BOOKS
The Age
Tuesday March 9, 2010
Gary Mehigan's Comfort FoodLantern, HB, $49.95"SHAMELESS cash-in," cried my colleagues, less pure-of-heart (cough) than myself. "Pan it €” he hasn't even included beef bourguignon!" they didn't add. But no, I insist. Sure, Gary Mehigan's profile has markedly increased since the success of € what's it called? MasterChef. But look at the title. Comfort Food. Simple food, the kind that endures €” made well, it tastes great. You don't like the sound of roast rib-eye with bearnaise sauce? Roasted pork belly with garlic and braised red cabbage? Chocolate cake with ganache and caramelised orange? There are food tomes that resemble science textbooks, then there are cookbooks with real food. I'm comfortable.GARY MUNROTop Chefs' Recipes Made EasyVirginia and Lisa HellierWilkinson Publishing, PB, $9.95.MOTHER-and-daughter team Virginia and Lisa Hellier reckon they have at least 10 cookbooks in them. That's after 25 years working in Australia's restaurant scene mainly as consultants and flamboyant facilitators of foodie events that have involved some of the world's big names €” Rick Stein, Antonio Carluccio and David Thompson among them. The duo's latest project €” a handbag-size cookbook of 88 pages €” is economical in size and price. It is also ambitious. Top Chefs' Recipes Made Easy collates the recipes of 28 chefs. It's the Helliers' first cookbook. We'll be holding them to nine more.VERONICA RIDGELight of Lucia: A celebration of Italian life, love and foodLuciana SampognaMurdoch Books, HB, $69.95IT'S not hard to romanticise anything Italian, least of all the food. Luciana Sampogna, owner of Sydney's Cucina Italiana cooking school, wears her heart and heritage on her sleeve in this quaint book that is always a pleasure to look at. Recipes are designed to complement important events in the life of a fictional little girl called Lucia, from fried prawns (perfect for a baptism, apparently) to pasta with walnut sauce (a recommended matrimonial dish). While the concept is, in turns, endearing and cloying, the recipes themselves are uniformly mouthwatering.ANNABEL ROSSCooking, Tasting, Living HoneyJodie GoldsworthyHB, $39.95HOW many people can identify the trees that produce fresh, fruity, warm or stronger deep-flavoured honeys? Fourth-generation Beechworth Honey beekeeper Jodie Goldsworthy has the answers. The evolution of the business (beginning with Goldsworthy's great-grandfather) is documented in the book, along with the extraordinary, important work bees do. It also details types of honey (from liquid, candied and creamed), together with tasting notes of distinctively flavoured varieties.GAIL THOMASAvailable from Readings, Books for Cooks, or beechworthhoney.com.au.
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