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Cook Express. Over 700 quick recipes ed:Heather Whinney
Monday November 16th, 2009
The one thing you can always guarantee with books from Dorling Kindersley is that they won’t get lost on your shelf. Gosh they are big. These monster books don’t go in for arty photography or long essays on sustainability. They are business-like tomes, designed to do what it says on the tin and Cook Express is no different with over 700 quick recipes to drum up after work and to entertain. -
I should coco - well bread at Cocomaya
Monday October 26th, 2009
Beautiful breads of all descriptions tumble off shelves, and for those with not much to do of an afternoon, then a sit down tea has to be worth having. I tried a selection of filled rolls, brioches and fancy pastries and all were perfect and nicely set off by the shop’s bleached wood interior. Delicious quiches too, as well as fruit tarts and savoury biscuits. -
A little bit of opera in the evening
Thursday October 15th, 2009
As I sit nibbling my tapas in the romantic candle lit bar at 190 , the rather glamorous girl I have been covertly observing, suddenly bursts into thrilling song while orchestral music swells from hidden speakers. As I pause, prawn halfway to my mouth in shock, she’s answered by a rich male tenor who sweeps into view to join her for a duet. Welcome to Opera Night. -
Cazadores tequila - take it slow and savour it
Sunday August 9th, 2009
Tequila doesn’t have a great rep in this country. Tequila slammers being things that people determined to spend a night in A&E like to drink. Even the name is tricky; no one seems to be able to say tequila without shouting it in a Speedy Gonzales accent. Cazadores is quality Tequila and we tried sipping it (at first), then moved to some cocktails. -
Seafood and Herb Lasagne
Friday November 21st, 2008If you love seafood, you’ll like this fabulous fish lasagne. Use fresh fish from the counter, or make the most of convenient packs of mixed frozen seafood to make it easy for you.
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Roasted Vegetable Lasagne
Friday November 21st, 2008No apologies for championing a bottled sauce here. Dolmio sauces are good quality and cut preperation time down by hours. What? You think every Italian woman has the time to make her own ragu ? Tu sei pazzo!
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Boiled Szechuan Style Rippled Dumplings
Friday November 21st, 2008The filling for these dumplings is typically Szechuan - the Szechuan peppercorns have a tingling, numbing flavour that is quite addictive. You’ll soon find yourself ladlling them over your food with abandon just like the Szechuanese!
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Thai Fried Rice with Crab
Friday November 21st, 2008Traditionally a way to use up leftover vegetables and scraps of meat, fried rice is a quick and cheap way to feed a hungry crowd. This version is a little more decadent using fresh, handpicked white crab meat and a homemade Thai chili jam.
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Vietnamese Pho
Friday November 21st, 2008If there is a national dish of Vietnam, it has to be pho. This fragrant noodle soup is slurped around the clock by everyone from business men to students to construction workers, often while squatting on low plastic stools in the street
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Chicken, Olive and Sweet Potato Tagine
Friday November 21st, 2008A tagine is the true heart of Moroccan cooking. It manages to be sweet, spicy, fruity and tangy all at the same time and to cook one at home will fill your kitchen with unbelievably delicious smells.
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Pascal Aussignac of Croque Gascon
Friday November 21st, 2008As megamall Westfield opens its doors we talk to one of the pioneer restaurateurs going in, both before the big event and on the opening day
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A bridge not too far
Friday November 21st, 2008Le Pont de la Tour means, of course, Tower Bridge. It sounds so much more romantic in French, but then so does just about anything including Andouillette, which you think must be a jolly form of country dancing but which translates in English to 'totally horrific tube of gut thats is stuffed full of offal and bits of animals you don’t want to even think about.’
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Festive Cooking
Friday November 21st, 2008After a sorry excuse for a summer this year, the nights are again drawing in and the days are getting seemingly shorter. Equally, the festive season seams to start earlier and earlier each year but what do you do if your cooking skills are more akin to Gordon Brown than Gordon Ramsay?
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Cheese Lord
Friday November 21st, 2008It seems highly likely that Alex James ex Blur will have Alex James ex Blur written on his headstone, it’s the only way that people seem to refer to him. It’s a bit unfair as he has carved out a whole new niche for himself since those heady BritPop days as tweedy countryman, conductor, columnist and now of course cheese maker.
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Pudz mean prizes
Friday November 21st, 2008We knew that he would win. Just watching Sam Greaves work around the Good Housekeeping kitchen along with the other three contestants (one had dropped out with flu) you could see he had the chops.Pro chefs, or even those like Sam just nineteen and studying food at university, have an economy of movement, a calm outer bearing and clear focus that marks them out. When his dish was presented for judging, it had the cheffy look too, one that makes the diner happy before a spoon is raised and which justifies the price on the menu.
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Desserts - Mary Berry
Friday November 21st, 2008
Are desserts the forgotten art? So many cookbooks are packed with astounding starters and mains, yet inexplicably tail off when it comes to desserts. Perhaps it’s because we don’t get excited about desserts as we did when children. Today as adults we often prefer cheese, feeling that desserts are bit bad for us or a bit self-indulgent. Once upon a time, though, everyone’s mother could make all kinds of desserts, knocking up trifles in an instant or assembling a fabulous sponge cake in an afternoon. And we lapped them up. Read more -
The Beer Book - Edited by Tim Hampson
Friday November 21st, 2008
You’ve got to love a book that has an embossed beer mat on its cover. Well you have to love a book about beer anyway don’t you? In a London where ‘cooking lager’ has become ubiquitous and any request for ‘bitter’ gets you the kind of look you might earn if asking for a Pink Gin, decent beer is having a tough time of it. Indeed breweries that have been around for a hundred years are closing and being turned into flats. So if you ever wanted to live in a brewery, chances are that if you have the cash now you can. Read more -
Great British Cheeses - Jenny Lindford
Friday November 21st, 2008
Not so long ago a book of Great British Cheeses would have been a contender for the title of Shortest Book Ever. Stilton, Cheddar, Wenseleydale and errmmmmm does Primula count? Today we are lucky to be in the middle of a British cheese resurgence with more people making cheeses than perhaps ever before. Great cheeses too, ones that can, and often do, appear on the tables at top London restaurants. -
British Seasonal Food - Mark Hix
Friday November 21st, 2008
Regional, seasonal. Seasonal.regional. This the mantra most London restaurant chefs are muttering to themselves as they scurry round their kitchens. Vegetables are interrogated harshly. “Where do you come from? How did you get here? Show me your papers, bitte.” It has become a commonplace to say both that vegetables taste better the fewer miles they travel to get to the plate, and that the anticipation and consummation of waiting for each vegetable to be in season is a great part of the pleasure of eating them. -
The Cooking Book
Friday November 21st, 2008
This book is breaking my desk. It isn’t just heavy; it’s condensed neutron heavy and requires two hands to lift. Drop it and it might go through the floor like a cartoon grand piano and not stop till it gets to the boiler room. Its weight is in knowledge. A thousand ‘every day’ recipes that are easily achievable and remarkably varied and that can turn a non-cook into a chef and take a middling cook up a lot higher. Read more
