A new edition of a classic early 17th century work – The Fruit, Herbs and Vegetables of Italy, written by the Italian refugee Giacomo Castelvetro.

When he came ot England he was horrified by our preference for large helpings of meat, masses of sugar and very little greenstuff. The Italians were both good gardeners, and had a famililiarity with many varieties of vegetable and fruit that were as yet little known in England.

Castelvetro takes us through the gardener’s year, listing the fruit and vegetables as they come into season, with simple and elegant ways of preparing them. Practical instructions are interspersed with tender vignettes of his life in his native Modena. He writes of children learning to swim in the canals of the Brenta, strapped to huge dried pumpkins to keep them afloat; Venetian ladies ogling passers-by from behind screens of verdant beanstalks; sultry German wenches jealously hoarding their grape harvest; and his intimate chats with Scandinavian royalty about the best way to graft pear cuttings and discomfort the Pope.

An entry for Spring:

And so I start the year with hops, the first shoots to appear at this time of year. These we never eat raw, but serve as a cooked salad. We wash them in several waters and then cook the desired amount in water with a little salt, when done we take them out and drain very well and serve in a nice clean dish seasoned with salt, plenty of oil, and a little vinegar or lemon juice and some crushed, not powered, pepper. Alternatively, once the hops are cooked, some of us flour them and fry them in oil and serve sprinkled with salt, pepper and bitter orange juice, and very tasty they are”

The Fruit, Herbs and Vegetables of Italy. is availble from Amazon.co.uk for £9.12.

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The perfect gift for Christmas? On The Menu: Seasonal Recipes for a Culinary Life by James Mackenzie.

This is a comprehensive reference guide and inspirational collection of 74 recipes with step-by-step instructions, showing you everything, from how to make the more challenging dishes, such as beer braised oxtails with deep fried oyster fritter, to how to make a simple but perfect chocolate brownie.

Jason Lowe’s exquisite photography effortlessly captures the remarkable food and this beautiful unspoilt part of the world.

With a foreword by the BBC’s Nigel Barden, the book perfectly captures James Mackenzie’s remarkable take on food at The Pipe and Glass Inn.

James Mackenzie is one of England’s brightest young chefs who uses his uniquely imaginative approach to produce an outstanding take on British food. Quality local and seasonal produce is at the heart of his cooking. James is the proprietor and head chef of the Michelin Starred Pipe and Glass Inn, which he and his wife Kate have owned since 2006. Having quickly established a reputation for unrivalled quality in the area, they have transformed the 17th century inn into a world-class Michelin-Starred destination. In their first year the Pipe and Glass Inn won the Yorkshire Life “Dining Pub Of The Year Award” and, in 2007, won the same publication’s “Restaurant Of The Year” title. Further recognition came for the Mackenzies in 2008, being named as the “Best Newcomer” in The Northern Hospitality Awards, entering the list of “40 Best Restaurants Outside London” at The London Restaurant Awards, also being voted into “The Top 30 Gastro Pubs in the UK” by PubChef Magazine and, finally, being awarded a Michelin Bib Gourmand. In 2009, the Pipe and Glass Inn won Enjoy England’s “Taste Of England” honour as well as retaining its Michelin Bib Gourmand. The ultimate accolade became reality when, in January 2010, the Pipe and Glass Inn achieved Michelin Star status, one of only ten pubs in the UK ever to gain this much coveted position.

ORDER YOUR SIGNED COPY HERE by Sunday 18th December to ensure delivery in the UK before Christmas. Or Order From Amazon.co.uk for £21.00.

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Annabel Langbein The Free Range Cook is now on sale in the UK and contains all the recipes you’ll need to cook up a scrumptious feast this Christmas – as well as make a great gift for yourself or the foodies in your life!

To give you a taste of what’s inside there are free samples available of nine of the delicious recipes, including:

• Sesame and Oregano Lavosh – the perfect nibble for pre-Christmas parties
• a special-occasion scallop salad with citrus chilli dressing
• succulent pork belly cooked in milk (a fun alternative to turkey)
• the oh-so-impressive frozen Strawberry Cloud Cake
• a devastatingly decadent Chocolate and Cranberry Slice – a sublime finish to your Christmas feast

To download these recipes simply click this link: http://www.annabel-langbein.com/freerangetaster/uk

And once you’ve cooked them you could win a kitchenware hamper worth £135 simply by uploading a photo to their website. The photo with the most votes wins so get your friends on board via Facebook, Twitter and email.

And who is Annabel Langbein? Well, she is The Free Range Cook and hosts a 13-part TV series filmed at her holiday cabin on the shores of Lake Wanaka, at the foot of New Zealand’s spectacular Southern Alps. Her cookbook Annabel Langbein’s The Free Range Cook is now available from Amazon for £13.60.

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To chew or not to chew? Is it a rock or a native? How do I open them?

Where can I get decent oysters for under £10 in London? Is it wrong to cook oysters?

Oysters are no longer the preserve of over-priced Champagne bars and cigar-smoking gentlemen. A new generation of oyster eaters can be found grabbing a glass of wine and a plate of oysters on the hoof between business meetings in the City or shopping trips in the West End. Celebrity chefs including Mark Hix and Richard Corrigan are including oysters in their menus, and more and more people are prepared to give them a go.

However, ordering oysters can be a daunting experience for first-timers, and it is difficult to know which to choose, let alone how to open and eat them.

The London Oyster Guide is a book written for (both wannabe and well-versed) oyster lovers by an oyster lover.

Colin Presdee certainly knows his oysters. He has magnanimously taken on the enviable task of reviewing more than 150 restaurants, bars, merchants, retailers and producers serving oysters (including a selection outside of London for a foodie daytrip). He’s delved into the history of oysters, sampled drinks with oysters and handpicked some exquisite oyster recipes, making this the definitive guide to oysters.

The London Oyster Guide is “invaluable for anyone taking their first steps towards realising how very good oysters can be. I would urge anyone to stop when they scan a menu featuring bivalves and choose some oysters that they have never tried before,” writes Charles Campion in the foreword.

“I believe that an oyster should be chewed exactly as any meat or fish. The succulent flavour as the teeth sink into the firm and creamy flesh is an explosion of mineral nuances with the flavour of the seashore on the lowest spring tide. Merely to swallow an oyster misses this essential part of the oyster experience, but everyone to one’s own.”

Presdee, originally from the village of Oystermouth in Mumbles in south Wales, opened the Oyster Perches restaurant, followed by the Drangway, both in Swansea. These specialised in food and oysters from fisheries including Colchester and Cornwall. Now a food writer and consultant living in London, he retains close links with Wales. He has written several books including ‘Food Wales – a second helping’ and ‘Food Wales – eating out guide’.

The book contains:
A guide to the different types of oysters and how to identify them (“The Rock is more elongated with a crinkly shell, with a flat top shell and deep cupped bottom shell; the native is fairly round with a flat top shell and a cupped bottom shell”).
Advice about when is best to eat oysters (the traditional season for native oysters was September to April (or the winter months with an ‘r’) and a list of oyster festivals and merchants.
How to open and present oysters, and a guide to which drinks and accompaniments are best served with them.
Original recipes including oysters with chilli and celery crumbs and oysters crisp-fried in breadcrumbs.
A directory of more than 150 places where oysters can be enjoyed in London segmented by region including Sheekey, Randall & Aubin and Livebait.

London Oyster Guide is available from Amazon.co.uk for £10.80.

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A new cookbook from reknown blogger Niamh Shields has just been released. Comfort and Spice draws on some recipes that Niamh used to great success on a Covent Garden fresh food stall, while others have appeared on her blog, Eat Like A Girl.

Blogging since 2007, Niamh states in the introduction that she is largely a self-taught cook and not a ‘chef’. “I am an enthusiastic home cook… I adore spices and flavour, comfort and fun, food that zings and sizzles. Quick week day recipes and long weekend ones, where my oven does the work while I drink some wine, or often while I sleep”

She also advocates using your spice box as a paint palate. “With a £10 investment in fresh spices every six months, you can change the way you eat and the way you cook”. She advocates the use of a simple palate of spices, those she uses most in her kitchen: sumac, cumin, coriander, cloves, turmeric, and cinnamon and herbs such as sage, parlsey and bay.

While many of the recipes draw on Niamh’s Irish ancestry – Irish Soda Farls, Black Pudding Croquettes, Blaas – others draw on cultures from around the world, Bircher Muesli from the antipodes for example, Chinese noodles with tofu and green tea, Beijing Dumplings Chorizo in Cider, Beef, Beetroot and Horseradish burgers and so on. Most recipes are savoury dishes with a few desserts, mainly fruit based, making it to the final chapter. These include such delights as Elderflower and Gooseberry Fool and Rhubarb and Blood Orange Meringue Pie.

Comfort & Spice (New Voices in Food) by Niamh Shields is currently available from Amazon for £7.94.

Niamh will be ‘doing a demo’ at the Abergavenny Food Festival on Sunday 18th Sept at 11am, with fellow New Voices in Food author, James Ramsden. Tickets available now.

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Fresh from manning the barbecue in his highly-successful book Fired Up, Ross Dobson takes a casual approach to indoor dining in Grillhouse. Hearty pies, thick-cut chips and lip-smacking ribs are all featured, along with all manner of steaks cooked to perfection. The book includes an array of all the essential starters and sides guaranteed to satisfy a hunger of any size, plus a little something sweet to indulge in at the end of a long, slow meal. Grillhouse is the ultimate guide to gastropub-style food at home.

Grillhouse: Gastropub at Home is a collection of all time favourite bistro style dishes, featuring 85 delicious, hearty and accessible recipes; modern styling and photography complement this classic selection of recipes.

Ross’ love affair with all things food began at a young age under the influence of his neighbours from Italy and Hong Kong. To enjoy what they ate, Ross found he would have to cook it for himself. After studying writing and communications, Ross found himself constantly drawn to food and in the food-mad town of Sydney he had his own successful cafe and catering business before venturing into the world of food publishing. Ross has several books under his belt and is constantly searching for accessible, exotic ingredients and exploring different cooking techniques.

Grillhouse is currently listed by Amazon.co.uk for £9.

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We consume it, we spread the seed, more fruit grows, everyone’s happy.

It’s in Nature’s best interests to make it as enticing as possible and she’s certainly done so. Fruit is a real treat that often needs no embellishment and is resoundingly, unequivocally good for us.

Mark Diacono’s first River Cottage handbook, Veg Patch, was a joy: a thorough, yet accessible guide to raising homegrown produce that has established Mark as one of the foremost thinkers and writers on the subject of growing what you eat.

Now he’s turned his attention to fruit and, as you’ll discover, has written another confidence-inspiring, anxiety-reducing little gem . . . or perhaps that should be little peach.
While there’s been a revolution in the growing of vegetables and herbs in the UK in recent years, home fruit growing has lagged a little behind. I suspect this is because there’s a certain air of mystery attached to growing fruit, a sense that specialist knowledge and hard-won skills must be acquired before one can make a go of it.

Fruit (River Cottage Handbook) is available from Amazon for just £8.49.

In his gardening courses at River Cottage, Mark banishes these myths and gives people the confidence to start producing their own berries, apples, plums, melons and apricots.
This book will do the same thing. As Mark explains, fruit wants to grow – you just have to let it – and he’s here to show you how.

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I knew I recognised the name from somewhere… Matt Armendariz… isn’t he that tattooed gay guy from America… writes a blog and takes food pictures…? Indeed he is. And now he has penned a book. On a Stick!

“Eighty quick-and-easy recipes for foods on sticks and skewers – from elegant hors d’oeuvres like caprese sticks and chocolate-covered cheesecake to delightfully lowbrow treats like corn dogs, fried pickles, and fudge puppies.

Matt Armendariz is a man who loves food, drink, and everything in between! As a former art and creative director for such companies as Whole Foods Market and Bristol Farms, Matt has been immersed in the world of food for 20 years. In 2005 he started Matt Bites, a food blog.”

It is very American. There are references to State Fairs and corn dogs for example. Some of the recipes are just plan ridiculous – fish and chips on a stick? Spaghetti and Meatballs on a stick?? On come on…

There are, however, many out of the 80 recipes that are highly tempting – Savoury Tofu Dango (Japanese tofu dumplings), Red Curry Shrimp and Pineapple Skewers (prawns and pineapple), Molotes (Oaxacan street food) and Dak Sanjuk (Korean marinated Chicken with spring onions) are all tempting, either as ‘party food’, starters or barbecue fare. The use of fresh mint in a honey and mint syrup for the Grilled Fruit Skewers was divine. None of the recipes are overly complicated, most easily converted to ‘proper’ measurements and even then the quantities don’t need to be that precise most of the time.

On a Stick! by Matt Armendariz is currently available from Amazon.co.uk for a bargain £7.29.

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Eat Your Books, a new recipe indexing website where members can search for recipes in cookbooks they already own launches today in the UK.

Eat Your Books currently has 83,000+ cookery books listed with 1,800 of the most popular cookbooks now fully indexed with a total of 400,000 recipes and around 10,700 searchable ingredients, with more books being added and indexed daily. In addition, every book listed on the site is available to buy, making it the most comprehensive range of cookbooks in the world!
Eat Your Books is aimed at people who love using cookbooks and love to cook. The site does not reproduce the actual recipe; it simply helps members quickly find their recipes in their cookbooks.
The subscription based site has already attracted thousands of members from over 50 countries worldwide. Members can:

• Search for recipes in their cookbooks using the main ingredients, ethnicity, course, occasion or several other categorisations.
• Search for recipes based on seasonal produce
• Create menus and print off shopping lists
• Organise books and recipes by using bookmarks.
• Share with other cookbook lovers and the EYB community their experiences and views of books and recipes.
• Be inspired and introduced to new cookbook authors by viewing other member’s collections.
• Make notes specific to family and friends tastes and food preferences and allergies
• Bulk scan their cookbook collections onto their online bookshelf quickly and easily

With cookery books currently dominating the top 10 UK non fiction books sales* chart and the continued presence of food and cookery shows on TV, it’s clear the nation still has an appetite to be inspired in their culinary efforts, yet what happens after that first wonderful mouth watering moment brought on by sitting down with your new cookbook?

“There is no substitute to browsing through a new addition to your cookbook collection or a much loved cookbook.” says Jane Kelly, co-founder of Eat Your Books, herself an admitted hoarder of cookbooks with a personal collection of over 1000 books. “Nothing beats that first feeling of culinary inspiration when you have a brand new cookbook full of wonderful mouth-watering recipes and beautiful photography. However the reality for many like myself is that it is impossible to remember every recipe and which cookbook you first saw it, so instead of heading to my cookbook collection I found myself increasingly searching online for recipes, some of which were definitely not tried and tested resulting in disappointment and grumbles at the dinner table. Our members have cookbook collections from 10 to over 3,000 books and now they are making use of them like never before.”

As more UK members join the site, more UK cookbooks will be indexed; key to this is that the more members owning a specific book, the quicker it moves up the indexing priority list. In addition, members can request for their favourite books to be indexed and the site also plans to enable members to start indexing their own books – something which will be particularly exciting for those members with older vintage cookbooks they want to be able to search through.

Eat Your Books is a subscription website; A monthly membership is £1.50 and annual membership is £15. A free trial allows up to 5 cookbooks to be searched. In addition, gift certificates are available for annual memberships making it a great gift idea for the cookbook enthusiast among your friends or family.

Eat Your Books is a privately owned company, set up by two British sisters, Jane Kelly now living in Boston, USA and Fiona Nugent now living in Auckland, NZ. The idea for the website came from Jane’s love of cooking, her large bookshelf of over 1000 cookbooks and her busy lifestyle. She really wanted a quick way to search through her cookbooks to help her plan the family meals, social get-togethers and to find particular recipes. For a couple of years Jane had been thinking about this idea and informal research showed that there are many others like her who would love to be able utilise their collection of cookbooks more effectively. A great deal of thought and planning has gone into the design of the site to provide a service that will enable people to make greater use of their cookbooks, to simplify the process of menu planning, and to bring together a community of cookbook lovers who want to share their experiences and be inspired by others.

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A dip into the lives, the wine loves with an associated anecdote from a host of internet wine names. That I think just about sums up Every Wine Tells A Story, a copy of which the author, Tara Devon O’Leary, posted over to me last week. Subtitled “A collection of the most memorable bottles of 2010 as told by 29 international wine experts” it is less about the most expensive bottle opened, the most famous “bound to impress” show-off label and more, as Simon Woods in his section mentions, more “right-place-right-time” wine.

In addition to Simon, (with a €3 wine) you will discover old Sleuthy, (with a wine picked before her recent Bordeaux epiphany), alongside Phil Spillman, the winemaker at Deakin Estate in Australia, Tim Pearson, owner of the South African Seven Springs Vineyard (who has picked a glorious South African wine) and Richard Siddle, Editor of Harpers Wine and Spirit magazine. Twenty-nine individuals in total; certainly an eclectic and engaging group. Plus you will find me in there too; just to make up the numbers.

But there is more to Every Wine Tells A Story than simple words for Tara has created a Facebook page when you are encouraged to record your own ‘best wine of 2010′ story. You can also appear in the next edition by submitting your details!

Thanks for your interest in Every Wine Tells A Story: a Collection of the Most Memorable Bottles of 2010 to Warm the Wine Lover’s Soul, as told by 29 International Wine Experts.

I’d like to share with you my motivation for this book. To me, expanding one’s experience of wine by tasting, drinking and appreciating different bottles is the best, easiest and most fun way to learn about wine.

So I hope that the stories of the wines in these pages will inspire and encourage you to choose wines that you haven’t had before and are interesting, unusual, and even perhaps a bit risky!

The second reason is because I believe wine is an experience. Wine amplifies an evening with friends, accentuates a great meal and wine evokes emotion, exuberance and passion. These stories do the same – they tell a personal tale of a time when the wine in the glass made that day with those people in that place even more special.

So please join me and my 28 fellow wine experts and enthusiasts as we share with you our personal experiences of one wine from 2010 that captured our imagination!”
– Tara Devon O’Leary

Every Wine Tells a Story a Collection of the Most Memorable Bottles of 2010 to Warm the Wine Lover’s Soul, as Told by 29 International Wine Experts is available from Amazon.co.uk

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