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First published by HarperCollinsPublishers 2019
FIRST EDITION
© Rosie Birkett 2019
Cover layout design © HarperCollinsPublishers 2019
Cover photograph © Helen Cathcart 2019
Food styling: Becks Wilkinson
Prop styling: Linda Berlin
A catalogue record of this book is available from the British Library
Rosie Birkett asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work
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Source ISBN: 9780008314279
Ebook Edition © May 2019 ISBN: 9780008314286
Version 2019-05-20
For Chrissy – the original JHC
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Contents
5 Fermented, Pickled and Preserved
Knowing how to cook and eat well is not only one of life’s most essential and great pleasures, it is a tonic for daily life. Engaging your senses, working with your hands and letting your mind unwind as you gently caramelise onions in butter until they smell so good you’re compelled to eat them straight from the pan: this is the magic of home cooking. And it should be fun, too. Where there’s cooking there’s often – delete as appropriate – lovers/friends/family/kids/dogs/wine/music. There’s discussion and debate, sometimes drama. The kitchen fills with the scent of good food, the windows steam up, the glasses brim, and the warm, fuzzy mess of our lives unfolds over plates of food greedily scraped clean.
Cooking is one of the most enriching and creative things we can do for ourselves and for those we love, and as something that we have to do most days, it should be joyful. For me, that means food prepared with a little thought and care. It could be as simple as a thick slice of homemade toast, soaking with really good butter and topped with a couple of excellent preserved anchovies; or clouds of golden meringue deep with the molasses kick of muscovado sugar. First and foremost, it’s about flavour.
As a food and cookery writer, it’s my job to obsess over food, write about it, create recipes, and I care immensely about every morsel I pop into my greedy, not-so-little mouth and the mouths of those in my vicinity. This book celebrates the possibilities and pleasures that homemade food can bring us when we take the time
