Step Forward Mr Slater (Nigel Slater's Real Food)

Member Name: thevenerablebede

Product:	Nigel Slater's Real Food
Date:	21/02/02 (2649 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: see op

Disadvantages: see op

Just before I started at university a girlfriend of mine, who was older and wiser than I, gave me one of those Penguin 60s books. You remember them, those small books that cost 60p released to mark 60 years of Penguin books. The book she gave me was Nigel Slater’s 30 Minute Suppers and contains about 30 or 40 different main course recipes. Inside was written “Don’t cook any of it now, just keep it and one day it will serve you well.” How right she was.

Whilst I have always been a keen cook, I had never really heard of Nigel Slater and I didn’t tuck into the book until I moved out of halls and into a place of my own. The first recipe I tried was the Warm New Potato Salad with Melted Taleggio and Rocket. It was quite delicious, dead simple and was a n instant hit with friends. In that small book Mr Slater also helped me create the perfect baked potato and taught me an easy but delicious rice pudding. It was obvious I needed to find out more from Mr Slater so I got hold of his best known work, Real Food.

Real Food is 320 pages of brilliant recipes accompanied by mouth-watering pictures and entertaining and enthusiastic food writing. Mr Slater is clear what real food is “big-flavoured unpretentious cooking.” And the book is a tribute to simple but fulfilling grub. It is split into esoteric chapters which revolve round a fantastic ingredient: Potatoes, Chicken, Sausages, Garlic, Bread, Cheese, Ice Cream and Chocolate. All are ingredients that Mr Slater can easily get excited about and each chapter begins with a homily to the humble spud or the noble garlic before moving onto a selection of recipes centred on the featured ingredient. Every one of the recipes is enthusiastically explained and clearly a favourite of the author.

And it is Mr Slater’s evangelical attitude to food that draws the whole book together and makes it such a pleasure to read and follow. He is no food snob, but he does like ev
erything to be of the highest quality and more than a little extravagant (he seems very keen on cream.) I particularly like his recipe for Pasta with Spicy Sausage, Basil and Mustard. This sublime mix of spicy sausage meat, pasta, mustard, basil, white wine and cream makes simply the most extravagant pasta sauce in the history of extravagance. If you haven’t had it, you haven’t lived.

Other recipes with a continental flavour include the Roast Chicken with basil and Garlic (shove chicken, wine, garlic, lemon and basil in the oven all together and it creates the most remarkable flavours and sauce) and also the Potato Pizza (sounds odd, tastes delicious) always go down well.

But it is his versions of the standards that really take the proverbial biscuit. Slater’s Toad in the Hole is excellent, the secret is to use really good sausages, wrap them in bacon or panchetta and add some mustard to the batter. If you didn’t think you needed a recipe for a steak sandwich, then prove yourself wrong and make it the Mr Slater way. Other dishes are simply original classics. The recipe for Baked Potatoes with Smoked Haddock and Mustard is as delicious as it is simple (poach the fish in cream, and scoop out the spud, mix together and put back in the skins.) And remaining on a fish theme, I heartily recommend the Toasted Smoked Mackerel Sandwich.

Mr Slater’s genius is his tone. He offers simple to follow recipes that are not patronising or overly detailed. He believes that the cook needs to have a feel for what they are doing and doesn’t cosset in the way that, say, Delia does. That said, Slater does go back to basics and is not difficult to follow and his advice on cooking baked potatoes is valuable and useful. Slater carries the reader with his enthusiasm for simple and appetising food. He wants you to enjoy cooking and treats it as a sensual activity but also you must enjoy eating the food, otherwise there is little po
int in cooking in the first place. Mr Slater is a valuable companion in the kitchen, and if he hasn’t joined you yet, I suggest you invite him in soonest.

If you still need convincing that Mr Slater is worth seeking out, there is no real reason to be coy any longer. Next Sunday stride forth and get your hands on a copy of the Observer. Mr Slater is the Food editor on that grand Sunday paper and always has a lovely column accompanied by some luscious recipes. Even better, once a month the Observer publishes its “Food Monthly” which is edited by Mr Slater and makes a splendid read. Seek it out!

Summary: