As you might recall, dear readers (if I have any yet), I am on mission of self-improvement for 2018, both because there is a lot to improve and because I have a lot of time to improve in now that Littlest Angel is in full-time school too.
One of the items of my self-improvement agenda is increasing my quite limited cooking repertoire. Of course, one of the reasons to do this is that, alone at home all day, I have run out of excuses NOT to do it!
My husband is obviously very keen to ensure that I keep up with this improvement as he bought me a copy of ‘Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat: Mastering the Elements of Good Cooking’ by Samin Nosrat for Christmas.
(Years ago, I knew a young lady who dumped her boyfriend when he bought her a handblender and a soup recipe book for Xmas. I guess she was, given they were a young dating couple, hoping for saucy undies, champagne and chocolates. As a middle-aged mum of two, married for the best part of two decades, I was just thrilled to get a gift. And a really interesting one, too! Oh, how one changes with age!)
Anyway, as ever, I digress.
Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat is a mighty tome, over 400 pages of food education. Food education? Well, it’s a cookery book, but it’s also a whole lot more than a cookery book.
The first part of this hefty hardbacked book is split into 4 categories, each one dealing with the whys and wherefors of the four elements of cooking – yep, you got it, salt, fat, acid and heat, just like it says on the cover. (I have just started it so am going through the salt section which is a real eye-opener. I need to go out and get myself some kosher salt for cooking this very weekend and save my expensive Maldon Sea Salt for where its really going to shine).
Part 2 is a combination of recipes, masterclasses and suggested menus. I haven’t got as far as this yet, but haven’t been able to resist a sneaky peek and was salivating over the Tuscan bean and kale soup. And let’s not talk about the Salted Caramel Sauce!
I have to be honest, there are some sections that I probably won’t go near, like ‘Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Chicken’. As a vegetarian of 30 years, the only way I intend looking at a chicken is at arm’s length, wearing rubber gloves and with a slightly turned-up nose when I make chicken for the kids. I have no need of spatchcocking, filleting or quartering.
Interestingly, one of the first chapter is ‘How to use this book’. And I think this shows really clearly how very different it is from any of your usual cookbooks – and I should know as I have a shelf groaning under the weight of my dusty old cookbooks.
No, this is a completely different beast – part cookery school, part science lesson (complete with kitchen experiments), and part recipes.
So, off I head to read on about seasoning with the right kind of salt, at the right time, and in the right place. And to get (to quote the New York Times) “the confidence and instincts to unshackle yourself from the tyranny of always following recipes, and make … a cook for life”.
