Recipe Challenge - Book #19

Monday, 20 July 2020

This challenge has made me very critical of recipe books.  I don't think I used be so judgy but now I've had to trawl through a new book every few days looking for a new recipe I've realised that there are definitely some traits which which make some books particularly annoying and/or dissapointing.

The biggest irritation is not having pictures of each recipe.  I can forgive this in older books but it is really annoying when the book has room for lots of photos, but they use the space to present artfully arranged potatoes.

Exhibit A: Delia's Vegetarian Collection.  

The fact that the cover photo is an arty cauliflower should have been a warning.  

Only about a quarter of the recipes have pictures. Instead the author has filled the pages with very useless photos of things like oranges,  a vase of flowers, a bunch of garlic, a box of beetroot and whatever other shit the stylist brought in that day. So frustrating!

I actually remember buying this book from a bookshop in Hawthorn over 10 years ago, and the price on the back tells me I paid $45 for it.  I certainly haven't gotten good value for money as I don't think I've made a single thing from it. 

Yesterday I didn't feel like making anything complicated, and I didn't feel like making anything without a picture, so after flicking backwards and forwards through it for ages I finally found something I could face making - a very simple fried rice dish with egg and spring onion (the picture below the beans above).

It turned out pretty well - I followed the recipe exactly and made the fluffiest and most delicious basmati rice I've ever made. But the book still annoys me and the author should take a long hard look at themselves.