Desert Island Dishes - cookbook review

Thanks to the Maldon Salt team, I had a great cookbook to review this month - Desert Island Dishes.

The book was launched this year to celebrate 130 years of Maldon Salt and has recipes from the World's Top chefs including Rick Stein, Albert Roux, Jason Atherton, Gary Rhodes and many many more and with a foreword by Jay Rayner. Big names showing their love and versatility of Maldon salt.

Maldon is a top pick for chefs, and even for home cooks like myself. Nothing really compares - the all natural flakes really do just taste better and add extra flavour to all your dishes.

The cookbook takes you through a variety of recipes which all feature salt (obviously) but which vary in ease - meaning there is something for everyone.

 

Chocolate truffle recipe

 

Stuffed Seabass with fennel

Recipes vary from the pretty simple to follow, to a little more advanced, but of course, all contain the very important ingredient - Maldon Salt.
Available from book shops now

Cookbook round up

I admit it. I've got a problem. I'm addicted to cookery books. I've now got around 90 in my collection and it's still growing. I love flicking through recipe book pages, copying the recipes or just getting some inspiration.

So I thought I'd share some of my most recent additions with you.

Bit of a mixture - First off the Hairy Dieters book by the Hairy Bikers. I watched the TV show and pretty much ended up buying this one alone for the pizza base pies - genious idea of replacing pastry with pizza base, knocking the calories down. It's an easy to use, simple recipe book. Not beautiful but practical.

On the other end of the scale we have the incredibly beautiful cookbook by Rachel Khoo, The Little Paris Kitchen. This is a gorgeous book to flick through in the evening but the recipes are really stand out too. I loved the Croque Madame recipe, which puts the eggs into little bread shaped cups. Delicious start to the weekend and perfect hangover food.

The Skinny French Kitchen by Harry Eastwood is another lovely book with fabulous photography and mouth watering recipes. It's typical french recipes with a skinny twist...think missing out the double cream...

We've only tried one so far, the boeuf bourguignon, but it certainly came out with an amazing flavour.

Finally, I succumbed to buying Gwyneth's book, Notes from my kitchen table in advance of her new book launch in April. I've not attempted a single recipe yet...but I will do!

Oh I love cookbooks.

Scandalicious Baking

It's been a while since I last posted. So apologies - it's been incredibly busy (but that's not an excuse!)

I was sent the new book, Scandalicious Baking by the lovely Signe Johansen to review a couple of months ago and I wasn't disappointed. Take a look here for more info: http://www.signejohansen.com/

Nordic is big business in the UK at the moment, thanks to the likes of the Nordic Bakery and Signe's books, Brits are beginning to realise there's more than meets the eye to Scandinavian cooking, including baking.

Scandalicious Baking is a fantastic book which gives you plenty of recipes to get stuck into which give you a taste for baking these delights without being too intimidating. From Chocolate and Orange Marmalade Loaf cake, through to Queen Maud muffins and Grilled Cheese with mushroom and hazlenut, there are plenty of recipes to satisfy a sweet or savoury tooth.

The photography in the book is a good enough reason to buy this book alone. Beautiful images that conjure up ideas of being the domestic goddess I'd always imagined I could be.

The first recipe i've had a go at from the book was the Cinnamon Bun Sharing Cake. Absolutely stunning. I'm always a little intimidated by any recipes which involve yeast, but this really wasn't a tough one to do...and the results were so impressive.

My lovely cinnamon bun!

 

I'll be using this one regularly - especially when I want to impress guests.

Pick up a copy from your local bookshop or on Amazon.co.uk

My 'Ideal'o summer reads

My cookbook collection is getting a bit out of hand. With over 60 different books all piled up in my kitchen, you'd think i'd stop...but i can't.  There's nothing more therapeutic than having a flick through and gaining a bit of inspiration for the next meal.

So when Idealo suggested that i'd be interested in joining their Idealo Summer reads event this year, I wasn't going to be choosing anything but cookbooks obviously.

So with the £25 limit I was very kindly given at Amazon, I picked out the following to start flicking through and pulling some recipes out over the next few months.

Joy the baker cookbook £7.99

Fantastic book for those of us, like me, who have a sweet tooth. I've been following her blog for a while and had my eye on this book.  Some great inspiration for baking here. I'll let you know how some of the recipes turn out.

Lunch in Paris - A delicious love story with recipes £5.66

Something a little bit different. Part love story, part recipes. Looks like a goodie!

Good Food - Easy Baking Recipes £3.64

Classic, easy to bake recipes

Skinny Meals in Heels £8.99


Great recipes of real food for those watching their weight. It's all about proper food done in a healthy way.

Thanks very much to Idealo for the Amazon gift voucher to buy the above. Here's the link you asked me to add: http://www.idealo.co.uk/pcat/3935/cooking-dining.html which will lead you to some frying pans.

Giraffe

I've always had a few issues with Giraffe. I've been there twice in my life time and both times been limited to eating the same dish - and no, i don't remember what it was. Try visiting Giraffe with a nut allergy - i dare you. There is literally nothing on the menu to choose from - everything has, or may have nuts. Pretty poor really. Surely they can manage not to sprinkle nuts on top of everything.

However, I'm always tempted to visit Giraffe due to the bright colours, good feedback I get from everyone else who goes there and the varied and interesting menu, which is why it was with a glad heart I heard that Giraffe has it's own cookbook. The cookbook features over 90 different recipes from across the globe including green onion slaw, miso lime salmon and more.





Sounds like a bit of a challenge to me - now I have access to the Giraffe Family Cookbook (£14 I can create my own 'Giraffe' experience at home. Just have to buy it now (unless Santa drops it off for Christmas!)

I'll update you on how it goes!