovered Julie Powell's blog, the Julie/Julia Project. I thought the idea was great - to document her attempts to cook the recipes in Julia Child's classic cookbook Mastering the Art of French Cooking in just one year - but I didn't much like Julie's blog persona and I never went back. How times change. A couple of years later, I couldn't put down the book that she wrote, much of which was taken directly from her the same blog entries that had annoyed me.

While the episodic nature of her adventures in cooking and the concomitant tears and tantrums was - to me, at least, if not to many of her numerous 'bleeders' (Julie's name for her blog readers) - more exasperating than not, her book is far more entertaining than just the sum of its parts. Through her blog, Julie developed her own, very distinctive, voice and her account of the 365 days she spent cooking 524 recipes in her small apartment kitchen has also changed her life.

When Julie started the project she was miserable, an anonymous temp in a New York government office. Twelve months later, having, along the way, learned how to split marrow bones, kill lobsters without a second thought and cooked for New York Times restaurant critic Amanda Hesser, she was an online celebrity with a book deal. It's an online Cinderella story of the kind dreamed about by anyone who has ever wanted to turn their passion into a job and, for that alone, Julie has to be applauded. She's also deserving of acclaim for writing such a funny, exasperating and enjoyable book. Julie & Julia is well worth investing both money and time in.

Julie & Julia by Julie Powell is published by Fig Tree.

Cookbook sections in secondhand bookshops can be a little hit or miss. There's always a pile of microwave cookbooks - no one, for some reason wants to hang onto these dodgy and dated texts - a scattering of horrible diet books and often lots of ancient Family Circle publications, with their "triple-tested in the test kitchens" claim, but, rarely something that you actually want to cook from, let alone buy. Still, I live in hope, so a recent trip to Athlone had to include a browse in the local secondhand bookshop (I still haven't discovered its name) which turned out to be a most amazing example of its kind.

Just a couple of shelves were devoted to cookbooks but what was on offer was enough to have me standing there, leafing through the pages, for quite a while. My eye was taken by a red hardbacked book from the 1960s, the gold letters on its spine saying "Monica's Kitchen". Opening it, I was so entertained by Monica Sheridan's humorous prose that I had to read it out loud to the Boyfriend - something that I continued to do through the weekend's café interludes, car journeys and meals in the tent.

Apart from her unfortunate love of unsweetened condensed milk in soups and the like, Monica's Kitchen is actually a breath of fresh air. Well travelled, she carelessly mentions dishes from France and the continent (she once spent months learning the foie gras business, "with the intention of setting myself up as a Goose Girl in the West of Ireland") alongside the plain, simple Irish recipes. Her roast chicken, unstuffed and dressed with the pan juices, would be appreciated by Nigel Slater and there are definite French influences to many of her vegetable recipes which are, fortunately, a long way from the traditional Irish boil-it-until-it-turns-grey method.

Some of her opinions are laugh-out-loud hilarious. I particularly liked her take the things necessary to make a cook:

"Another essential to good cooking is a husband or son with an adventurous palate. Women do not cook for other women, or for themselves. If they are cooking for other women, it is to annoy them or dazzle them..."

A few of her recipe asides veer towards the demented - ideas on dye in pea soup ("Any fool can make pea soup, but here are the refinements that give it an air. You should add a good spoon of green vegetable dye to the soup just before you serve it. That will take the anaemic look off it."), boned chicken ("Frankly, I wouldn't recommend it, but, if you want to see green in the eyes of the women and hear the praise of gluttonous men ringing in your ears, well, here goes."), brown bread ("The longevity of the men and women of rural Ireland may be directly attributed to their simple diet of porridge, wholemeal bread and stews - together with their uncompromising refusal to fraternise with Income Tax Collectors.") - but Monica's Kitchen is chock-full of useful suggestions and recipes as well as being a complete treat to read. Well worth looking out for.

Monica's Kitchen by Monica Sheridan is published by Castle Publications Ltd.

One of the big advantages of being settled back in Dublin, with book shelves once again, is having all my old cookbooks to pore over and rediscover. Although I did manage to build up a fair collection in New Zealand, it couldn't really compare to my beloved older stacks of books by Nigel Slater, Darina Allen, Tamasin Day-Lewis, Nigella Lawson and my ancient copies of the Paula Daly-written McDonnell's Good Food Cook Books. The first and second books in this series, bought from saving up the tokens on Stork Margarine packets, were two of the first cookbooks owned by my mother.

Every recipe, of course, used Stork Margarine - they were first printed in 1976, long before Darina Allen started turning the Irish nation back into butter lovers - and just leafing through them is an exercise in nostalgia. As a child I cooked my way through Drop Scones, Franzipan Flan, Steak Diane and Melba Toast, while a picture of The Runaway Train children's birthday cake furnished many hours-worth of dreaming. I subsequently made this for a cousin who probably was too young to appreciate more than the Liquorice Allsorts used for wheels and the Smartie cargo - it's not really a cake worth returning to. But many of the recipes, albeit with Stork swapped for butter, definitely are.

Every Christmas Cake in our house was, and still is, covered with Almond and Royal Icing according to the tables in the first book. I learned how to make choux pastry from the step-by-step photographs when I was about eleven and subsequently became famed for my Chocolate Éclairs. Family get-togethers were normally preceded by several days of Éclair-making when I took over the kitchen and most of the freezer (and probably my mother's nerves!) to make what I considered a sufficient supply - normally 2-3 per person. While I haven't made Éclairs in years, I have returned to several other of the recipes, with a few modern updates, to great success.

The Sausage Plait pictured on the cover was a particular favourite when I was younger. One day I cooked it on the shelf below one of my mum's Apple Tarts and, although I initially thought it was ruined when the tart's sweet, appley juices overflowed on top of it, the apple flavour actually complemented the pork so much that I now add apple to the recipe. It's a great supper dish, especially with a good accompanying salad, and it also travels very well as part of a picnic spread.

Continue reading "An old favourite: McDonnell's Good Food Cook Books" »

As charity cookbooks go, Real Food for Real People is a real gem. The book is part of a fundraising drive for Moneystown National School's building fund and was produced and published by the Parents' Committee in this County Wicklow village. But, even though Real Food for Real People was evidentially done on a shoestring, the design quality still shines out. Illustrated mainly with children's drawings and photos, and scattered with quotations from, amongst others, Shakespeare and Lenin, it is a simple and well laid-out book.

The recipes do not disappoint either, with Real Food for Real People gathering together a broad selection of well-loved recipes from local families, some of which have been handed down through the generations. Foreign dishes - Mrs Bittel's Waffles, Flamiche aux Poitreaux - share space with Stuffed Marrow, Nettle Soup and Mrs Doyle's Brown Bread. There's also a substantial selection of biscuits (Congolais, Gigi's Chocolate Chip Cookies), deserts (Chocolate Roulade, Ishy Gran's Trifle) and cakes (Mary Quinn's Currant Cake, Granny Tish's Christmas Cake)

Along with the food, the book also includes a history of Moneystown National School by former principle Frank McGillick, making it a lovely keepsake for anyone in or connected to the community. But - and that's what sets Real Food for Real People apart from so many other similar productions - the design and the recipes are of a high enough standard to let it stand alone, far beyond the confines of County Wicklow.

And it seems like lots of people agree. Priced at an eminently reasonable €10, the first print run sold out in about a month but the book has since been reprinted. I picked up my copy in the Alliance Française in Dublin, I've also seen it in Avoca Handweavers and it is also available online at www.moneystowncookbook.com for €10.00 + €2.50 P&P. A good cause and great cooking.

Real Food for Real People is published by Moneystown National School's Parents' Committee.

Undoubtedly creative and definitely contemporary, Kevin Dundon's Full on Irish is a book that is easy to admire yet, as a collection of recipes, it is not entirely successful. Too much fussing over presentation, as with the beautifully and immaculately layered Smoked Salmon Cake with Chive Cream Cheese, is a huge turn off for me. I want to be able to look at the pictures and think "I can do that" rather than "it's too complicated for me." Maybe it is to do with my style of cooking, which is all about landing dishes on the table and letting people help themselves, rather than delicately plating up little morsels of food, but I find it very difficult to get excited about cookbooks that devote a paragraph to telling me how to arrange the dish before presenting it.

Still, grumbles aside, Full on Irish is a beautifully put together book. Each recipe is illustrated with well arranged photographs from Alan Murphy, who also takes pictures of the chef in action - making Orange Scented Pastry Cages, harvesting spuds, picking Wexford mussels and cradling a hen from the gardens of Dunbrody House, Dundon's award-winning restaurant and luxury hotel in County Wexford. Dunbrody House is also host to a cookery school run by Dundon and he is a great champion of local produce and artisan producers. Traditional butcher Leo Halford in Wellington Bridge, specialist mushrooms from Fancy Fungi and Hook Head potatoes from Vincent and Geraldine Rowe are just some of the foodstuffs that he highlights while Atlantic salmon and Wexford strawberries also get a mention. Dundon also has to be applauded for sensibly valuing local and seasonal foods over organic imports and for growing many of his own fruit and vegetables in the gardens around Dunbrody House.

While I would prefer to admire rather than cook many of the dishes in Full on Irish, it has piqued my interest in visiting Dunbrody House and Dundon's final two chapters - Kitchen Garden and The Larder - have a particularly useful selection of recipes for Balsamic Reduction, Chilli Jam and Dunbrody Cucumber Pickle with Rocket. Eye candy, undoubtedly, but Full on Irish may not get much use in the kitchen.

Full on Irish: Creative Contemporary Cooking by Kevin Dundon is published by Epicure Press.

Although these wee cookbooks are small - just 64 pages - they are beautifully formed. The Irish Food books are from the same stable that produces the Bridgestone Top 100 guides to restaurants and places to stay, as well as the Irish Food Guide - Sally and John McKenna's Estragon Press - they are well worth investing in, and at €3 apiece, they won't break the bank.

Slow & Traditional is a celebration of what the McKennas call Irish soul food. Indeed, with a selection of simple and approachable recipes for dishes like Dublin Coddle, Champ and Colcannon, this is comfort cooking at its best.

Waterford's acclaimed Tannery Restaurant chef Paul Flynn teams up with Sally McKenna in Fast & Modern. Concentrating on the best of Irish artisan produce, Flynn and McKenna present a selection of imaginative recipes that showcase wonderful products like mature Hegarty's cheddar cheese (Risotto of Peaches and Mature Hegarty's Cheddar) and Glenilen Clotted Cream (Crab Quiche with Glenilen Clotted Cream).

A section at the back of each book contains background information on associations and individuals working with Irish food as well as a directory of producers. Small packages indeed, but very good ones. I wonder if we'll have to wait long for their big brothers?

Irish Food: Slow & Traditional by John and Sally McKenna & Irish Food: Fast & Modern by Paul Flynn and Sally McKenna are published by Estragon Press.

With a subtitle that says, "Big-time home cooking for family and friends" you can't say that you haven't been warned. Tom Douglas, with his wife Jackie Cross, is the owner of several restaurants in Seattle one of which, Etta's Seafood, I've heard about for years from a friend that worked there some time ago. As is evident from the cover photograph, he's a big man with a big appetite - the kind of chef that, in short, you'd trust to cook you dinner or to tell you how to cook your own dinner. Don't go looking for any nouvelle cuisine in this book 'cos you ain't gonna find it. What you will find, however, are plenty of recipes that will make you want to march right into that kitchen of yours and start cooking for crowds.

Douglas writes by menu and the book has a total of thirteen adaptable menus for every (American) occasion, including Puget Sound Crab Feed, Screen Door Barbeque, Kat and Clay's Merlot Release Picnic and Christmas Eve with the Dows. There are no dinners à deux here; rather this is a book to arrange events by. Plan your own adaptation of Pop Pop's Winter Solstice, get half-a-dozen people over for A Chinese Feast or figure out where your local market is so that you can organise a Pike Place Market Menu.

Each menu starts off with a creative cocktail, a most civilised way to start a meal, and Douglas also gives suggestions on appropriate wines to go with the food. There are tips in the side margins and explanations of ingredients and techniques. After years of seeing kosher salt recommended in American recipes I now know why (because it tastes less harsh taste and salty than table salt) and how to make reductions to add intensity to the dishes I cook. One of the best things about this book is Douglas' A Step Ahead section in each recipe where he details anything that you can prepare in advance - something I wish more cookbook writers would make use of.

Douglas is a proud champion of the best of local food producers and this book will be a wealth of information to anyone based in and around Seattle. The rest of us will have to settle for trying a glass of his Homemade Bianco on the Rocks with a Twist followed by - to do a little menu mixing - some Sweet and Hot Fried Almonds, Spring Chickens with Green Marinade and Sweet Pea Risotto, topped off with Bitter Orange Chocolate Mousse. What's not to like?

Tom's Big Dinners by Tom Douglas is published by Morrow Cookbooks.

Before I started reading/reviewing these books, Anne Willan was unfamiliar to me but, as soon as they arrived, her name started to crop up in my reading with increasing regularity. An American by way of Yorkshire, Willan established La Varenne, the prestigious Burgundy-based French cooking school, in 1975. For those who haven't the time or money to study with her, she has also written an impressive number of cookbooks, ranging from Dorling Kindersley's Perfect series (Perfect Chicken Dishes, Perfect Chocolate Deserts, Perfect Appetizers etc), last year's useful A Cook's Book of Quick Fixes to the more personal in From My Chateau Kitchen.

How to Cook Absolutely Everything and Best Recipes for Absolutely Everything are, however, work manuals rather cookbooks to gloat and glory over (see Roast Figs, Sugar Snow, A Paradiso Year: Autumn and Winter Cooking or Unwrapped: Green and Black's Chocolate Recipes for examples of those!). How to Cook..., in particular, is very instruction book-like, laid out with photographs of food at various stages of doneness with accompanying text that explains details of colour and texture. It originated, as Willan points out in the introduction, in her kitchen: " 'That looks done to me,' I said one day as a student lifted a roast chicken out of the oven. And then I thought - how do I know? Cooking is a skill learned by experience, and nothing is more difficult than judging when a dish is cooked just right." Although she states that smell, sight, touch, hearing and, finally, taste, are all important in determining when food is ready, Willan does a surprisingly good job of communicating this through the visual images and text in this small (well under 200 pages) book.

With chapters ranging through eggs, pasta, desserts, meat and fruit, there's a wealth of information here for both inexperienced and veteran cooks. The chapter on sauces, for instance, covers - amongst others - stocks, gravies, hollandaise, mayonnaise and vinaigrette alongside sweet sauces like pastry cream and fruit coulis. The meat chapter has useful instructions on how to use a simple thumb test for firmness - as in comparing your thumb muscle's resilience to that of the food - as a way to judge how well a piece of meat or fish is cooked. It sure beats having to cut into a piece of steak in the pan to see how bloody it is. The images which accompany grain pilaffs and risottos are similarly helpful and it is always useful to compare your mental image of how a food looks when it is cooked with actual pictures of the real thing. Each section starts with a paragraph on the method of cooking, as well as tips on appropriate seasonings and remedies for technical problems.

Willan does includes several recipes so that readers can experiment with their new-found knowledge (in the apple section, Tarte des Demoiselles Tatin looks particularly good) but there just aren't enough, especially when you get to the chocolate mousse and ganache sections in the desserts chapter. For those associated recipes - Chocolate Mousse with Raspberries and Pecan Truffles - you have to go to the companion book, Best Recipes for Absolutely Everything. As Best Recipes... and How to Cook... are so complimentary to each other, I don't understand why Quadrille Publishing didn't publish both books in the one volume. How to Cook Absolutely Everything is both educational and interesting but it is frustrating to have to go search for recipes in Best Recipes for Absolutely Everything. Only two stars out of fivce - it could have been more.

How to Cook Absolutely Everything and Best Recipes for Absolutely Everything by Anne Willan are published by Quadrille Publishing.

My first introduction to Ursula Ferrigno was through a book called Bread (published by Dorling Kindersley) that she co-wrote with Eric Treuillé, the owner of London shop/haven Books For Cooks. It's an eminently useful publication with, as is the Dorling Kindersley way, plenty, almost too many, illustrations. This became a much-used publication in my kitchen - especially when the Boyfriend appointed himself official bagel-maker! - and so it was with great interest I turned to Ferrigno's latest book, Trattoria: Food for Family and Friends.

Fortunately publishers Mitchell Beazley don't go in for the totally step-by-step, picture-at-each-stage idea. Trattoria is more atmospheric than the dictatorial Bread but the quality of the recipes doesn't suffer from that. Ferrigno has published several other well-regarded Italian cookery books and she certainly knows her stuff. Each recipe starts with a paragraph where she talks evocatively about the ingredients used, the history of the dish and the area that the food is associated with. The emphasis throughout is on fresh, regional and seasonal food and, while Ferrigno celebrates tradition, she is not hide-bound by it.

Ferrigno includes recipes from and little histories of some of her favourite trattoria, tempting the reader to visit Italy as well as cooking its food. The book is sumptuously photographed by Francesca Yorke - the dishes, as well as the people, produce and landscape - and will appeal to anyone with even a passing interest in Italian food. All I need now is a map so I can plot my gastronomic tour of Italy!

Trattoria: Food for Family and Friends by Ursula Ferrigno is published by Mitchell Beazley.

Coming back from New Zealand, I keep getting told that "staying in is the new going out" and this would seem to be borne out by the publication of both Darina Allen's Easy Entertaining and her daughter-in-law Rachel Allen's Favourite Food For Friends within a few weeks of each other in late 2005.

While Rachel's book is a perfectly acceptable selection of recipes if you're interested in cooking for friends at home, Easy Entertaining is a far more comprehensive tome. Darina has gathered over 250 recipes that cover everything from three-course dinners to tapas and one-pot suppers and this book is full of excellent ideas with plenty of modern twists on old standards. There's nothing too complicated here for kitchen novices but entertaining experts will be definitely be pleased with the variety on offer - Spiced Chicken and Red Peppers with Orzo, Tomato and Coconut Milk Soup, Martha Rosenthal's Red Lentil Dahl are just a few of the recipes I currently have bookmarked in my copy.

While I would avoid the section that deals with party games, Tom Doorley's advice on picking wine and drinks is very useful although I was rather annoyed at his use of sterling prices instead of euros.

Easy Entertaining is, however, a book that you will return to again and again, whether you have the excuse of cooking food for friends - or you just want some innovative dishes to cook for yourself. Rachel may be flavour of the month at the moment but she has a long way to go before I'd turn to her before Darina.

Easy Entertaining by Darina Allen is published by Kyle Cathie, €25

While the internet has undoubtedly simplified the matter of finding holiday accommodation, it's never at hand (unless, of course, you've got your portable internet device nearby) when you're on the road, looking for a decent bite to eat and somewhere to stay at short notice. Situations like these that make you thankful for having a guide book into the glove-box of your car and Georgina Campbell's guides to Ireland are useful tomes for such eventualities.

Ms Campbell's latest publication, The Best of The Best is described by her publishers as being "for the more discerning traveller and diner". Like the Bridgestone Guides, the selections in Campbell's guides are based on merit alone rather than the establishments actually paying for inclusion.

With useful maps aplenty to assist your navigation, Campbell informs readers of the finest restaurants, accommodation, pubs and cafés throughout the country. It is more comprehensive and less idiosyncratic than the Bridgestone Guides but there are still enough mouth-watering accounts of dinners and breakfasts enjoyed to keep even the most rampant foodie happy.

With places to stay and eat in every price range, you can easily avoid greasy garage shops and unwelcoming B&Bs while traveling around Ireland by keeping The Best of The Best and the Bridgestone Guides in your glove-box. You know it's worth it.

Georgina Campbell's Ireland: The Best of The Best is published by Epicure Press.

Although already the author of two well-received memoirs - Kitchen Confidential and A Cook's Tour - as well as a couple of not so popular detective novels, it has taken American chef Anthony Bourdain a little while to embark on his own cookbook and he throws himself into the undertaking with commendable vigour.

An already hyperactive writing style doesn't get lost anywhere along the way as he pushes, prods and sometimes seems to want to deliberately antagonise readers. Bourdain is the executive chef at New York City restaurant Les Halles, and he has decreed that this book is a "field manual to strategy and tactics". To that end, he's determined to treat the reader as if he or she were a rookie in his kitchen. He doesn't mince his words as he coerces and advises, issuing warnings and occasionally yelling (in print).

Bourdain takes the solid, mainly carnivorous (don't miss the blood and guts chapter), French principles behind Les Halles and reworks them for a private kitchen to good effect. Behind all the bluster, there's a chef with a talent for imparting his knowledge of food to those who wish to learn. While it won't be very useful to vegetarians (fans of Ysanne Spevack's Fresh and Wild Cookbook avoid!), the Les Halles Cookbook is an undoubted education.

Les Halles Cookbook by Anthony Bourdain is published by Bloomsbury.

Derry woman and Sunday Telegraph food writer Diana Henry has again come up trumps with her latest book, Roast Figs, Sugar Snow. Her first cookbook, Crazy Water, Pickled Lemons, focused on the tastes and enchantments of the Middle East, Mediterranean and North Africa. With praise from Claudia Roden and its appearance twice on the Glenfiddich award shortlist, it became an instant classic.

Like Crazy Water, Pickled Lemons, there is a focus on travelling in Roast Figs, Sugar Snow. Henry has traversed the chilly areas of the Northern Hemisphere and collected recipes from Maine, Norway, Tuscany and Denmark, grouping them by theme under idiosyncratic chapter headings. Tales From the Hunt covers game and wild mushrooms, Earthly Pleasures focuses on pumpkin, squash, beans and lentils while Sugar Snow is devoted to maple syrup.

Henry's introductions to each chapter are evocative and personal, being as much a travel guide as information on the ingredients. Like her previous book, there are seasonal quotes scattered throughout from Laurie Lee, Marianne Moore and Robert Frost as well as the piece that inspired her - Laura Ingalls Wilder's vivid description of a sugar snow in Vermont from Little House in the Big Woods. These literary diversions make Roast Figs, Sugar Snow a book that is worth reading as well as cooking from. But don't underestimate Henry's recipes. There's the detail of Sugar-On-Snow for those Ingalls Wilder fanatics, Beef Pie with Wild Mushrooms and Claret ("you can make men fall in love with you with this pie"), the substantial-sounding Steamed Apple and Marmalade Pudding and Uncle Desmond's Sloe Gin.

Vividly luminous photographs by Jason Lowe compliment Henry's sensuous writing and make Roast Figs, Sugar Snow a book to curl up with on a dark night in front of a roaring fire. Just don't try doing it when you're hungry.

Roast Figs, Sugar Snow by Diana Henry is published by Mitchell Beazley.

British organic and Fair Trade food chain Fresh and Wild teamed up with organic expert Ysanne Spevack, editor of online organic food magazine organicfood.co.uk, to produce this cookbook. It's both worthy and worthwhile, but sometimes Spevack's party political broadcasts on behalf of Fresh and Wild do get a little tiresome, especially when there's only a limited amount of the shops to go around.

That aside, the biggest problem with this book is the lack of a glossary. There are frequent references to ingredients that probably won't be familiar to many readers - tempeh, spelt, rapadura - and, although Spevack does explain what they are, that's only useful if you read the whole thing in sequence. Things can get confusing if you, like me, tend to dip in and out of recipe books rather than peruse it from cover to cover. An A to Z glossary would save both time and patience, further demystifying all those odd things you find in health shops.

The selection of recipes in the Fresh and Wild Cookbook are undeniably healthy and often intriguing. Worth working through if you're making the effort to move away from meat and two veg.

Fresh and Wild Cookbook by Ysanne Spevack is published by Thorsons.

With 15 years of eating and sleeping the length and breadth of the country in a tireless quest for the best of the best, John and Sally McKenna have it down to a fine art. This year's editions of The Bridgestone 100 Best Restaurants and The Bridgestone 100 Best Places to Stay are as wonderfully opinionated and idiosyncratic as ever. And also, very importantly, they are independent. The McKennas and their travelling editors pay for their own meals and accommodation, refusing - as they note at the start of each book - any offers of discounts or gifts.

In the introduction of the Best Restaurants there's a clear declaration of intent when the McKennas talk about "facsimile food, served in grand rooms where menus read well, and then eat badly because they are trapped in pretentiousness, or some crazy idea called "fine dining", a concept, which as far as we can see, is just petit-bourgeois." There's a similar air about the introduction to Best Places To Stay, with an attack on "4-star joints that sit high on the top of a hill, without a tree in sight…lavishly tarmacadamed up to the door with a brightly lit fountain that doesn't work, inappropriate decking beside the heli-pad, and PVC windows".

The most expensive places - for eating or staying - aren't necessarily the most praised. I would have to agree with the McKennas when they say that "you discover value when you discover the work of talented people who are passionate about what they do and who do it in an original way." Sometimes it's better to have one amazing, if expensive, meal in a month than eat your lunch out five days a week in one of Dublin's rubbish cafés. There are bank-breakers in both these books - a penthouse at the Clarence is €2,500, the hotel described here merely as a "work in progress", and a night out at L'Ecrivain is never going to come cheaply. But there are other price options too. Grove House in Schull is €80 per room in low season, and Donegal's wonderfully relaxing Coxtown Manor does very reasonably priced gourmet breaks while many of the venues mentioned also have early bird menus.

Continue reading "The Bridgestone 100 Best Restaurants 2006 & The Bridgestone 100 Best Places to Stay 2006 by John and Sally McKenna ****" »

Now that the turkey has settled, the Cranberry Sauce eaten and the crackers pulled it's time to get round to reading through the pile of Christmas books, top of which is Nigel Slater's The Kitchen Diaries. It was difficult, but I managed to hold out till Christmas to get my hands on it. My Cuisine subscription has started too - I discovered the magazine had arrived at home and been placed underneath the tree! - although it does seem strange to read descriptions of picnic and barbeque food while we're surrounded by late December freezing fog. Not that it'll stop me from enjoying the magazine, though. Now it's time to dig out a selection box, pull the big armchair up to the fire and get stuck in to reading. Happy lazy Christmas!

New Zealand cafés do fantastic salads and whenever my tastebuds need a kick and I'm looking for an unusual salad recipe, I turn to former café owner (now cookbook writer) Julie Le Clerc or one of Mark McDonough's Zarbo books. Zarbo is a popular Auckland-based delicatessen, fresh food store and café. The name is familiar throughout New Zealand from being emblazoned on its own range of dressings, marinades, rubs and chutneys. The shop also stocks an exceptional range of imported food products, meaning - if you're in Auckand, of course - that you'll never be stuck for any of the ingredients mentioned in Zarbo Zest.

The inspirations for Mark's recipes come from both near and far - the exotic flavours of North Africa and, even closer, Asia; the fresh produce of New Zealand; more familiar food from Europe. Another thing that inspires him is the balance between work and life. His recipes are all workable for the time-poor generation with homemade smoothies and muesli for the busy weekdays and homemade jams and brunch dishes for more leisurely weekends.

Mark has some intriguing combinations of flavours and techniques - Kaffir Lime Leaf Marmalade, for instance, and Gravlax with Coriander Root and Szechwan Pepper or Pumpkin, Orange and Bay Jam. He has a section on dressings which gets full marks for a homemade version of Thai Sweet Chilli Sauce but it is a little disappointing that he doesn't clarify which dressing goes best with what.

That aside, Zarbo Zest is an inspiring and approachable cookbook with plenty of mouthwatering dishes for every occasion. Now, if only I could get back to New Zealand to see the café itself in action...

Zarbo Zest by Mark McDonough is published by Random House New Zealand.

To my sorrow I must admit that I have only once eaten in Denis Cotter's award-winning Café Paradiso restaurant in Cork. But that one time, nearly ten years ago now, was mostly memorable for my first taste of polenta. My sociologist student friend felt it was deeply ironic that I should be writing my thesis on the