Cook, eat, repeat

by Nigella Lawson

Cooking is not something you do, and then its finished with.  It is a thread woven through our lives, encompassing memory, desire and sustenance, both physical and emotional.

When my daughter Katy was born, I was sent a copy of Nigella’s Feast.  I read it from cover to cover during those long breast-feeding hours.  Katy turned 21 during the hard lockdown in April last year and FEAST is still the cookbook I turn to over and over again for tried and trusted recipes!

Cook, eat, repeat reminds me a bit of Feast although it feels more like a lovely long conversation about food with a friend than a regular cookbook.  There are obviously many recipes (150!) and pics but there’s a lot of chatty observation about food in general.  For example, there’s a chapter on anchovies and loads of suggestions – throw some anchovies in a pan with garlic, lemon zest and etc etc – before you actually get to the recipes. She defends brown food (stews), raves about anchovies and rhubarb, has a groan about the annoying concept of a “guilty pleasure”, explains what makes a good recipe, inspires some vegan feasts and extols the comforts of Christmas.  On the subject of brown butter Nigella says I feel so excitedly full of suggestions that I hardly know how to marshal this undisciplined barrage of ideas!

I spent the weekend reading through it marking recipes and writing up grocery lists.  Lovely ideas popped up like creamy anchovy sauce, rum-spiked French toast, salty chocolate cookies, green tahini sauce, chocolate peanut butter cake, Tuscan bean soup etc etc.  Let Nigella tell you about it in this video on the PRH page:  https://bit.ly/2YFuHPM

Cooking and eating are daily ways to find pleasure, and to share it, and that companionship is as much the measure of a good dinner as the food.

You really feel as if she wants you to succeed, gently holding your hand and leading you to the oven to prove that even you – the woman who burnt porridge – can share in her love of food. And if there is one thing lockdown 2.0 needs more of, it is compassion and kindness like that – the Independent

Cook, eat, repeat has come to save lockdown – Hello magazine

Good news is that the TV series will be aired in SA on BBC Lifestyle from the 15th of March.