I have an addiction luckily it isn't too damaging to my health , my addiction is cook books , I love cooking and indeed am a cook so it really is something that aids my career ! My most recent addition to my collection is Rachel Allen's Home cooking bought for 50p at our band jumble sale see I had no hope of resisting!! What is it? Home cooking is written by the Irish TV chef Rachel Allen who studied at Ballymaloe Cookery School and also teaches there. This is her 6th book but her first for me I decided to buy it after having a quick flick because this covered every meal as well as having lovely sounding recipes which were well laid out and didn't seem ...  Read the complete review

I already own two of Rachel Allen's books and have watched several of her televisions series. I was hoping to receive her latest book Home Cooking for Christmas and having received it I can happily say I am glad I did. There often seems to be a mixed opinion of Rachel herself. Some love her happy homely approach. Others find this annoying and possibly a bit twee. Home Cooking is her biggest book to date containing 351 pages and like her previous books it ties in with the television serious by the same name (currently been shown on Saturday mornings, 11.35 a.m., BBC1). The television series only features a couple of recipes per episode though, just giving a ...  Read the complete review

This book is one of 3 Rachel Allen books that I currently own - the others being the excellent 'Bake' and 'Rachel's Food for Living.' If you are not already familiar with her, Allen is part of the same family that run the prestigious Ballymaloe cookery school in Ireland. She also has TV series that are shown on the BBC and Good Food channel. I bought this book for only £7.50 in WHSmith. It has an RRP of £25 but can be bought for £16 on Amazon and is also available in a Kindle version. The physical book itself is quite sturdy - being hardback with a matt cover and a bookmark ribbon. The paper is of good quality and the binding strong enough that ...  Read the complete review

For me the only person that can rival Nigella is Rachel Allen. I'm a relative newcomer to her work, but since i discovered her various tv series i've been quite a fan. The great thing about this book in particular is that it is such a good 'basic' cook book. It's full of real food, not the sort that intimidates the heck out of you, but the sort you'd happily make for your family and friends. The layout is easy to follow, easy to read instructions but there aren't photos for each recipe. I really like the fact that the book is split into courses as chapters - which are as follows - Breakfast Lunch sunday ...  Read the complete review