No Place Like Home - Hardcover

Leigh, Rowley

4.25

8 ratings by Goodreads

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1857024990 ISBN 13: 9781857024999

Publisher: Fourth Estate, 2000

View all copies of this ISBN edition:

A celebration of home cooking by the chef at one of London’s top British restaurants.

’Some things are better cooked in restaurants: that’s why people go to them. But the converse is equally true. There are plenty of dishes that no restaurant does properly.’

Distinguished chef and food writer Rowley Leigh places these dishes at the heart of his first book. Home cooking is celebrated for its simplicity, seasonality and the delights of eating at home and cooking for friends. This encompasses the art of making good gravy, saut�ing potatoes and grilling sea bass, as well as digressions into Euro food, Australian cricket and the strangeness of rhubarb, amongst others. Menus are based on events such as Boxing Day lunch, Hallowe’en Night and a May birthday lunch for a ‘fishetarian’ aunt.

Beautifully written and illustrated with original line drawings and colour photography, this is an elegant, witty and irresistible invitation to keep those home fires burning.

"synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.

Review:

Rowley Leigh's stylish No Place Like Home is a vigorously argued treatise in praise of home cooking. Strange, perhaps, for a metropolitan restaurant chef--but Leigh's food is noted for its simplicity, seasonality and truth of flavour. Here he concentrates on food that is better when done at home than in a restaurant. A roast leg of lamb rather than a piece of grilled chump; summer pudding rather than a Grand Marnier souffl�. Cassoulet; breast of veal with pork, spinach and garlic stuffing; baked quinces with cinnamon and Vin Santo. This is wonderful food--rich, savoury, elegant and designed to bring out the best in the ingredients. Leigh covers all the basics--roasts, stews, perfect mash and so on--but also gives himself room for a welcome idiosyncrasy. The book is cleverly structured: it falls into four seasonal parts, each of which contains a number of complete three-course meals for different types of occasion--Easter Sunday Lunch, Alfresco Dinner, Halloween Night, Boxing Day Lunch are some of these exemplars. (Leigh acknowledges that few people care nowadays to cook three courses for every meal, but as he says, the recipes are there if you want them.) Additionally, three starch Interludes contain meditations on potatoes, rice and pasta. Leigh is devoted to British food, as you can tell from his flag-waving spring meal to impress foreigners: sea kale with blood orange hollandaise; sea trout fillet with a horseradish crust, served with Jersey Royal potatoes; and rhubarb fool. The book is greatly enhanced by good photography (good in that it actually shows what the food should look like) and by Lucinda Rogers' witty line-drawings, so reminiscent of Elizabeth David's early illustrators. --Robin Davidson

From the Back Cover:

There is no place like home to enjoy the simple stuff. Can a restaurant match the sight or aroma of a leg of lamb brought to the table, that sense of salivatory anticipation, or the sense of participation as a member of the group carves and apportions the meat before one’s eyes?’

Roast leg of lamb crusted with garlic and parsley, accompanied by tender stalks of purple sprouting broccoli at the peak of their season, followed by a rich chocolate mousse. It is a meal to savour, a lunch to linger over deep into the afternoon with friends, family and fine wine. It is not a meal that can be truly enjoyed in the bustle of a restaurant.

Renowned chef and food writer Rowley Leigh places these dishes at the heart of his first book. His superb writing passionately celebrates home cooking for its simplicity, seasonality and the joys of eating at home and cooking for friends. Recipes range from the more familiar delights of the Sunday roast and summer pudding, to native rarities such as sea kale, quinces and wild sea trout fillet, to the simple pleasures of parma ham and figs or just an apple and cheese for pudding.

Leigh focuses on the ingredients Britain grows best, recasting the familiar to inspire with its diversity and subtlety. Pears come in a salad with scarole and roquefort. Venison is stewed with chocolate and onions and accompanied by silken polenta. Greengages and almonds make a delicious tart. And if you thought shrimp paste, macaroni or cod and parsley were old hat, this book will make you think again.

All the basics are covered, with failsafe recipes for the perfect mash, quick roast potatoes, simple pasta and everything you can do with rice. There are witty and opinionated digressions into Euro food, Australian cricket and the strangeness of rhubarb, amongst others. Menus are based on calendar events such as Boxing Day lunch, Hallowe’en Night and a spring lunch for a ‘fishetarian’ aunt.

Beautifully illustrated with original line drawings by Lucinda Rogers and colour photography, this is an irresistible invitation to keep those home fires burning.

"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.