Digesting the latest on the culinary shelves
Marco’s cheating art
Marco Pierre White, the youngest chef ever to be awarded three Michelin stars, has inspired both Gordon Ramsay and Heston Blumenthal, but the whole point of Marco Made Easy (Orion, R275) is to inspire people like you and me, who want a quick meal without any fussy truffle foam. His shortcuts include turkey steak with rosemary and Gruyere – brilliant for Christmas leftovers. Of the recent slew of cookbooks celebrating simplicity, this is by far the best.
Soap dishes
7de Laan has been running for 10 years on SABC2 and is one of our most popular soapies, partly because its characters behave like real people who do real things – like cooking and eating. Cook with 7de Laan (Human & Rousseau, R250) gives away the secret recipes of seven characters. Hilda shares her delicious date fingers, Matrone makes a General De la Rey cake with dried figs and pecan nuts, and Charmaine gives us biltong and tomato quiche.
Willie the Wizard
Willie Harcourt-Cooze makes women faint with lust (and not just for his heavenly chocolate). In Willie’s Chocolate Bible (HarperCollins, R330), he takes chocolate temptation to a new level, with vivacious tales of the magic bean, and chocolate recipes that should come with a moral guidance warning.
One-Pot Lady
Clarissa Dickson Wright, the remaining half of Two Fat Ladies and cook extraordinaire, achieves a triumph in Potty (Hodder & Stoughton, R265). Described as a cookbook for anyone who loves good food but hates washing up, this includes an ingenious recipe for bacon and eggs cooked in a mug.
Compiled by Sue de Groot, Photographs by Graeme Wyllie. This article was taken from the January 2011 issue of Food & Home.
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