• rees.linda on January 15, 2015

  Bought this secondhand for £2.49- bargain! Great book for learning about names of cuts and what to use them for. My husband swears by it too, for things like cooking Xmas rib of beef. My edition is 2004, UK.

• owaint on November 22, 2010

  Absolute prefection, one of my favourite books.

Notes about Recipes in this book

• Souvlaki lamburgers

  • wester on July 15, 2012

    Nice but not brilliant. The flavour was very good, but the mixture was a bit wet. I found the 2 cm a bit too thick - they took much longer than given in the book and the end result was a bit dry. I suppose a "merry sizzle" is a bit higher flame than I had thought.

• Chicken and olive fry-up

  • wester on January 10, 2013

    I made this with leftover turkey, and it was very tasty. I used a splash of fish sauce instead of the anchovies, and it worked out fine. The pasta or lentils can also be replaced with cauliflower - a very nice variation.

• Aromatic pork belly hot pot

  • baybritta on February 07, 2013

    I use this for beef tendon which I happen to love. Must blanch tendons twice in boiling water for a minute before adding to the stock.

  • twoyolks on November 01, 2020

    This was great. The pork was tender and the broth was richly flavored. The only thing that made it less than perfect was that the pork belly was fatty (obviously) and some of the fat was a bit unpleasant to eat. But it was easy to discard.

  • Nichill on December 01, 2019

    Delicious (with superb quality pork belly). Devoured by kids equally. Some vegetable, e.g. cabbage would have been nice alongside it, or perhaps within. Might try replacing the chilli flakes with szechwan peppercorns.

  • meginyeg on November 11, 2023

    This was good. Our pork belly was pretty fatty. I should have done a better job skimming the fat. But over all a good dish.

• Calf's liver with little onions, sage, and aged vinegar

  • tgirlza on June 13, 2010

    Great with EVO mash.

• Coronation chicken

  • fprincess on November 18, 2010

    This recipe is pretty basic but it's a good use for leftover roast chicken. I made it as a sandwich.

• Herb roast chicken

  • fprincess on November 30, 2010

    I like the combination of white wine, herbs and butter very much. I had some difficulties with this recipe - the butter was a little difficult to get to stick to the chicken, and my chicken was underdone. Next time I will let the butter soften for a longer time and will use a temperature probe set at 165F in the thigh (I made the mistake of using it in the breast which cooks faster).

• Citrus-braised lamb shanks

  • fprincess on November 05, 2010

    The flavors are great but the cooking instructions were way off. The meat was not cooked enough and was tough. Next time I would use this recipe with the cooking conditions from Lucques.

  • e_ballad on April 09, 2017

    This was ok but didn't wow us. I used a whole lot more zest & citrus juice to finish the dish, but even then the flavours seemed muted. Based on fprincess' note, I increased the cooking time to 4 hours & the texture was perfect, just falling off the bone. Can also get to this recipe via Online Recipes on the Serious Eats site.

• Pan-to-oven pork chops with garlic

  • fprincess on November 04, 2010

    This was nice with the abundance of roasted garlic. But pork chops seem to be much leaner in the US compared to the UK (at least based on the pictures from the book) so the dish was not as succulent as it could have been. It was a little on the dry side. The juices/sauce were very good. The amount of prep for this dish is minimal.

• Roast belly of pork with apple sauce

  • Emily Hope on December 03, 2010

    Genius. So simple and easy, but got the most raves of all the dishes at the dinner party it was served at. Of course, it's hard to go wrong with pork belly! Due to incompetent butchers, I ended up with belly that didn't have the skin, so no crackling, alas, but the recipe worked fine despite the lack of skin. Roasted until it looked done, and later put back in a lower oven for a while to rewarm... this seemed to render out more fat w/o drying the meat too much, so I wonder if a slightly longer baking time would be preferable? Will need to experiment. Managed to eke out 8-ish servings from a shy 3 pounds of belly, but I think 3 pounds for 6 people is safer. Served with: veggie minestra (deb madison), homemade applesauce and pear chutney (both disappeared but I think I prefer the chutney), clay-pot potatoes (deb madison), a cabbage/fennel/apple slaw with walnuts, homemade bread (tartine bread book, also a hit), and apple crisp w/bourbon currants (rustic fruit desserts)

  • twoyolks on February 07, 2021

    I also didn't have any pork skin but the fat got so crispy that I'm not sure I missed it. Flavor is great. The apple sauce goes very well with it. Only issue is that it's rich so I can't eat too much of it.

• Yorkshire pudding

  • twoyolks on January 28, 2013

    I make this is a muffin tin instead of a large sheet. A popover pan would probably be even better. A full recipe makes about 20 individual yorkshire puddings.

• Shepherd's pie

  • twoyolks on March 12, 2012

    I used veal stock in place of lamb stock (I had no lamb stock). I used beer instead of red wine (I had no open red wine). I also added peas and extra carrots.

• Main-course borscht

  • e_ballad on April 21, 2017

    Want the definition of "stick-to-your-ribs"? Just try this one out. Perfect for the depths of winter, this is utterly delicious. Sour cream is an absolute must.

• Tunisian lamb with eggplant

  • e_ballad on February 13, 2018

    A very rich, hearty dish. Easy to prepare & then forget about while it does its magic in the oven or stovetop. I think that adding the coriander right before serving might have brightened the dish more than cooking it for a further 10 mins.

• Horseradish mash

  • tekobo on April 10, 2016

    Followed instructions to bake the potatoes first. Scooped out and riced the potato and mixed with warm milk and butter. Divine.

• Rice pudding pork

  • guyscott on May 23, 2020

    page 278

• Butter chicken or pheasant (Murgh makhani)

  • Bessp on August 21, 2024

    A delicious supper. A tiny bit fussy, but very tasty. I doubled it to have leftovers for lunches this week. Not my favorite butter chicken recipe, but still worth making.

• NPR by T. Susan Chang

  Review in Best cookbooks of 2007 article.

  Full review