A moist walnut cake made even-moreish with added hazelnuts for extra tenderness and an inspired figgy compote.
My sister keeps her cookbooks on a shelf above the kitchen door. The average weight for a hardback cookbook is apparently 0.91kg and, while there are a few paperbacks and outliers up there, most of these 34 books look of pretty average build. It’s hardly surprising, then, that the slim shelf is more than gently sagging. As a demanding older sister, I make it known how glad I am that my cookbooks are not only up there, too, but have also clearly been pulled out relatively recently. As a food writer who has given my sister books over the years, I am interested to see which ones are there; which books belonging to a working mum of three, who describes herself as “an utterly average, functional cook who is easily annoyed by cookbooks but needs them, and likes to eat good things”, have made it on to the shelf. And of those that are there, which are used most.
Prashad, Kaushy Patel’s 2012 book of vegetarian Indian cooking, is right in the middle of the shelf, its spine showing signs of a hard-working life. As are the spines of Nigella’s How to Eat, Delia’s Complete Cookery Course and a book of British baking, which has also spent some time in a sunny spot and is suitably faded. Bee Wilson’s The Secret of Cooking is the newest arrival on the shelf and already looking a bit knocked about (my sister first picked it up at my house, sat at the table reading for ages before looking up and saying, “I don’t hate this”. Then went off and bought herself a copy). Rukmini Iyer’s bright-green The Quick Roasting Tin is also used weekly. Then there are two books by Anna Del Conte, the very sight of which are reassuring: Cooking with Coco, which she wrote about cooking with her granddaughter, and a 2012 compendium called Italian Kitchen, which has a pan of golden sweet-and-sour onions on the cotton cover. Italian Kitchen is the book I pulled off the shelf to read while I drank my coffee the other morning. And this week’s recipe is a variation of Anna’s straightforward and good torta di noci, or walnut cake, with added hazelnuts.
Continue reading… A moist walnut cake made even-moreish with added hazelnuts for extra tenderness and an inspired figgy compote.My sister keeps her cookbooks on a shelf above the kitchen door. The average weight for a hardback cookbook is apparently 0.91kg and, while there are a few paperbacks and outliers up there, most of these 34 books look of pretty average build. It’s hardly surprising, then, that the slim shelf is more than gently sagging. As a demanding older sister, I make it known how glad I am that my cookbooks are not only up there, too, but have also clearly been pulled out relatively recently. As a food writer who has given my sister books over the years, I am interested to see which ones are there; which books belonging to a working mum of three, who describes herself as “an utterly average, functional cook who is easily annoyed by cookbooks but needs them, and likes to eat good things”, have made it on to the shelf. And of those that are there, which are used most.Prashad, Kaushy Patel’s 2012 book of vegetarian Indian cooking, is right in the middle of the shelf, its spine showing signs of a hard-working life. As are the spines of Nigella’s How to Eat, Delia’s Complete Cookery Course and a book of British baking, which has also spent some time in a sunny spot and is suitably faded. Bee Wilson’s The Secret of Cooking is the newest arrival on the shelf and already looking a bit knocked about (my sister first picked it up at my house, sat at the table reading for ages before looking up and saying, “I don’t hate this”. Then went off and bought herself a copy). Rukmini Iyer’s bright-green The Quick Roasting Tin is also used weekly. Then there are two books by Anna Del Conte, the very sight of which are reassuring: Cooking with Coco, which she wrote about cooking with her granddaughter, and a 2012 compendium called Italian Kitchen, which has a pan of golden sweet-and-sour onions on the cotton cover. Italian Kitchen is the book I pulled off the shelf to read while I drank my coffee the other morning. And this week’s recipe is a variation of Anna’s straightforward and good torta di noci, or walnut cake, with added hazelnuts. Continue reading… Cake, Food, Italian food and drink, Baking, Nuts and seeds, Dessert, Snacks, Fruit, Summer food and drink
