COOK books are a burgeoning arm of the publishing industry, with an endless variety on offer ranging from the obscure to the niche.
Rarely is it possible to get one book that covers all your cooking needs.
- In the Kitchen, by Allan Campion and Michele Curtis. Hardie Grant books, rrp $59.95
Well, In the Kitchen is that book.
The 800-page tome - as heavy as a big chook - has more than 1000 everyday, no-fuss recipes with simplicity, seasonality and freshness the overriding theme.
Allan Campion and Michele Curtis, both professional chefs and food authors, have chosen their favourite recipes and placed them in nearly 20 chapters, which include the stock standard - brunch, barbies and cakes - as well as the more ingenious: pasta and polenta, slow cooking, roasts, preserves and lunchbox ideas.
You will find traditional family recipes alongside dinner party options, the easy and the complex, modern Australian and a range of global offerings.
For instance, Page 180 offers an "end of autumn" glamour dish of spaghetti with blue-swimmer crab, fennel and tomato, while the opposite page has humble macaroni cheese.
Anzac biscuits run alongside Italian biscotti, and tomato sauce is followed by opulent, rich duck sauce.
Recipes are accompanied by personal stories, vignettes and tips: crab cakes were on the menu "when we welcomed in the year 2000 with friends at home"; lemon chicken polpettini meatballs "are one of our son Luke's favourite meals" and pasties are a family favourite on bushwalks.
With the emphasis on food, not all recipes are accompanied by pictures.
Each chapter begins with an overview, a cheat sheet of recipes, and "things you need to know", such as a description of different types of rice and a seasonal vegetable chart.
If your kitchen bench is going to heave with recipe books, at least make this one of them.
