Become The Naked Chef! (Jamie's Ministry of Food: Anyone Can Learn to Cook in 24 Hours - Jamie Oliver)

Member Name: blonde_girl774

Product:	Jamie's Ministry of Food: Anyone Can Learn to Cook in 24 Hours - Jamie Oliver
Date:	10/10/09 (160 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Easy to Follow Recipes & Wide Range of Dishes.

Disadvantages: Quite Costly to Make Some Dishes.

My boyfriend and I recently moved into our first house which was a really exciting even if it did nearly bankrupt us. After a couple of weeks the novelty of living on our own finally wore off as we realised that the fridge was empty except for some jam and tomato ketchup, the washing basket was overflowing and our bank account was looking quite low. The main reason for the latter problem was that we'd not only been spending a lot of money on things for the house but also the fact that we'd been eating our most nights. Obviously eating out most nights is far from sustainable, especially when running a house as well and so we finally had to face the reality that neither of us had actually cooked much since our University days when we'd lived like typical students on a diet of beans on toast and pasta!

Luckily one of our friends came to the rescue by buying us probably one of the most useful house warming presents that we recieved. We were fortunate enough to get quite a few nice presents off our family and friends however one of our friends bought me a cookbook... and my boyfriend some beer which I did think was slightly sexist of them but didn't bother to mention this! Now I've never actually owned and used a cookbook before, I've bought the odd one that I've seen on offer in those cheap discount book shops you find but they've always taken a back seat on my book shelf. I can remember when I was younger buying one and making such a mess in my parent's kitchen that I was discouraged from ever cooking again... in fact if I ever offered my mum used to try and persuade me against it!

The cookbook they bought me was by Jamie Oliver and entited "Ministry of Food" along with the claim that "Anyone can learn to cook in 24 hours" on the front cover. The book isn't quite A4 size although it isn't far off and the front cover features a picture of Jamie Oliver equipped with a knife and fork sat in front of a plate of appetising food. It isn't really a book that would initially grab me while it was sat on the shelf as the front cover is a little drab but as I'm quite a fan of Jamie Oliver I decided to give it a go the following weekend. The book is luckily hardback meaning it can withstand a little battering on my windowsill and the paper cover that covers the actual book means that I can easily hide any spillages, I tend to remove that when using the book so as to keep it looking nice!

I imagine the majority of you will have heard of Jamie Oliver but if not he's a Cockney born guy who came onto the food scene with his first television series The Naked Chef in 1999. Since then he's gone from strength to strength with a number of television series and also published books. One of his most notable series was Jamie's School Dinners which was screened a couple of years ago now and focused on his efforst to get processed and unhealthy foods banned from schools. As a result the subject of school dinners was brought to the political forefront and meant that many schools have since had to focus on a more healthy eating policy thanks to Jamie Oliver. As if this wasn't enough he's also the current face of Sainsburys! The book I recieved, Ministry of Food, was published back in October 2008.

The book begins with an eight page introduction whereby Jamie basically introduces you to the idea of this book. It turns out that the book is named after the Ministry of Food which was set up by the government during World War II to ensure there was enough food to go around and also to educate the public about proper food and nutrition. This is what Jamie aims to do with this book and his introduction ends with a "Pass it on Pledge" which Jamie asks you to sign to ensure that you'll pass the recipes you learn in the book onto a family member or a friend. It's actually quite a nice idea, Jamie suggests you master one recipe from each chapter and then pass it onto your guests during a dinner party. He also highlights that this book is for complete beginners which was incredibly reassuring for me!

This is followed by a six page section on what Jamie calls the "Essentials" meaning these are things that every kitchen should have. Now although he points out that kitchen equipment is quite cheap to buy there is no way everything he suggests you need would be cheap, not when he's telling you to buy a large griddle pan, metal tongs, knives, salad spinner and food processor! He also goes on to tell you about some essential ingredients which again would cost a small fortune to buy. These include things that I already had such as dried pasta, ketchup and plain flour and things that I'd never think to buy in a million years including garam masala, smoked paprika and tinned cannellini beans. Again I'd just much rather buy things like this as I go along and when I actually need them for a particular recipe.

The book is then split into different sections depending on what it is you're actually looking to cook. The sections include Twenty Minute Meals, Quick Pasta, Tasty Stir Frys, Simple Soups, Comforting Stews, Family Roads, Classic Fish and Kick Start Breakfasts so there is a real range. Altogether there are fourteen different topics covered in the book with the average one containing seven or eight different recipes. Each recipe follows the same format which consists of a short introduction, the ingredients you'll need (along with how many it serves), what you need to do to prepare / make / cook (depending what it is you're doing) and then the serving suggestions. The format is the same regardless of what recipe you choose to do and it's quite nice to have that sort of uniformity throughout.

The layout of the book is fairly nice in that the majority of recipes are given a full page and the opposite page has photos of the recipe in progress and the end result to. Some of the smaller recipes, such as the soup ones, have just a single page devoted to the recipe and the pictures. Every so often you'll come across a double page spread of a picture of someone eating a recipe from this book along with their name and occupation and a small quote of something they've said about the book. Although this is useless really I did find it quite nice to read some of the things they said, it also encouraged me to pass some of the recipes on although obviously all of this may have been simply acting! There's an index at the back which is the place I normally start if I've got some sort of idea of what I want to make.

Just to go into a little bit of detail I've always found that in the past recipes that use bullet points or numbered points are the easiest to follow, with each point being on a new line so I know exactly what I am doing along each step of the way. However although Jamie uses bullet points his instructions are written in a continuous paragraph type fashion meaning that it's quite easy to loose where you're up to, especially as you don't even have numbers which clearly would remind you. The instructions are written in a straightforward way, for example "Cut the ends off your spring onions and finely slice" or "Pick the basil leaves and place in the fridge for later" or "Add the garlic and olives and cook for 1 minute, then add the anchovies and tomatoes." All in all it's quite simple to follow his fairly precise instructions.

So onto the most important question of all, what are the recipes like? Well I've had this book for about three months and in that time have made seven recipes in total which I don't think is too bad going really. The very first recipe I tried out of this book was the lasagne which was different to any type of lasagne I'd ever had as Jamie proposed using creme fraiche instead of the white sauce and adding both bacon and celery which I'd never had before. The recipe was easy to follow and really thorough in that there was no point where I felt lost or unsure about everything. The timings were quite exact although I did leave the lasagne in for about ten minutes more than he suggested as the top didn't appear too golden when I first checked. The taste was absolutely delicious and everyone agreed it was the nicest they'd ever had!

Other recipes that I've tried include the classic tomato spaghetti, the sizzling beef with spring onions and black bean sauce, the spring vegetable and bean soup (without the beans as I forgot to buy any!) and the cookies too. Each recipe has been really easy to follow and they've all been delicious, in the past when I've followed recipes they've never really turned out quite right but I can honestly say that by following this book they've all turned out exactly as they should... or so people tell me anyway! Jamie really does seem to have every step covered, I usually manage to veer off track when following a recipe or by doing something slightly wrong which then ruins the whole thing but with this book I've managed to avoid any disasters! The food is delicious and I've never had a single complaint about any of it.

Now the only thing I would say is that the recipes aren't really the most cost effective, when I made the lasagne I made it for six people so I added a tiny bit to each of the ingredients as Jamie's lasagne serves four to six people and I didn't want to give too small portions! In total it cost me over £20 to buy the ingredients, by the time I bought 600g of good quality mince, the streaky bacon, the tubs of creme fraiche and all the parmesan cheese it did cost a small fortune. Plus it took about two hours to make and cook so all in all it probably would have been cheaper to buy a ready made one. I've found this same thing with the majority of things I've made out of this book so do prepare to spend a little on ingredients, but then again you are getting far more healthy dishes than you would with all ready meals.

This book has a retail price inside the cover of £25 although on Amazon it's currently selling for £14.99, on WH Smith it's currently selling for £17.50 and in supermarkets I've seen it for under £20 quite recently too. I'd recommend buying this book if you fancy improving your cooking knowledge and the number of dishes you can cook. There's a huge range of dishes and quite a lot of variety within each dish too, Jamie also points out that you can adapt quite a lot of them easily so there's plenty of room to experiment and put your own stamp on them too. The only people who should avoid this is those that calorie count as Jamie is far from aware of the calories that must go into some of his recipes, you could probably have your entire calorie quota from just one helping of some of his dishes!

Thanks for reading.

Summary: A simple cookbook from Jamie Oliver aimed at people who aren't great cooks!