Real Food

`Nigel Slater's Real Food' and `Real Cooking' by Nigel Slater (name above the title, of course) are two great expositions on the real joy of cooking. Slater characterizes his point of view in the motto to `Real Cooking' as `There is too much talk of cooking being an art or a science - we are only making ourselves something to eat.' With this sentiment, Slater dismisses the Shirley Corriher / Alton Brown `kitchen science' camp on the one hand and the Keller / Boulud / Girardet `haute cuisine' camp on the other. In some ways, this also dismisses the high-end culinary magazine crowd as you may find in `Bon Appetit', `Gourmet', and `Martha Stewart Living'. While this seems to dismiss a goodly portion of the modern culinary establishment, it really does not. Slater is certainly in the same camp as his nibs, Jamie Oliver, his good friend, Nigella Lawson, and Oliver's mentors, Rose Gray and Ruth Rogers of London's River Café. In fact, if I did not know that Oliver was primarily influenced by Gray, Rogers, and Gennaro Contaldo, I would have guessed that Oliver was a Slater disciple from the word `GO'. I am happy to say that there are plenty of important cookbook writers in the United States who can easily be considered to be in Slater's camp. Leading the list is probably Jacques Pepin, especially with his various quick cooking books such as his latest `Fast Food My Way'. I do not wish, however, to give the impression that Slater is all about fast cooking. He is certainly about simple cooking in the same sense that Richard Olney describes in `Simple French Food', but he is a whole lot more about being in love with the sensual qualities of food and how well those qualities of various foods mix together in the most effective way.What is certainly true is that both Slater and Oliver represent the kind of cooking I enjoyed on my two trips to England, primarily the kind of cooking I saw at some of the better pubs in Hampshire and in London suburbs.Both of these books are primarily about recipes and the salient qualities of particular classes of food. For a study of Slater's `philosophy' of cooking in depth, see his recent book `Appetite'. These two books are even organized in very similar ways, in that each chapter presents a particular raw material or class of raw material. The more traditionally organized `Real Cooking' has chapters on:Fish & ShellfishChicken & Other BirdsPork, Bacon, and SausagesLamb and other MeatsPasta, Beans, Rice & GrainsVegetablesCheese, Snacks & PuddingsThe later book, `Real Food', which is also the tie-in book for a Television Series (not seen in the US, to my knowledge) is more to the point, with chapters entitled:PotatoesChickenSausagesGarlicBreadCheeseIce-creamChocolateThe chapter on bread is a good indication of Slater's point of view, in that he gives us nothing on baking bread, but just about everything you may want (this side of Nancy Silverton's sandwich book) to know about making some really interesting and unusual sandwiches. Similarly, the sausage book says nothing about how to make sausages, only how to make the very best use of them.True to his word in his `motto' quoted above, you will find not one word about the relative fat content of milk and cream, the emulsifying power of an egg, or calibrating the temperature of your oven. On the other hand, you will find much about, for example, the relative tastes of pork, beef, and lamb fat and the virtues of free range raised poultry. Here is one strong point of contact between the articulate and reflective Slater and the ebullient and emotional Oliver (or our own Emeril Lagasse, if you wish). Both will rhapsodize at length over the qualities of a nice thick layer of fat on a chop from an artisinally raised hog.For those of you who do not like `chatty' cookbooks, both of these books may be preferable to the very discursive `Appetite', although both of these books do have their share of culinary poetry before the recipe details. Neither book is as extreme as `Appetite' in the direction of teaching us to cook without a book. You can easily pick out a recipe from these books and make them without a lot of background reading or culinary skill. But never confuse `simple' with `easy' or `fast'. While Slater may do the Rachel Ray gig in other books, these books have their share of slow marinades and braises. They also have their share of whisking, filtering, and thickening techniques.The other side of the coin is that Slater's palate is extremely simple. Aside from his protein or starch of choice, few of his ingredients go far beyond the simple pantry of milk, cream, butter, basic cheeses, parsley, flour, lemon, lime, bacon, sage, thyme, bay, bread, olive oil, rice, stock, garlic, and mushrooms. Unlike Sir Jamie, Slater is about as down home English cooking as Paula Deen is about Savannah cooking.The biggest difficulty an American is likely to have with Slater's recipes is that they are all make heavy use of metric units for weight and larger volumes in place of ounces, pounds, and cups. Even though I was a chemist thoroughly familiar with the metric system, I had to dig out a good conversion table to remind myself that a pound was about 450 grams. A lesser difficulty may be with Slater's names for common food varieties such as potatoes, although he almost always specifies `waxy' or `floury' potatoes rather than the English varietal name.The other main difficulty with Slater's recipes is that they are all paradigms of high fat, high sodium, and high cholesterol preparations. They are definitely dishes to be eaten when the occasion calls for serious comfort food.If you like Jamie Oliver or Nigella Lawson, you will really like Slater!

I wrote earlier about Slater's "Eat" and the same applies to this book: Slater's approach is contemporary, intelligent, simple and sophisticated. The result? That following his philosophy you can produce an astonishing meal with very little. Slater takes a few quality ingredients, prepares them simply, and without unnecessary additions or nonsense makes a simple meal that is altogether satisfying to the point of brilliance. No food writer is truer to the ingredients, or more inspired by the essence of the ingredient. Neither ingredients nor technique are farfetched or exotic - instead Slater uncovers the flavors inherent in each dish. Slater makes one salivate, and then he makes one want to cook. He is inspired and writes so disarmingly (and charmingly) well that Salter could convince me to cook anything.

Nigel Slater writes with a passion for food that is highly inspiring. His recipes are relatively straight-forward, with an emphasis on fine ingredients prepared simply. Everything I have prepared has been delicious first-time and increasingly more delicious with each subsequent attempt. This volume offers some great classics arranged by food type. The downside to this is that there are some key foods that do not feature (e.g. beef, rice), so don't expect this to be your only reference. Be warned: Slater's recipes are not for the overly weight conscious. He puts flavor ahead of everything else, with generous use of fats and sugars (but only the best available of course!).

Slater's book records his creative improvisation with seasonal ingredients. To judge by this book, a typical Englishman eats a more varied diet than most Americans, so the ingredients of some of his recipes are out of the reach of many Americans. Nevertheless, an imaginative cook can easily adapt. In truth, the great strength of this book is the way Slater responds intuitively to food and applies classic techniques to them. This is an idea book for those who read cookbooks as much for literature about food as for recipes.

This stuff is okay. Much better real food recipes can be had from other authors.

Nigel Slater's cook books always please us. He takes the best of products, whether from the garden or the market, and tells the cook how to make it really delicious. Real Food is almost a back to basics - but a pretty nice "basics" it is indeed.

Loved this cook book ! So much fun.

good wrapping and fast service cannot respond on this book, bought it for a friend - I think this one is all types of salad, looked scrumptous

Good book in his normal fashion, but disappointed with the continual plug for Nigella Lawson and at least seven of her recipes included in the book. I have a few of her books and if I want her recipes I’ll buy her book.

Nigel Slater doesn't do anything very new in my book - but that's the beauty of it. He cooks like I do. I get the impression that he looks in his store cupboard, and uses the contents to make a delicious meal. But then he describes what he's made - the look, the feel, the aroma of the ingredients and the finished product, and even the sound of the food in the pan, and it leaves you wanting to get into the kitchen and do it. And eat it. And, for the most part, it's as good as he described it.I can cook, and I can cook well, but I can't make my cooking come alive on the printed page like Nigel Slater does. Chapeau for being the king of the Sustaining Book.

The book contents is excellent. I can cook a bit but decided to start cooking more and bought a load of new books, this is my favorite. It is nicely laid out into sections on chicken, potatoes, sausage, garlic, bread etc and some good pictures in places to let you see what it should come out like. There is a clear nicely written intro to each section to get you enthused and very easy to follow recipes. I jumped straight in with the Thai green curry that turned out really nice.The only down side of this book for me was that after cooking with it once the cover started coming away from the spine. Maybe I got a duff one? Either way it is going back and I will order the hardback version or another copy of this one as I do want a copy!

VERY happy with this book. This man speaks my language, just as Nigella does, and that explains why half a dozen of her recipes have been included in his book.The recipes are simple and delicious and this may well end up being one of the most revisited books in my extensive and varied collection.

I reccommend this book to anyone interested in cooking and if you are interested in reading about cooking. A good easy clear style spiced with his personality. I would cook with him in his kitchen any time. Such a delight he takes in different tastesworking together and he positively encourages you to follow your own urges as regards tastes and so my confidence has grown in considering "mmm what do I want to taste for supper" and really going along with it. Good value and good fun! Good transaction!