An Italian Classic, 27 Nov 2008
I think that this is one of my favourite recipe books ever!! I love Italian food and this book has it all. Really simple sauces and marinades to much more complex cookery. If ever we are stuck for an idea for dinner this book is always picked up first, I would highly recommend it!

Wonderful - just beware the quantities, 21 Aug 2008
There are some reviews of this fabulous cook book which complain about the poor translation, the fact that the book isn't in Engish alphabetical order, that the quantities aren't precise enough ... You're safe to ignore all these quibbles provided you accept the basis on which this cookebook was created.

It was designed to guide (young) Italians who were starting to lose their traditional roots in national cuisine and to help them know just how to make high quality food. For this audience it isn't necessary to give exact quantities or lengths of time ... they just know. And after working with this cookery book, you'll get to know these things too.

For me, a precise English/American book telling me just precisely what to do down to the last millilitre, gramme or degree of heat is not letting you be creative, not allowing you to find out what works best for you in your kitchen, and - above all - what great ingredients work with which.

This is a classic book; its English translation works; and I simply couldn't be without it. (And excuse me, if cooking is all about glossy photos, count me out: I prefer pictures that look like what I make, not some bizarre studio impersonation of food.

The Silver Spoon is all about good food cooked by real people in real kitchens. Bravo! Buy it!

A must for any italian food lover, 28 Apr 2008
My step father was an Italian restauranteur and had a copy of this same book in Italian throughout his career. He even had it rebound a few years back. During his life he ran a hotel in Rome and cooked for cardinals that came there from the vatican using recipes from the Silver spoon.

I was therefore thrilled when this came out in English and so far have bought 3 copies so that both my daughters have them for their homes. They use them daily. Not only is this the authentic cookery book for Italian food lovers it is amazingly economical, utilising seasonal fresh foods and not that many ingredients unlike so many newer recipes.

Risotto with carrots for example is fantastically creamy as the carrot is pureed. Highly recommended reading and an ideal gift for any newly weds or new home buyers.

Really Good, 11 Apr 2008
Bought this book from Amazon and after two weeks have cooked 4 things from it. Every recipe has tasted great with bags of flavour. More importantly, every recipe has worked.



Best Italian cook book, 05 Feb 2008
This is an excellent book with over 2000 authentic recipes (some are very authentic - there's a whole section on brains!) The recipes are, typically of Italian food, simple and easy to follow. There is also a small section at the back with some more complicated recipes from famous Italian chefs. All in all a top book you're not likely to get bored with quickly.

How long does it take before somebody becomes a national treasure? It's certainly happened to Nigel Slater, and Eating for England is a highly enjoyable reminder of just why we esteem the estimable Mr Slater. Subtitled The Delights & Eccentricities of the British at Table, this is wonderfully entertaining stuff, explaining such matters as how some of our most cherished foods are the result of frugality (bread and butter pudding, for instance, is the direct result of utilising a few slices of leftover bread and a pat of butter, rather than culinary aspiration). As Slater points out, the British have a relationship with food which is quite unlike that of any other nation -- for many years, we were reluctant to discuss food matters (leaving culinary discussion to, for instance, the French), but we now appear to be in the grip of a national food obsession, with program after program on television and -- inevitably -- a host of books on the subject. But few are written as entertainingly as Nigel Slater's. It isn't just the discussion of food itself (from haute cuisine to the humblest of comfort foods) that's so diverting here, but other sociological (and tongue-in-cheek) related matters, such as `A Teenager at the Table' (`The shoulders droop, the head hangs sulkily down, eyes glaring intently at an invisible spot on their lap. Their whole body seems to say `I'm not eating this'). And Nigel Slater is perfectly happy to address subjects not found in any other food books (such as the modest chocolate bar -- different varieties are entertainingly compared and contrasted).

This is a personal portrait of the British and their food, filled with love of the eccentricities and peculiarities that encapsulate the national character. And it's great fun. --Barry Forshaw

An Italian Classic, 27 Nov 2008
I think that this is one of my favourite recipe books ever!! I love Italian food and this book has it all. Really simple sauces and marinades to much more complex cookery. If ever we are stuck for an idea for dinner this book is always picked up first, I would highly recommend it!

Wonderful - just beware the quantities, 21 Aug 2008
There are some reviews of this fabulous cook book which complain about the poor translation, the fact that the book isn't in Engish alphabetical order, that the quantities aren't precise enough ... You're safe to ignore all these quibbles provided you accept the basis on which this cookebook was created.

It was designed to guide (young) Italians who were starting to lose their traditional roots in national cuisine and to help them know just how to make high quality food. For this audience it isn't necessary to give exact quantities or lengths of time ... they just know. And after working with this cookery book, you'll get to know these things too.

For me, a precise English/American book telling me just precisely what to do down to the last millilitre, gramme or degree of heat is not letting you be creative, not allowing you to find out what works best for you in your kitchen, and - above all - what great ingredients work with which.

This is a classic book; its English translation works; and I simply couldn't be without it. (And excuse me, if cooking is all about glossy photos, count me out: I prefer pictures that look like what I make, not some bizarre studio impersonation of food.

The Silver Spoon is all about good food cooked by real people in real kitchens. Bravo! Buy it!

A must for any italian food lover, 28 Apr 2008
My step father was an Italian restauranteur and had a copy of this same book in Italian throughout his career. He even had it rebound a few years back. During his life he ran a hotel in Rome and cooked for cardinals that came there from the vatican using recipes from the Silver spoon.

I was therefore thrilled when this came out in English and so far have bought 3 copies so that both my daughters have them for their homes. They use them daily. Not only is this the authentic cookery book for Italian food lovers it is amazingly economical, utilising seasonal fresh foods and not that many ingredients unlike so many newer recipes.

Risotto with carrots for example is fantastically creamy as the carrot is pureed. Highly recommended reading and an ideal gift for any newly weds or new home buyers.

Really Good, 11 Apr 2008
Bought this book from Amazon and after two weeks have cooked 4 things from it. Every recipe has tasted great with bags of flavour. More importantly, every recipe has worked.



Best Italian cook book, 05 Feb 2008
This is an excellent book with over 2000 authentic recipes (some are very authentic - there's a whole section on brains!) The recipes are, typically of Italian food, simple and easy to follow. There is also a small section at the back with some more complicated recipes from famous Italian chefs. All in all a top book you're not likely to get bored with quickly.

You'd have to be a Nigel ..., 27 Nov 2008
... to write this. Or a Jeremy. Or possibly a Terence. But maybe we all have anorak-y tendencies when it comes to name-checking the fondly remembered foods of our 1950s and 60s childhoods.
But sorry, Nigel - you've done this too many times before - and so have too many other people. Spangles, Dairylea triangles, Jammie Dodgers, Tunnock's teacakes have had the Proustian treatment before. And let's face it though Spangles now RIP, nearly all of these along with Sarson's vinegar and Bisto can be bought in any Tesco today. Though I agree that floral gums (and cherry lips, the best for eating surreptitiously through double Latin) have had the chemistry formula changed and don't taste the same.
When Nigel gets stuck, or his Proustian madeleine/Rich Tea disintegrates soggily into his mug of PG, he throws in a page or two about farmers' markets - and then he simply gets BORING.
Eating for England is simply Toast reheated. And Nigel is getting to be an old aunt who retells the same stories too many times. (He's getting careless, too; the delectable lime barrel was never in Dairy Box, p166, it was everybody's favourite centre in Milk Tray. And Dairy Box wasn't made by Cadbury's, either. )

A disappointing mess of a book, 03 Nov 2008
"Eating For England" is re-heated "Toast". Disappointingly, Slater has produced a clunker here, and where Toast worked because he linked food memories to his own childhood, this latest volume lacks any structure on which to hang various short observations and sketches about food. What's more, it's quite repetitive in places, and simpy doesn't work in others.

Slater at his best pinpoints a long forgotten food memory that several of us of a certain age will have had. There are a few gems like that here (the whole chocolate Club biscuit experience for example) - but these are too few and far between for my liking.

Nigel Slater writes best about himself and his relationship with food. When he tries something different - observational stuff about different types of cook, or diner, it simply doesn't work because he's not part of that set up. You can't remain aloof from such things and pretend otherwise. These pieces of the book come over as phoney - and in places bitchy and unamusing.

"The Kitchen Diaries" was neither a practical cook book or a particularly entertaining diary; "Eating For England" maintains this loss of focus from an excellent food writer who needs to re-connect with a loyal audience next time around. Nige - let's just cut to the recipes for the next one, eh?

All puddings are English. Nigel is a pudding. Therefore Nigel, regrettably, is English., 23 Oct 2008
Eating for England - The Delights and Eccentricities of the BRITISH at Table? I skimmed this book before delivering it to one of my numbskull relatives as a birthday present. After seeing the response here to this curious choice of words I'm reminded that no-one ever lost money underestimating the intelligence of the public.

It's an easy enough volume to follow. The layout is good, the writing merry and informal (if slightly knowing in the unappealing sense of the word 'clever'). There is even an interesting culinary suggestion or two.

Unfortunately nothing is value-free, and with Jamie Mockney under contract to sell us the fake barrow-boy-next-door line I'm afraid Nigel (change of name Nige?) Slater has still to win me over. Cookery's cultural implications, the idea of its saying something about the nation at large, is obviously dear to people's hearts.

But Britain is not a nation. It is a bureaucratic manoeuvre. In any event things like puddings are an ENGLISH speciality. So too Syllabub (very popular with the Elizabethans, who if nothing else knew who they were) and much else besides (try Florence White's 'Good Things in England' to learn more).

The title of this book is a masterpiece of ignorance and effrontery. Fortunately the modern English are the most passive, stupid and easily exploited people in Europe. They will buy it in droves. I just wonder how much faith we should place in the judgement of someone who doesn't know the difference between an administrative convenience and a nation in the truest sense of the word.


farmer's market propaganda, 09 Oct 2008
I must say there were many times where I laughed out loud or smiled in relation to many things I do or eat and how they are quintessentially British. I also learned that I AM the 'oh-i-never-measure-anything cook.' The experience of reading this lovely book, however has been marred by every other page judging people for not going to local greengrocers and not supporting farmer's markets.

I may be lucky enough to afford (or just a good budgeter!) to eat organic/local/fairtrade and have time to shop 3 times a week instead of one big one (I'm a student) but I know of too many people who simply don't have the time, energy OR money to buy ethically all the time and they shouldn't be made to feel bad for this. I want Nigel, Hugh AND Jamie (3 men I love very much) to spend a week in a council estate with a family of 5 and see how much money they have to spend on their groceries!

Lovely promise but...., 09 Jul 2008
I had looked forward to this for some time. I have been a fan on NS on TV since he first appeared. I like his style, his taste and his appreach to food. So why oh why or WHY did NS have to ruin it all for me with a single thoughtless - and eeming uncharacteristic - comment. He makes the point that continental stews are flavoursome and interesting while ours '...smell of old people.' As newly retired. I found it belittling, insulting and it stopped me reading the book in my tracks.

How would you survive on wartime rations? Eating for Victory (subtitled Healthy Home Front Cooking on War Rations) makes for absolutely fascinating reading -- and may answer the question as to what the reader might have made of these more straitened times.

The book reproduces official Second World War instruction leaflets (which have never before been published in book form) and demonstrates how millions of people in Britain endured food shortages during the hardships of WWII. With a perceptive foreword by Jill Norman, Eating for Victory shows that the government endeavoured to keep morale high by producing a host of the upbeat leaflets included here on such subjects as `using up stale crusts' and `foods for fitness' (the leaflets are most amusing in this area, showing how much thinking has changed over the years -- the use of fats and lard looks very quaint in these more enlightened times). But what gives particular pleasure here is the verbatim reproduction of the original artwork and typefaces, which vividly conjures a lost era. To read this entertaining little book is like climbing into a time machine to take us back to the 1940s. --Barry Forshaw

An Italian Classic, 27 Nov 2008
I think that this is one of my favourite recipe books ever!! I love Italian food and this book has it all. Really simple sauces and marinades to much more complex cookery. If ever we are stuck for an idea for dinner this book is always picked up first, I would highly recommend it!

Wonderful - just beware the quantities, 21 Aug 2008
There are some reviews of this fabulous cook book which complain about the poor translation, the fact that the book isn't in Engish alphabetical order, that the quantities aren't precise enough ... You're safe to ignore all these quibbles provided you accept the basis on which this cookebook was created.

It was designed to guide (young) Italians who were starting to lose their traditional roots in national cuisine and to help them know just how to make high quality food. For this audience it isn't necessary to give exact quantities or lengths of time ... they just know. And after working with this cookery book, you'll get to know these things too.

For me, a precise English/American book telling me just precisely what to do down to the last millilitre, gramme or degree of heat is not letting you be creative, not allowing you to find out what works best for you in your kitchen, and - above all - what great ingredients work with which.

This is a classic book; its English translation works; and I simply couldn't be without it. (And excuse me, if cooking is all about glossy photos, count me out: I prefer pictures that look like what I make, not some bizarre studio impersonation of food.

The Silver Spoon is all about good food cooked by real people in real kitchens. Bravo! Buy it!

A must for any italian food lover, 28 Apr 2008
My step father was an Italian restauranteur and had a copy of this same book in Italian throughout his career. He even had it rebound a few years back. During his life he ran a hotel in Rome and cooked for cardinals that came there from the vatican using recipes from the Silver spoon.

I was therefore thrilled when this came out in English and so far have bought 3 copies so that both my daughters have them for their homes. They use them daily. Not only is this the authentic cookery book for Italian food lovers it is amazingly economical, utilising seasonal fresh foods and not that many ingredients unlike so many newer recipes.

Risotto with carrots for example is fantastically creamy as the carrot is pureed. Highly recommended reading and an ideal gift for any newly weds or new home buyers.

Really Good, 11 Apr 2008
Bought this book from Amazon and after two weeks have cooked 4 things from it. Every recipe has tasted great with bags of flavour. More importantly, every recipe has worked.



Best Italian cook book, 05 Feb 2008
This is an excellent book with over 2000 authentic recipes (some are very authentic - there's a whole section on brains!) The recipes are, typically of Italian food, simple and easy to follow. There is also a small section at the back with some more complicated recipes from famous Italian chefs. All in all a top book you're not likely to get bored with quickly.

You'd have to be a Nigel ..., 27 Nov 2008
... to write this. Or a Jeremy. Or possibly a Terence. But maybe we all have anorak-y tendencies when it comes to name-checking the fondly remembered foods of our 1950s and 60s childhoods.
But sorry, Nigel - you've done this too many times before - and so have too many other people. Spangles, Dairylea triangles, Jammie Dodgers, Tunnock's teacakes have had the Proustian treatment before. And let's face it though Spangles now RIP, nearly all of these along with Sarson's vinegar and Bisto can be bought in any Tesco today. Though I agree that floral gums (and cherry lips, the best for eating surreptitiously through double Latin) have had the chemistry formula changed and don't taste the same.
When Nigel gets stuck, or his Proustian madeleine/Rich Tea disintegrates soggily into his mug of PG, he throws in a page or two about farmers' markets - and then he simply gets BORING.
Eating for England is simply Toast reheated. And Nigel is getting to be an old aunt who retells the same stories too many times. (He's getting careless, too; the delectable lime barrel was never in Dairy Box, p166, it was everybody's favourite centre in Milk Tray. And Dairy Box wasn't made by Cadbury's, either. )

A disappointing mess of a book, 03 Nov 2008
"Eating For England" is re-heated "Toast". Disappointingly, Slater has produced a clunker here, and where Toast worked because he linked food memories to his own childhood, this latest volume lacks any structure on which to hang various short observations and sketches about food. What's more, it's quite repetitive in places, and simpy doesn't work in others.

Slater at his best pinpoints a long forgotten food memory that several of us of a certain age will have had. There are a few gems like that here (the whole chocolate Club biscuit experience for example) - but these are too few and far between for my liking.

Nigel Slater writes best about himself and his relationship with food. When he tries something different - observational stuff about different types of cook, or diner, it simply doesn't work because he's not part of that set up. You can't remain aloof from such things and pretend otherwise. These pieces of the book come over as phoney - and in places bitchy and unamusing.

"The Kitchen Diaries" was neither a practical cook book or a particularly entertaining diary; "Eating For England" maintains this loss of focus from an excellent food writer who needs to re-connect with a loyal audience next time around. Nige - let's just cut to the recipes for the next one, eh?

All puddings are English. Nigel is a pudding. Therefore Nigel, regrettably, is English., 23 Oct 2008
Eating for England - The Delights and Eccentricities of the BRITISH at Table? I skimmed this book before delivering it to one of my numbskull relatives as a birthday present. After seeing the response here to this curious choice of words I'm reminded that no-one ever lost money underestimating the intelligence of the public.

It's an easy enough volume to follow. The layout is good, the writing merry and informal (if slightly knowing in the unappealing sense of the word 'clever'). There is even an interesting culinary suggestion or two.

Unfortunately nothing is value-free, and with Jamie Mockney under contract to sell us the fake barrow-boy-next-door line I'm afraid Nigel (change of name Nige?) Slater has still to win me over. Cookery's cultural implications, the idea of its saying something about the nation at large, is obviously dear to people's hearts.

But Britain is not a nation. It is a bureaucratic manoeuvre. In any event things like puddings are an ENGLISH speciality. So too Syllabub (very popular with the Elizabethans, who if nothing else knew who they were) and much else besides (try Florence White's 'Good Things in England' to learn more).

The title of this book is a masterpiece of ignorance and effrontery. Fortunately the modern English are the most passive, stupid and easily exploited people in Europe. They will buy it in droves. I just wonder how much faith we should place in the judgement of someone who doesn't know the difference between an administrative convenience and a nation in the truest sense of the word.


farmer's market propaganda, 09 Oct 2008
I must say there were many times where I laughed out loud or smiled in relation to many things I do or eat and how they are quintessentially British. I also learned that I AM the 'oh-i-never-measure-anything cook.' The experience of reading this lovely book, however has been marred by every other page judging people for not going to local greengrocers and not supporting farmer's markets.

I may be lucky enough to afford (or just a good budgeter!) to eat organic/local/fairtrade and have time to shop 3 times a week instead of one big one (I'm a student) but I know of too many people who simply don't have the time, energy OR money to buy ethically all the time and they shouldn't be made to feel bad for this. I want Nigel, Hugh AND Jamie (3 men I love very much) to spend a week in a council estate with a family of 5 and see how much money they have to spend on their groceries!

Lovely promise but...., 09 Jul 2008
I had looked forward to this for some time. I have been a fan on NS on TV since he first appeared. I like his style, his taste and his appreach to food. So why oh why or WHY did NS have to ruin it all for me with a single thoughtless - and eeming uncharacteristic - comment. He makes the point that continental stews are flavoursome and interesting while ours '...smell of old people.' As newly retired. I found it belittling, insulting and it stopped me reading the book in my tracks.

Eating through the hard times too, 09 Oct 2008
I bought the pair for my mum a year ago and they have ended up going round the whole family, young and old. Yes they have a nostalgic feel to them and it's food that nana used to make but thats what makes them so good, we are now having to live as if things are rationed, the meals that were made back then weren't full of e numbers and other nasty things (lets face it, we've all become alergic to them all anyway), they were wholesome and filling with no waste, after all I'm sure it's not only me that loves bubble and squeek on a monday with the sunday roast left overs. It has made me realize how lucky I am to have everything I want but I can survive on next to nothing.
Also the Make do and Mend is also full of cleaning tips and a definate must for anyone living in a period house and trying to keep things going, I live in a stone cottage and in a preservation area, with a house full of original things like Arga'sand stone floors I found good tips on how to care for these items without using chemical cleaners that corrode them away.

Fascinating, enlightening, 10 Jul 2008
The introduction to this book sets the scene of the wartime kitchen and beyond during rationing, and continues with reproductions of wartime leaflets. For content I would have given this book five stars but marked it down by one since I found some of the reproductions rather difficult to read due to poor quality - even with my super new reading glasses.

This book is not just a nostalgic look at the past but contains valuable nutritional advice which is as applicable today with the range of foods available to us as it was then.

Given the current economic climate and the need for us all to reduce food and energy waste, there are many useful tips to pick up from this book. Filling, wholesome food and a balanced diet is possible with good planning, even with the most frugal ingredients.

I also picked up nutritional tips - the benefits of parsley for example - and how to reduce fat.

Something I now want to do is weigh out the family's weekly wartime rations and see how many days it lasts! No wonder everyone was slim during the war, but apparently slim, fit and much healthier than many people are today.






fascinating collection of WW2 Food Facts and recipes, 21 Jan 2008
If you are interested in domestic life during World War Two, this is the book for you. It is a fascinating collection of Ministry of Food "Food Facts" and recipes: including how to render fat and bottle tomatoes. A must for anyone who wants to try "Eating for Victory".

An Italian Classic, 27 Nov 2008
I think that this is one of my favourite recipe books ever!! I love Italian food and this book has it all. Really simple sauces and marinades to much more complex cookery. If ever we are stuck for an idea for dinner this book is always picked up first, I would highly recommend it!

Wonderful - just beware the quantities, 21 Aug 2008
There are some reviews of this fabulous cook book which complain about the poor translation, the fact that the book isn't in Engish alphabetical order, that the quantities aren't precise enough ... You're safe to ignore all these quibbles provided you accept the basis on which this cookebook was created.

It was designed to guide (young) Italians who were starting to lose their traditional roots in national cuisine and to help them know just how to make high quality food. For this audience it isn't necessary to give exact quantities or lengths of time ... they just know. And after working with this cookery book, you'll get to know these things too.

For me, a precise English/American book telling me just precisely what to do down to the last millilitre, gramme or degree of heat is not letting you be creative, not allowing you to find out what works best for you in your kitchen, and - above all - what great ingredients work with which.

This is a classic book; its English translation works; and I simply couldn't be without it. (And excuse me, if cooking is all about glossy photos, count me out: I prefer pictures that look like what I make, not some bizarre studio impersonation of food.

The Silver Spoon is all about good food cooked by real people in real kitchens. Bravo! Buy it!

A must for any italian food lover, 28 Apr 2008
My step father was an Italian restauranteur and had a copy of this same book in Italian throughout his career. He even had it rebound a few years back. During his life he ran a hotel in Rome and cooked for cardinals that came there from the vatican using recipes from the Silver spoon.

I was therefore thrilled when this came out in English and so far have bought 3 copies so that both my daughters have them for their homes. They use them daily. Not only is this the authentic cookery book for Italian food lovers it is amazingly economical, utilising seasonal fresh foods and not that many ingredients unlike so many newer recipes.

Risotto with carrots for example is fantastically creamy as the carrot is pureed. Highly recommended reading and an ideal gift for any newly weds or new home buyers.

Really Good, 11 Apr 2008
Bought this book from Amazon and after two weeks have cooked 4 things from it. Every recipe has tasted great with bags of flavour. More importantly, every recipe has worked.



Best Italian cook book, 05 Feb 2008
This is an excellent book with over 2000 authentic recipes (some are very authentic - there's a whole section on brains!) The recipes are, typically of Italian food, simple and easy to follow. There is also a small section at the back with some more complicated recipes from famous Italian chefs. All in all a top book you're not likely to get bored with quickly.

You'd have to be a Nigel ..., 27 Nov 2008
... to write this. Or a Jeremy. Or possibly a Terence. But maybe we all have anorak-y tendencies when it comes to name-checking the fondly remembered foods of our 1950s and 60s childhoods.
But sorry, Nigel - you've done this too many times before - and so have too many other people. Spangles, Dairylea triangles, Jammie Dodgers, Tunnock's teacakes have had the Proustian treatment before. And let's face it though Spangles now RIP, nearly all of these along with Sarson's vinegar and Bisto can be bought in any Tesco today. Though I agree that floral gums (and cherry lips, the best for eating surreptitiously through double Latin) have had the chemistry formula changed and don't taste the same.
When Nigel gets stuck, or his Proustian madeleine/Rich Tea disintegrates soggily into his mug of PG, he throws in a page or two about farmers' markets - and then he simply gets BORING.
Eating for England is simply Toast reheated. And Nigel is getting to be an old aunt who retells the same stories too many times. (He's getting careless, too; the delectable lime barrel was never in Dairy Box, p166, it was everybody's favourite centre in Milk Tray. And Dairy Box wasn't made by Cadbury's, either. )

A disappointing mess of a book, 03 Nov 2008
"Eating For England" is re-heated "Toast". Disappointingly, Slater has produced a clunker here, and where Toast worked because he linked food memories to his own childhood, this latest volume lacks any structure on which to hang various short observations and sketches about food. What's more, it's quite repetitive in places, and simpy doesn't work in others.

Slater at his best pinpoints a long forgotten food memory that several of us of a certain age will have had. There are a few gems like that here (the whole chocolate Club biscuit experience for example) - but these are too few and far between for my liking.

Nigel Slater writes best about himself and his relationship with food. When he tries something different - observational stuff about different types of cook, or diner, it simply doesn't work because he's not part of that set up. You can't remain aloof from such things and pretend otherwise. These pieces of the book come over as phoney - and in places bitchy and unamusing.

"The Kitchen Diaries" was neither a practical cook book or a particularly entertaining diary; "Eating For England" maintains this loss of focus from an excellent food writer who needs to re-connect with a loyal audience next time around. Nige - let's just cut to the recipes for the next one, eh?

All puddings are English. Nigel is a pudding. Therefore Nigel, regrettably, is English., 23 Oct 2008
Eating for England - The Delights and Eccentricities of the BRITISH at Table? I skimmed this book before delivering it to one of my numbskull relatives as a birthday present. After seeing the response here to this curious choice of words I'm reminded that no-one ever lost money underestimating the intelligence of the public.

It's an easy enough volume to follow. The layout is good, the writing merry and informal (if slightly knowing in the unappealing sense of the word 'clever'). There is even an interesting culinary suggestion or two.

Unfortunately nothing is value-free, and with Jamie Mockney under contract to sell us the fake barrow-boy-next-door line I'm afraid Nigel (change of name Nige?) Slater has still to win me over. Cookery's cultural implications, the idea of its saying something about the nation at large, is obviously dear to people's hearts.

But Britain is not a nation. It is a bureaucratic manoeuvre. In any event things like puddings are an ENGLISH speciality. So too Syllabub (very popular with the Elizabethans, who if nothing else knew who they were) and much else besides (try Florence White's 'Good Things in England' to learn more).

The title of this book is a masterpiece of ignorance and effrontery. Fortunately the modern English are the most passive, stupid and easily exploited people in Europe. They will buy it in droves. I just wonder how much faith we should place in the judgement of someone who doesn't know the difference between an administrative convenience and a nation in the truest sense of the word.


farmer's market propaganda, 09 Oct 2008
I must say there were many times where I laughed out loud or smiled in relation to many things I do or eat and how they are quintessentially British. I also learned that I AM the 'oh-i-never-measure-anything cook.' The experience of reading this lovely book, however has been marred by every other page judging people for not going to local greengrocers and not supporting farmer's markets.

I may be lucky enough to afford (or just a good budgeter!) to eat organic/local/fairtrade and have time to shop 3 times a week instead of one big one (I'm a student) but I know of too many people who simply don't have the time, energy OR money to buy ethically all the time and they shouldn't be made to feel bad for this. I want Nigel, Hugh AND Jamie (3 men I love very much) to spend a week in a council estate with a family of 5 and see how much money they have to spend on their groceries!

Lovely promise but...., 09 Jul 2008
I had looked forward to this for some time. I have been a fan on NS on TV since he first appeared. I like his style, his taste and his appreach to food. So why oh why or WHY did NS have to ruin it all for me with a single thoughtless - and eeming uncharacteristic - comment. He makes the point that continental stews are flavoursome and interesting while ours '...smell of old people.' As newly retired. I found it belittling, insulting and it stopped me reading the book in my tracks.

Eating through the hard times too, 09 Oct 2008
I bought the pair for my mum a year ago and they have ended up going round the whole family, young and old. Yes they have a nostalgic feel to them and it's food that nana used to make but thats what makes them so good, we are now having to live as if things are rationed, the meals that were made back then weren't full of e numbers and other nasty things (lets face it, we've all become alergic to them all anyway), they were wholesome and filling with no waste, after all I'm sure it's not only me that loves bubble and squeek on a monday with the sunday roast left overs. It has made me realize how lucky I am to have everything I want but I can survive on next to nothing.
Also the Make do and Mend is also full of cleaning tips and a definate must for anyone living in a period house and trying to keep things going, I live in a stone cottage and in a preservation area, with a house full of original things like Arga'sand stone floors I found good tips on how to care for these items without using chemical cleaners that corrode them away.

Fascinating, enlightening, 10 Jul 2008
The introduction to this book sets the scene of the wartime kitchen and beyond during rationing, and continues with reproductions of wartime leaflets. For content I would have given this book five stars but marked it down by one since I found some of the reproductions rather difficult to read due to poor quality - even with my super new reading glasses.

This book is not just a nostalgic look at the past but contains valuable nutritional advice which is as applicable today with the range of foods available to us as it was then.

Given the current economic climate and the need for us all to reduce food and energy waste, there are many useful tips to pick up from this book. Filling, wholesome food and a balanced diet is possible with good planning, even with the most frugal ingredients.

I also picked up nutritional tips - the benefits of parsley for example - and how to reduce fat.

Something I now want to do is weigh out the family's weekly wartime rations and see how many days it lasts! No wonder everyone was slim during the war, but apparently slim, fit and much healthier than many people are today.






fascinating collection of WW2 Food Facts and recipes, 21 Jan 2008
If you are interested in domestic life during World War Two, this is the book for you. It is a fascinating collection of Ministry of Food "Food Facts" and recipes: including how to render fat and bottle tomatoes. A must for anyone who wants to try "Eating for Victory".



home guard , 02 Oct 2006
A great recipe book if you are looking for recipes from a bygone age then i would recommend this book.When you make the recipes it gives you a true idea of what they really had to endure. Buy the book and make some of the recipes and I believe you wont be disappointed.

An Italian Classic, 27 Nov 2008
I think that this is one of my favourite recipe books ever!! I love Italian food and this book has it all. Really simple sauces and marinades to much more complex cookery. If ever we are stuck for an idea for dinner this book is always picked up first, I would highly recommend it!

Wonderful - just beware the quantities, 21 Aug 2008
There are some reviews of this fabulous cook book which complain about the poor translation, the fact that the book isn't in Engish alphabetical order, that the quantities aren't precise enough ... You're safe to ignore all these quibbles provided you accept the basis on which this cookebook was created.

It was designed to guide (young) Italians who were starting to lose their traditional roots in national cuisine and to help them know just how to make high quality food. For this audience it isn't necessary to give exact quantities or lengths of time ... they just know. And after working with this cookery book, you'll get to know these things too.

For me, a precise English/American book telling me just precisely what to do down to the last millilitre, gramme or degree of heat is not letting you be creative, not allowing you to find out what works best for you in your kitchen, and - above all - what great ingredients work with which.

This is a classic book; its English translation works; and I simply couldn't be without it. (And excuse me, if cooking is all about glossy photos, count me out: I prefer pictures that look like what I make, not some bizarre studio impersonation of food.

The Silver Spoon is all about good food cooked by real people in real kitchens. Bravo! Buy it!

A must for any italian food lover, 28 Apr 2008
My step father was an Italian restauranteur and had a copy of this same book in Italian throughout his career. He even had it rebound a few years back. During his life he ran a hotel in Rome and cooked for cardinals that came there from the vatican using recipes from the Silver spoon.

I was therefore thrilled when this came out in English and so far have bought 3 copies so that both my daughters have them for their homes. They use them daily. Not only is this the authentic cookery book for Italian food lovers it is amazingly economical, utilising seasonal fresh foods and not that many ingredients unlike so many newer recipes.

Risotto with carrots for example is fantastically creamy as the carrot is pureed. Highly recommended reading and an ideal gift for any newly weds or new home buyers.

Really Good, 11 Apr 2008
Bought this book from Amazon and after two weeks have cooked 4 things from it. Every recipe has tasted great with bags of flavour. More importantly, every recipe has worked.



Best Italian cook book, 05 Feb 2008
This is an excellent book with over 2000 authentic recipes (some are very authentic - there's a whole section on brains!) The recipes are, typically of Italian food, simple and easy to follow. There is also a small section at the back with some more complicated recipes from famous Italian chefs. All in all a top book you're not likely to get bored with quickly.

You'd have to be a Nigel ..., 27 Nov 2008
... to write this. Or a Jeremy. Or possibly a Terence. But maybe we all have anorak-y tendencies when it comes to name-checking the fondly remembered foods of our 1950s and 60s childhoods.
But sorry, Nigel - you've done this too many times before - and so have too many other people. Spangles, Dairylea triangles, Jammie Dodgers, Tunnock's teacakes have had the Proustian treatment before. And let's face it though Spangles now RIP, nearly all of these along with Sarson's vinegar and Bisto can be bought in any Tesco today. Though I agree that floral gums (and cherry lips, the best for eating surreptitiously through double Latin) have had the chemistry formula changed and don't taste the same.
When Nigel gets stuck, or his Proustian madeleine/Rich Tea disintegrates soggily into his mug of PG, he throws in a page or two about farmers' markets - and then he simply gets BORING.
Eating for England is simply Toast reheated. And Nigel is getting to be an old aunt who retells the same stories too many times. (He's getting careless, too; the delectable lime barrel was never in Dairy Box, p166, it was everybody's favourite centre in Milk Tray. And Dairy Box wasn't made by Cadbury's, either. )

A disappointing mess of a book, 03 Nov 2008
"Eating For England" is re-heated "Toast". Disappointingly, Slater has produced a clunker here, and where Toast worked because he linked food memories to his own childhood, this latest volume lacks any structure on which to hang various short observations and sketches about food. What's more, it's quite repetitive in places, and simpy doesn't work in others.

Slater at his best pinpoints a long forgotten food memory that several of us of a certain age will have had. There are a few gems like that here (the whole chocolate Club biscuit experience for example) - but these are too few and far between for my liking.

Nigel Slater writes best about himself and his relationship with food. When he tries something different - observational stuff about different types of cook, or diner, it simply doesn't work because he's not part of that set up. You can't remain aloof from such things and pretend otherwise. These pieces of the book come over as phoney - and in places bitchy and unamusing.

"The Kitchen Diaries" was neither a practical cook book or a particularly entertaining diary; "Eating For England" maintains this loss of focus from an excellent food writer who needs to re-connect with a loyal audience next time around. Nige - let's just cut to the recipes for the next one, eh?

All puddings are English. Nigel is a pudding. Therefore Nigel, regrettably, is English., 23 Oct 2008
Eating for England - The Delights and Eccentricities of the BRITISH at Table? I skimmed this book before delivering it to one of my numbskull relatives as a birthday present. After seeing the response here to this curious choice of words I'm reminded that no-one ever lost money underestimating the intelligence of the public.

It's an easy enough volume to follow. The layout is good, the writing merry and informal (if slightly knowing in the unappealing sense of the word 'clever'). There is even an interesting culinary suggestion or two.

Unfortunately nothing is value-free, and with Jamie Mockney under contract to sell us the fake barrow-boy-next-door line I'm afraid Nigel (change of name Nige?) Slater has still to win me over. Cookery's cultural implications, the idea of its saying something about the nation at large, is obviously dear to people's hearts.

But Britain is not a nation. It is a bureaucratic manoeuvre. In any event things like puddings are an ENGLISH speciality. So too Syllabub (very popular with the Elizabethans, who if nothing else knew who they were) and much else besides (try Florence White's 'Good Things in England' to learn more).

The title of this book is a masterpiece of ignorance and effrontery. Fortunately the modern English are the most passive, stupid and easily exploited people in Europe. They will buy it in droves. I just wonder how much faith we should place in the judgement of someone who doesn't know the difference between an administrative convenience and a nation in the truest sense of the word.


farmer's market propaganda, 09 Oct 2008
I must say there were many times where I laughed out loud or smiled in relation to many things I do or eat and how they are quintessentially British. I also learned that I AM the 'oh-i-never-measure-anything cook.' The experience of reading this lovely book, however has been marred by every other page judging people for not going to local greengrocers and not supporting farmer's markets.

I may be lucky enough to afford (or just a good budgeter!) to eat organic/local/fairtrade and have time to shop 3 times a week instead of one big one (I'm a student) but I know of too many people who simply don't have the time, energy OR money to buy ethically all the time and they shouldn't be made to feel bad for this. I want Nigel, Hugh AND Jamie (3 men I love very much) to spend a week in a council estate with a family of 5 and see how much money they have to spend on their groceries!

Lovely promise but...., 09 Jul 2008
I had looked forward to this for some time. I have been a fan on NS on TV since he first appeared. I like his style, his taste and his appreach to food. So why oh why or WHY did NS have to ruin it all for me with a single thoughtless - and eeming uncharacteristic - comment. He makes the point that continental stews are flavoursome and interesting while ours '...smell of old people.' As newly retired. I found it belittling, insulting and it stopped me reading the book in my tracks.

Eating through the hard times too, 09 Oct 2008
I bought the pair for my mum a year ago and they have ended up going round the whole family, young and old. Yes they have a nostalgic feel to them and it's food that nana used to make but thats what makes them so good, we are now having to live as if things are rationed, the meals that were made back then weren't full of e numbers and other nasty things (lets face it, we've all become alergic to them all anyway), they were wholesome and filling with no waste, after all I'm sure it's not only me that loves bubble and squeek on a monday with the sunday roast left overs. It has made me realize how lucky I am to have everything I want but I can survive on next to nothing.
Also the Make do and Mend is also full of cleaning tips and a definate must for anyone living in a period house and trying to keep things going, I live in a stone cottage and in a preservation area, with a house full of original things like Arga'sand stone floors I found good tips on how to care for these items without using chemical cleaners that corrode them away.

Fascinating, enlightening, 10 Jul 2008
The introduction to this book sets the scene of the wartime kitchen and beyond during rationing, and continues with reproductions of wartime leaflets. For content I would have given this book five stars but marked it down by one since I found some of the reproductions rather difficult to read due to poor quality - even with my super new reading glasses.

This book is not just a nostalgic look at the past but contains valuable nutritional advice which is as applicable today with the range of foods available to us as it was then.

Given the current economic climate and the need for us all to reduce food and energy waste, there are many useful tips to pick up from this book. Filling, wholesome food and a balanced diet is possible with good planning, even with the most frugal ingredients.

I also picked up nutritional tips - the benefits of parsley for example - and how to reduce fat.

Something I now want to do is weigh out the family's weekly wartime rations and see how many days it lasts! No wonder everyone was slim during the war, but apparently slim, fit and much healthier than many people are today.






fascinating collection of WW2 Food Facts and recipes, 21 Jan 2008
If you are interested in domestic life during World War Two, this is the book for you. It is a fascinating collection of Ministry of Food "Food Facts" and recipes: including how to render fat and bottle tomatoes. A must for anyone who wants to try "Eating for Victory".



home guard , 02 Oct 2006
A great recipe book if you are looking for recipes from a bygone age then i would recommend this book.When you make the recipes it gives you a true idea of what they really had to endure. Buy the book and make some of the recipes and I believe you wont be disappointed.

The Arrogance of Wealth, 16 Oct 2008
Having spent 50 years at the sharp end of the Wine Trade I found it fascinating to read about the ephereal aspect which one only encountered through reputation and the more elite journals of the business.
Apart from being saddened by the discrediting of one much loved personality in the trade I enjoyed the discomfort of the exposure of a well known charletan and the unveiling of the enormous vanity of his hugely wealthy clients whose judgement deserted them when social acceptance was the carrot. To be the owner of a bottle of wine more than 230 years old with ownership attributed to Thomas Jefferson but without any clear provenance distorted the sensibilities they would regularly apply to their own businesses.
These bottles included the most expensive ever sold, which was a direct consequence of the self same vanity of the purchasers. But it was an enormous confidence trick that was compounded by the greed of the subject's clients as they increasingly fell under the spell cast by the opportunity to own a priceless, but also probably worthless bottle of wine.


When Money Isn't Enough, 13 May 2008
Mr. Wallace has produced a great read that is interesting from a historical prospective while it harpoons the very wealthy whose pursuit of money is no longer satisfying. Nope, these folks have to pursue a type of collectable that they cannot have any provenance for, which experts in the field can only hope to guess at what the bottle contains. Wine that is a century younger than the bottle on the book cover might at best be "recognizable as wine", unless of course it has become an ingredient for salad dressing.

The central charlatan in this tale is a master at exploiting the wishes of collectors and even the experts that should know better. Or perhaps that do know better and just let their own egos persuade them that in spite of zero evidence the product is real, and worse, valid sources that explain there is nothing to suggest the wine's legitimacy, never slow down. On with the auction!

The book is not just about human nature and its dimmer moments, there is a great deal of information on wine production, wine history and enough wine tasting descriptions for the most avid connoisseur. Or if you find the whole field a bit pretentious and tedious you might still be entertained by the likes of what follows "the art of drinking the very oldest rarities required an extra degree of connoisseurship-almost a kind of necrophilia".

I look forward to many more from the pen of Mr. Wallace. This is a very good offering that should find a wide audience whether you are an avid wine drinker or you feel the 18th Amendment was a great idea.

An Italian Classic, 27 Nov 2008
I think that this is one of my favourite recipe books ever!! I love Italian food and this book has it all. Really simple sauces and marinades to much more complex cookery. If ever we are stuck for an idea for dinner this book is always picked up first, I would highly recommend it!

Wonderful - just beware the quantities, 21 Aug 2008
There are some reviews of this fabulous cook book which complain about the poor translation, the fact that the book isn't in Engish alphabetical order, that the quantities aren't precise enough ... You're safe to ignore all these quibbles provided you accept the basis on which this cookebook was created.

It was designed to guide (young) Italians who were starting to lose their traditional roots in national cuisine and to help them know just how to make high quality food. For this audience it isn't necessary to give exact quantities or lengths of time ... they just know. And after working with this cookery book, you'll get to know these things too.

For me, a precise English/American book telling me just precisely what to do down to the last millilitre, gramme or degree of heat is not letting you be creative, not allowing you to find out what works best for you in your kitchen, and - above all - what great ingredients work with which.

This is a classic book; its English translation works; and I simply couldn't be without it. (And excuse me, if cooking is all about glossy photos, count me out: I prefer pictures that look like what I make, not some bizarre studio impersonation of food.

The Silver Spoon is all about good food cooked by real people in real kitchens. Bravo! Buy it!

A must for any italian food lover, 28 Apr 2008
My step father was an Italian restauranteur and had a copy of this same book in Italian throughout his career. He even had it rebound a few years back. During his life he ran a hotel in Rome and cooked for cardinals that came there from the vatican using recipes from the Silver spoon.

I was therefore thrilled when this came out in English and so far have bought 3 copies so that both my daughters have them for their homes. They use them daily. Not only is this the authentic cookery book for Italian food lovers it is amazingly economical, utilising seasonal fresh foods and not that many ingredients unlike so many newer recipes.

Risotto with carrots for example is fantastically creamy as the carrot is pureed. Highly recommended reading and an ideal gift for any newly weds or new home buyers.

Really Good, 11 Apr 2008
Bought this book from Amazon and after two weeks have cooked 4 things from it. Every recipe has tasted great with bags of flavour. More importantly, every recipe has worked.



Best Italian cook book, 05 Feb 2008
This is an excellent book with over 2000 authentic recipes (some are very authentic - there's a whole section on brains!) The recipes are, typically of Italian food, simple and easy to follow. There is also a small section at the back with some more complicated recipes from famous Italian chefs. All in all a top book you're not likely to get bored with quickly.

You'd have to be a Nigel ..., 27 Nov 2008
... to write this. Or a Jeremy. Or possibly a Terence. But maybe we all have anorak-y tendencies when it comes to name-checking the fondly remembered foods of our 1950s and 60s childhoods.
But sorry, Nigel - you've done this too many times before - and so have too many other people. Spangles, Dairylea triangles, Jammie Dodgers, Tunnock's teacakes have had the Proustian treatment before. And let's face it though Spangles now RIP, nearly all of these along with Sarson's vinegar and Bisto can be bought in any Tesco today. Though I agree that floral gums (and cherry lips, the best for eating surreptitiously through double Latin) have had the chemistry formula changed and don't taste the same.
When Nigel gets stuck, or his Proustian madeleine/Rich Tea disintegrates soggily into his mug of PG, he throws in a page or two about farmers' markets - and then he simply gets BORING.
Eating for England is simply Toast reheated. And Nigel is getting to be an old aunt who retells the same stories too many times. (He's getting careless, too; the delectable lime barrel was never in Dairy Box, p166, it was everybody's favourite centre in Milk Tray. And Dairy Box wasn't made by Cadbury's, either. )

A disappointing mess of a book, 03 Nov 2008
"Eating For England" is re-heated "Toast". Disappointingly, Slater has produced a clunker here, and where Toast worked because he linked food memories to his own childhood, this latest volume lacks any structure on which to hang various short observations and sketches about food. What's more, it's quite repetitive in places, and simpy doesn't work in others.

Slater at his best pinpoints a long forgotten food memory that several of us of a certain age will have had. There are a few gems like that here (the whole chocolate Club biscuit experience for example) - but these are too few and far between for my liking.

Nigel Slater writes best about himself and his relationship with food. When he tries something different - observational stuff about different types of cook, or diner, it simply doesn't work because he's not part of that set up. You can't remain aloof from such things and pretend otherwise. These pieces of the book come over as phoney - and in places bitchy and unamusing.

"The Kitchen Diaries" was neither a practical cook book or a particularly entertaining diary; "Eating For England" maintains this loss of focus from an excellent food writer who needs to re-connect with a loyal audience next time around. Nige - let's just cut to the recipes for the next one, eh?

All puddings are English. Nigel is a pudding. Therefore Nigel, regrettably, is English., 23 Oct 2008
Eating for England - The Delights and Eccentricities of the BRITISH at Table? I skimmed this book before delivering it to one of my numbskull relatives as a birthday present. After seeing the response here to this curious choice of words I'm reminded that no-one ever lost money underestimating the intelligence of the public.

It's an easy enough volume to follow. The layout is good, the writing merry and informal (if slightly knowing in the unappealing sense of the word 'clever'). There is even an interesting culinary suggestion or two.

Unfortunately nothing is value-free, and with Jamie Mockney under contract to sell us the fake barrow-boy-next-door line I'm afraid Nigel (change of name Nige?) Slater has still to win me over. Cookery's cultural implications, the idea of its saying something about the nation at large, is obviously dear to people's hearts.

But Britain is not a nation. It is a bureaucratic manoeuvre. In any event things like puddings are an ENGLISH speciality. So too Syllabub (very popular with the Elizabethans, who if nothing else knew who they were) and much else besides (try Florence White's 'Good Things in England' to learn more).

The title of this book is a masterpiece of ignorance and effrontery. Fortunately the modern English are the most passive, stupid and easily exploited people in Europe. They will buy it in droves. I just wonder how much faith we should place in the judgement of someone who doesn't know the difference between an administrative convenience and a nation in the truest sense of the word.


farmer's market propaganda, 09 Oct 2008
I must say there were many times where I laughed out loud or smiled in relation to many things I do or eat and how they are quintessentially British. I also learned that I AM the 'oh-i-never-measure-anything cook.' The experience of reading this lovely book, however has been marred by every other page judging people for not going to local greengrocers and not supporting farmer's markets.

I may be lucky enough to afford (or just a good budgeter!) to eat organic/local/fairtrade and have time to shop 3 times a week instead of one big one (I'm a student) but I know of too many people who simply don't have the time, energy OR money to buy ethically all the time and they shouldn't be made to feel bad for this. I want Nigel, Hugh AND Jamie (3 men I love very much) to spend a week in a council estate with a family of 5 and see how much money they have to spend on their groceries!

Lovely promise but...., 09 Jul 2008
I had looked forward to this for some time. I have been a fan on NS on TV since he first appeared. I like his style, his taste and his appreach to food. So why oh why or WHY did NS have to ruin it all for me with a single thoughtless - and eeming uncharacteristic - comment. He makes the point that continental stews are flavoursome and interesting while ours '...smell of old people.' As newly retired. I found it belittling, insulting and it stopped me reading the book in my tracks.

Eating through the hard times too, 09 Oct 2008
I bought the pair for my mum a year ago and they have ended up going round the whole family, young and old. Yes they have a nostalgic feel to them and it's food that nana used to make but thats what makes them so good, we are now having to live as if things are rationed, the meals that were made back then weren't full of e numbers and other nasty things (lets face it, we've all become alergic to them all anyway), they were wholesome and filling with no waste, after all I'm sure it's not only me that loves bubble and squeek on a monday with the sunday roast left overs. It has made me realize how lucky I am to have everything I want but I can survive on next to nothing.
Also the Make do and Mend is also full of cleaning tips and a definate must for anyone living in a period house and trying to keep things going, I live in a stone cottage and in a preservation area, with a house full of original things like Arga'sand stone floors I found good tips on how to care for these items without using chemical cleaners that corrode them away.

Fascinating, enlightening, 10 Jul 2008
The introduction to this book sets the scene of the wartime kitchen and beyond during rationing, and continues with reproductions of wartime leaflets. For content I would have given this book five stars but marked it down by one since I found some of the reproductions rather difficult to read due to poor quality - even with my super new reading glasses.

This book is not just a nostalgic look at the past but contains valuable nutritional advice which is as applicable today with the range of foods available to us as it was then.

Given the current economic climate and the need for us all to reduce food and energy waste, there are many useful tips to pick up from this book. Filling, wholesome food and a balanced diet is possible with good planning, even with the most frugal ingredients.

I also picked up nutritional tips - the benefits of parsley for example - and how to reduce fat.

Something I now want to do is weigh out the family's weekly wartime rations and see how many days it lasts! No wonder everyone was slim during the war, but apparently slim, fit and much healthier than many people are today.






fascinating collection of WW2 Food Facts and recipes, 21 Jan 2008
If you are interested in domestic life during World War Two, this is the book for you. It is a fascinating collection of Ministry of Food "Food Facts" and recipes: including how to render fat and bottle tomatoes. A must for anyone who wants to try "Eating for Victory".



home guard , 02 Oct 2006
A great recipe book if you are looking for recipes from a bygone age then i would recommend this book.When you make the recipes it gives you a true idea of what they really had to endure. Buy the book and make some of the recipes and I believe you wont be disappointed.

The Arrogance of Wealth, 16 Oct 2008
Having spent 50 years at the sharp end of the Wine Trade I found it fascinating to read about the ephereal aspect which one only encountered through reputation and the more elite journals of the business.
Apart from being saddened by the discrediting of one much loved personality in the trade I enjoyed the discomfort of the exposure of a well known charletan and the unveiling of the enormous vanity of his hugely wealthy clients whose judgement deserted them when social acceptance was the carrot. To be the owner of a bottle of wine more than 230 years old with ownership attributed to Thomas Jefferson but without any clear provenance distorted the sensibilities they would regularly apply to their own businesses.
These bottles included the most expensive ever sold, which was a direct consequence of the self same vanity of the purchasers. But it was an enormous confidence trick that was compounded by the greed of the subject's clients as they increasingly fell under the spell cast by the opportunity to own a priceless, but also probably worthless bottle of wine.


When Money Isn't Enough, 13 May 2008
Mr. Wallace has produced a great read that is interesting from a historical prospective while it harpoons the very wealthy whose pursuit of money is no longer satisfying. Nope, these folks have to pursue a type of collectable that they cannot have any provenance for, which experts in the field can only hope to guess at what the bottle contains. Wine that is a century younger than the bottle on the book cover might at best be "recognizable as wine", unless of course it has become an ingredient for salad dressing.

The central charlatan in this tale is a master at exploiting the wishes of collectors and even the experts that should know better. Or perhaps that do know better and just let their own egos persuade them that in spite of zero evidence the product is real, and worse, valid sources that explain there is nothing to suggest the wine's legitimacy, never slow down. On with the auction!

The book is not just about human nature and its dimmer moments, there is a great deal of information on wine production, wine history and enough wine tasting descriptions for the most avid connoisseur. Or if you find the whole field a bit pretentious and tedious you might still be entertained by the likes of what follows "the art of drinking the very oldest rarities required an extra degree of connoisseurship-almost a kind of necrophilia".

I look forward to many more from the pen of Mr. Wallace. This is a very good offering that should find a wide audience whether you are an avid wine drinker or you feel the 18th Amendment was a great idea.

Its ok...., 18 Oct 2008
I like the recipes in the book there are some things there that are quite different for someone from the U.K, my reservation about the book is i would of liked to see a few photos of the food as it always leaves me wanting a little when you arent sure how somethings should be presented.

Its obvious how to serve soup a burger but there are some recipes which it would of been a great help for.

I really like the ideas in top secret restaurant recipes:creating kitchen clones as this gives you a real idea of how things should go together.

Like i say though the recipes are really very good and easy too follow as well.

American Diner cookbook, 26 Sep 2008
I ordered this book from Amazon a few weeks ago. It is well worth the money. Brilliant pictures of the diners and the recipes are great.

Mouth watering, 03 May 2008
This is probably the best cookbook in my collection. I love food, especially American food, and everything that I've wanted to sample and never got the chance to, is in this book waiting for me to cook. I can't wait.

Fantastic!, 29 Nov 2007
I bought this book not too long ago as the other reviewers raved on about it and the synoposis sounded lovely! The reviewers and the synoposis were not wrong! This book is amazing! All the recipes you can think of that would be in a Diner in America are in this book! I love it!

Not just a cookbook, 27 Jan 2007
Having travelled a lot in the USA I started a collection of Regional American Cookbooks. I came across The American Diner by pure chance, thinking that it sounded quite good. I was wrong! It is much more than "good" it is quite fabulous. I have tried out a good deal of the recipes, all turned out well. The section on Burgers in particular I found to be quite invaluable and have cooked many of these with great results. All the recipes are written clearly and are easy to follow. Don't be put off if like me you live in England as all the ingredients used in the book are available here. On another note, the book is full of charming pictures of Diners of the past and a little story attached to each of them. I can't rate this book highly enough.

An Italian Classic, 27 Nov 2008
I think that this is one of my favourite recipe books ever!! I love Italian food and this book has it all. Really simple sauces and marinades to much more complex cookery. If ever we are stuck for an idea for dinner this book is always picked up first, I would highly recommend it!

Wonderful - just beware the quantities, 21 Aug 2008
There are some reviews of this fabulous cook book which complain about the poor translation, the fact that the book isn't in Engish alphabetical order, that the quantities aren't precise enough ... You're safe to ignore all these quibbles provided you accept the basis on which this cookebook was created.

It was designed to guide (young) Italians who were starting to lose their traditional roots in national cuisine and to help them know just how to make high quality food. For this audience it isn't necessary to give exact quantities or lengths of time ... they just know. And after working with this cookery book, you'll get to know these things too.

For me, a precise English/American book telling me just precisely what to do down to the last millilitre, gramme or degree of heat is not letting you be creative, not allowing you to find out what works best for you in your kitchen, and - above all - what great ingredients work with which.

This is a classic book; its English translation works; and I simply couldn't be without it. (And excuse me, if cooking is all about glossy photos, count me out: I prefer pictures that look like what I make, not some bizarre studio impersonation of food.

The Silver Spoon is all about good food cooked by real people in real kitchens. Bravo! Buy it!

A must for any italian food lover, 28 Apr 2008
My step father was an Italian restauranteur and had a copy of this same book in Italian throughout his career. He even had it rebound a few years back. During his life he ran a hotel in Rome and cooked for cardinals that came there from the vatican using recipes from the Silver spoon.

I was therefore thrilled when this came out in English and so far have bought 3 copies so that both my daughters have them for their homes. They use them daily. Not only is this the authentic cookery book for Italian food lovers it is amazingly economical, utilising seasonal fresh foods and not that many ingredients unlike so many newer recipes.

Risotto with carrots for example is fantastically creamy as the carrot is pureed. Highly recommended reading and an ideal gift for any newly weds or new home buyers.

Really Good, 11 Apr 2008
Bought this book from Amazon and after two weeks have cooked 4 things from it. Every recipe has tasted great with bags of flavour. More importantly, every recipe has worked.



Best Italian cook book, 05 Feb 2008
This is an excellent book with over 2000 authentic recipes (some are very authentic - there's a whole section on brains!) The recipes are, typically of Italian food, simple and easy to follow. There is also a small section at the back with some more complicated recipes from famous Italian chefs. All in all a top book you're not likely to get bored with quickly.

You'd have to be a Nigel ..., 27 Nov 2008
... to write this. Or a Jeremy. Or possibly a Terence. But maybe we all have anorak-y tendencies when it comes to name-checking the fondly remembered foods of our 1950s and 60s childhoods.
But sorry, Nigel - you've done this too many times before - and so have too many other people. Spangles, Dairylea triangles, Jammie Dodgers, Tunnock's teacakes have had the Proustian treatment before. And let's face it though Spangles now RIP, nearly all of these along with Sarson's vinegar and Bisto can be bought in any Tesco today. Though I agree that floral gums (and cherry lips, the best for eating surreptitiously through double Latin) have had the chemistry formula changed and don't taste the same.
When Nigel gets stuck, or his Proustian madeleine/Rich Tea disintegrates soggily into his mug of PG, he throws in a page or two about farmers' markets - and then he simply gets BORING.
Eating for England is simply Toast reheated. And Nigel is getting to be an old aunt who retells the same stories too many times. (He's getting careless, too; the delectable lime barrel was never in Dairy Box, p166, it was everybody's favourite centre in Milk Tray. And Dairy Box wasn't made by Cadbury's, either. )

A disappointing mess of a book, 03 Nov 2008
"Eating For England" is re-heated "Toast". Disappointingly, Slater has produced a clunker here, and where Toast worked because he linked food memories to his own childhood, this latest volume lacks any structure on which to hang various short observations and sketches about food. What's more, it's quite repetitive in places, and simpy doesn't work in others.

Slater at his best pinpoints a long forgotten food memory that several of us of a certain age will have had. There are a few gems like that here (the whole chocolate Club biscuit experience for example) - but these are too few and far between for my liking.

Nigel Slater writes best about himself and his relationship with food. When he tries something different - observational stuff about different types of cook, or diner, it simply doesn't work because he's not part of that set up. You can't remain aloof from such things and pretend otherwise. These pieces of the book come over as phoney - and in places bitchy and unamusing.

"The Kitchen Diaries" was neither a practical cook book or a particularly entertaining diary; "Eating For England" maintains this loss of focus from an excellent food writer who needs to re-connect with a loyal audience next time around. Nige - let's just cut to the recipes for the next one, eh?

All puddings are English. Nigel is a pudding. Therefore Nigel, regrettably, is English., 23 Oct 2008
Eating for England - The Delights and Eccentricities of the BRITISH at Table? I skimmed this book before delivering it to one of my numbskull relatives as a birthday present. After seeing the response here to this curious choice of words I'm reminded that no-one ever lost money underestimating the intelligence of the public.

It's an easy enough volume to follow. The layout is good, the writing merry and informal (if slightly knowing in the unappealing sense of the word 'clever'). There is even an interesting culinary suggestion or two.

Unfortunately nothing is value-free, and with Jamie Mockney under contract to sell us the fake barrow-boy-next-door line I'm afraid Nigel (change of name Nige?) Slater has still to win me over. Cookery's cultural implications, the idea of its saying something about the nation at large, is obviously dear to people's hearts.

But Britain is not a nation. It is a bureaucratic manoeuvre. In any event things like puddings are an ENGLISH speciality. So too Syllabub (very popular with the Elizabethans, who if nothing else knew who they were) and much else besides (try Florence White's 'Good Things in England' to learn more).

The title of this book is a masterpiece of ignorance and effrontery. Fortunately the modern English are the most passive, stupid and easily exploited people in Europe. They will buy it in droves. I just wonder how much faith we should place in the judgement of someone who doesn't know the difference between an administrative convenience and a nation in the truest sense of the word.


farmer's market propaganda, 09 Oct 2008
I must say there were many times where I laughed out loud or smiled in relation to many things I do or eat and how they are quintessentially British. I also learned that I AM the 'oh-i-never-measure-anything cook.' The experience of reading this lovely book, however has been marred by every other page judging people for not going to local greengrocers and not supporting farmer's markets.

I may be lucky enough to afford (or just a good budgeter!) to eat organic/local/fairtrade and have time to shop 3 times a week instead of one big one (I'm a student) but I know of too many people who simply don't have the time, energy OR money to buy ethically all the time and they shouldn't be made to feel bad for this. I want Nigel, Hugh AND Jamie (3 men I love very much) to spend a week in a council estate with a family of 5 and see how much money they have to spend on their groceries!

Lovely promise but...., 09 Jul 2008
I had looked forward to this for some time. I have been a fan on NS on TV since he first appeared. I like his style, his taste and his appreach to food. So why oh why or WHY did NS have to ruin it all for me with a single thoughtless - and eeming uncharacteristic - comment. He makes the point that continental stews are flavoursome and interesting while ours '...smell of old people.' As newly retired. I found it belittling, insulting and it stopped me reading the book in my tracks.

Eating through the hard times too, 09 Oct 2008
I bought the pair for my mum a year ago and they have ended up going round the whole family, young and old. Yes they have a nostalgic feel to them and it's food that nana used to make but thats what makes them so good, we are now having to live as if things are rationed, the meals that were made back then weren't full of e numbers and other nasty things (lets face it, we've all become alergic to them all anyway), they were wholesome and filling with no waste, after all I'm sure it's not only me that loves bubble and squeek on a monday with the sunday roast left overs. It has made me realize how lucky I am to have everything I want but I can survive on next to nothing.
Also the Make do and Mend is also full of cleaning tips and a definate must for anyone living in a period house and trying to keep things going, I live in a stone cottage and in a preservation area, with a house full of original things like Arga'sand stone floors I found good tips on how to care for these items without using chemical cleaners that corrode them away.

Fascinating, enlightening, 10 Jul 2008
The introduction to this book sets the scene of the wartime kitchen and beyond during rationing, and continues with reproductions of wartime leaflets. For content I would have given this book five stars but marked it down by one since I found some of the reproductions rather difficult to read due to poor quality - even with my super new reading glasses.

This book is not just a nostalgic look at the past but contains valuable nutritional advice which is as applicable today with the range of foods available to us as it was then.

Given the current economic climate and the need for us all to reduce food and energy waste, there are many useful tips to pick up from this book. Filling, wholesome food and a balanced diet is possible with good planning, even with the most frugal ingredients.

I also picked up nutritional tips - the benefits of parsley for example - and how to reduce fat.

Something I now want to do is weigh out the family's weekly wartime rations and see how many days it lasts! No wonder everyone was slim during the war, but apparently slim, fit and much healthier than many people are today.






fascinating collection of WW2 Food Facts and recipes, 21 Jan 2008
If you are interested in domestic life during World War Two, this is the book for you. It is a fascinating collection of Ministry of Food "Food Facts" and recipes: including how to render fat and bottle tomatoes. A must for anyone who wants to try "Eating for Victory".



home guard , 02 Oct 2006
A great recipe book if you are looking for recipes from a bygone age then i would recommend this book.When you make the recipes it gives you a true idea of what they really had to endure. Buy the book and make some of the recipes and I believe you wont be disappointed.

The Arrogance of Wealth, 16 Oct 2008
Having spent 50 years at the sharp end of the Wine Trade I found it fascinating to read about the ephereal aspect which one only encountered through reputation and the more elite journals of the business.
Apart from being saddened by the discrediting of one much loved personality in the trade I enjoyed the discomfort of the exposure of a well known charletan and the unveiling of the enormous vanity of his hugely wealthy clients whose judgement deserted them when social acceptance was the carrot. To be the owner of a bottle of wine more than 230 years old with ownership attributed to Thomas Jefferson but without any clear provenance distorted the sensibilities they would regularly apply to their own businesses.
These bottles included the most expensive ever sold, which was a direct consequence of the self same vanity of the purchasers. But it was an enormous confidence trick that was compounded by the greed of the subject's clients as they increasingly fell under the spell cast by the opportunity to own a priceless, but also probably worthless bottle of wine.


When Money Isn't Enough, 13 May 2008
Mr. Wallace has produced a great read that is interesting from a historical prospective while it harpoons the very wealthy whose pursuit of money is no longer satisfying. Nope, these folks have to pursue a type of collectable that they cannot have any provenance for, which experts in the field can only hope to guess at what the bottle contains. Wine that is a century younger than the bottle on the book cover might at best be "recognizable as wine", unless of course it has become an ingredient for salad dressing.

The central charlatan in this tale is a master at exploiting the wishes of collectors and even the experts that should know better. Or perhaps that do know better and just let their own egos persuade them that in spite of zero evidence the product is real, and worse, valid sources that explain there is nothing to suggest the wine's legitimacy, never slow down. On with the auction!

The book is not just about human nature and its dimmer moments, there is a great deal of information on wine production, wine history and enough wine tasting descriptions for the most avid connoisseur. Or if you find the whole field a bit pretentious and tedious you might still be entertained by the likes of what follows "the art of drinking the very oldest rarities required an extra degree of connoisseurship-almost a kind of necrophilia".

I look forward to many more from the pen of Mr. Wallace. This is a very good offering that should find a wide audience whether you are an avid wine drinker or you feel the 18th Amendment was a great idea.

Its ok...., 18 Oct 2008
I like the recipes in the book there are some things there that are quite different for someone from the U.K, my reservation about the book is i would of liked to see a few photos of the food as it always leaves me wanting a little when you arent sure how somethings should be presented.

Its obvious how to serve soup a burger but there are some recipes which it would of been a great help for.

I really like the ideas in top secret restaurant recipes:creating kitchen clones as this gives you a real idea of how things should go together.

Like i say though the recipes are really very good and easy too follow as well.

American Diner cookbook, 26 Sep 2008
I ordered this book from Amazon a few weeks ago. It is well worth the money. Brilliant pictures of the diners and the recipes are great.

Mouth watering, 03 May 2008
This is probably the best cookbook in my collection. I love food, especially American food, and everything that I've wanted to sample and never got the chance to, is in this book waiting for me to cook. I can't wait.

Fantastic!, 29 Nov 2007
I bought this book not too long ago as the other reviewers raved on about it and the synoposis sounded lovely! The reviewers and the synoposis were not wrong! This book is amazing! All the recipes you can think of that would be in a Diner in America are in this book! I love it!

Not just a cookbook, 27 Jan 2007
Having travelled a lot in the USA I started a collection of Regional American Cookbooks. I came across The American Diner by pure chance, thinking that it sounded quite good. I was wrong! It is much more than "good" it is quite fabulous. I have tried out a good deal of the recipes, all turned out well. The section on Burgers in particular I found to be quite invaluable and have cooked many of these with great results. All the recipes are written clearly and are easy to follow. Don't be put off if like me you live in England as all the ingredients used in the book are available here. On another note, the book is full of charming pictures of Diners of the past and a little story attached to each of them. I can't rate this book highly enough.

Surprisingly readable - I loved it!, 08 Apr 1999
I usually avoid French Historians, just because their distinct style is not normally to my liking. This book was an exception, and I'll admit it surprised me. It is dense and anectotal, so I wouldn't recommend it for long reads, but if taken in small doses it's wonderful! She's very, very funny, which says a lot, because French writers usually don't make me chuckle. It took me a month to read it, and it was worth the time.

A very French interpretation of the History of Food, 04 Feb 1999
I use the book in its original French version and have not read the translated English text. The writing is quite complex and heavy and at times chauvinistically French. The work however is very comprehensive and overflows with details and anecdotes. Sometimes, one is left to wonder how realistic and founded some of the statements are. Regardless, it is a fun reference work which is plenty worth buying.

Lots of meat in a flawed translation, 29 Aug 1998
There's so much packed into this book that it's better to use it as a reference rather than a straight-through read. The author (or the translator) is not as familiar with American food history; case in point: significant credit is given to "Betty Crock[sic]" for advancing the cause of cooking. It is unclear if the author knows Betty Crocker is fictional...... Worth having in your library.

An Italian Classic, 27 Nov 2008
I think that this is one of my favourite recipe books ever!! I love Italian food and this book has it all. Really simple sauces and marinades to much more complex cookery. If ever we are stuck for an idea for dinner this book is always picked up first, I would highly recommend it!

Wonderful - just beware the quantities, 21 Aug 2008
There are some reviews of this fabulous cook book which complain about the poor translation, the fact that the book isn't in Engish alphabetical order, that the quantities aren't precise enough ... You're safe to ignore all these quibbles provided you accept the basis on which this cookebook was created.

It was designed to guide (young) Italians who were starting to lose their traditional roots in national cuisine and to help them know just how to make high quality food. For this audience it isn't necessary to give exact quantities or lengths of time ... they just know. And after wor