Lori de Mori and Laura Jackson: co-founders of Hackney’s Towpath Cafe The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking? LJ: Simon Hopkinson’s Roast Chicken and Other Stories The food of love: what would you cook to impress a potential date? And what piece of music would accompany it? LDM: I never cook to impress, I […]
Natalie Tangsakul, chef and restaurateur The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking? I read old Thai cookbooks in Thai for fun. It takes me back to traditional and more elaborate cooking which I dream of having the time to do. The ability to leisurely cook and make my own coconut milk from scratch is […]
Angela Clutton, food writer and food historian The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking? Niki Segnit’s Flavour Thesaurus is one that I pull out more than any other when looking for ideas – or reassurance – on flavour combination possibilities. And I love her writing style, too – full of wit and personality The […]
Valentine Warner, cook, food writer and broadcaster The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking The Independent Cook by Jeremy Round. It was the first book that really made me think about seasonality, particularly British but also nodding to seasonal produce in other countries. It is deeply original, and the writing is very humorous. He […]
Vicky Bennison, writer and founder of the Pasta Grannies Project The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking Deborah Madison’s The Greens Cookbook. I’m not vegetarian but this book and her restaurant moved vegetarian cooking on from being only about lentil crumbles. I still use several recipes from it The food of love: what would […]
Fergus Henderson MBE, chef and restaurateur The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking? When Marcella Hazan’s Classic Italian Cooking arrived in our house, it changed our lives forever. My father loved to eat and my mother was always a good cook, but this was transformative. It expanded our horizons and opened our eyes to […]
Anna Hedworth, Cook, owner of Cook House The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking The Art of Living According to Joe Beef: A Cookbook of Sorts, this book has always brought me joy and ideas since I ventured into the world of food, making me see it was possible to do things your own […]
Cerys Matthews MBE, musician, cookbook author, radio presenter The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking Wild Food by Roger Phillips for showing me the edible plants, berries, mushrooms and flowers that grow all around us. I always thought it would be handy if armageddon happened, or if I ran away, I’d know how to […]
Felicity Cloake, food journalist and author The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking Nigel Slater’s Real Food came into our house in my mid-teens and frankly blew my mind – I’ve always loved reading cookery books but for someone brought up on Delia and the Dairy Book of Cookery from the milkman, the passion […]
Robin Moxon, fishmonger and restaurateur Cookbook that’s most influenced you I’ve never used cookbooks for recipes unless it’s cuisines I don’t have a grasp of ie Moroccan Indian etc – I then use them for ideas. I have a copy of Lisboeta by Nuno Mendes, it reminds me to keep it simple and that sweat […]
Sabrina Ghayour, chef, food-writer and author The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking Genuinely I couldn’t pick one because I take inspiration from so many books, people and things that I can’t attribute it to a single book The food of love: what would you cook to impress a potential date? I’ve done some crazy […]
Richard Bertinet, baker, author, founder of the Bertinet Kitchen Cookery School and Bakery and BBC Food Champion The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking? Lionel Poilane’s Guide de l’Amateur de Pain. It’s in French but I love to still go back to it from time to time. Poilane was my bread hero and I […]
Chris Corbin OBE, restaurateur, Chairman of the charity Leuka and founding partner of Who’s Cooking Dinner The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking? I would say A A Gill’s Table Talk has been influential and hilarious at the same time. His wisdom on why we eat in restaurants; a meal is ‘a metaphor for […]
Pen Vogler, author and food historian The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking Eliza Acton’s Modern Cookery for Private Families; published in 1845. It includes every British classic and all her recipes work. A succession of food writers filched her recipes, from Mrs Beeton onwards, so it has probably influenced more people than they […]
Jason Atherton, chef and restaurateur The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking I like The French Laundry Cookbook by Thomas Keller, it is so well produced and presented. Each time you open it there is something to inspire right there on the page The food of love… What would you cook to impress a […]
Sybil Kapoor, author, food writer and broadcaster The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking There are quite a few, including The Chez Panisse Menu Cookbook by Alice Waters and Chinese Gastronomy by Hsiung Ju Lin and Tsuifeng Lin. However, if I can only choose one, it would have to be The Robert Carrier Cookery […]
Ollie Dabbous, chef, restaurateur The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking I remember reading one of Raymond Blanc’s early cookbooks, which was a complete eye-opener. A few years later I was working for him. A few years later he invested in my first restaurant The food of love… What would you cook to impress […]
Rowley Leigh, Chef, Restaurateur and Journalist The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking French Provincial Cooking, Elizabeth David. Boring I know The food of love… What would you cook to impress a potential date Can’t remember Your top five dinner guests, dead or alive Ava Gardner, Ken Dodd, Phyllis Diller, Carey Mulligan and William […]
Atoosa Sepehr, author and photographer The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking The book that I return to that has influenced my cooking style, and continues to do so, is an old notebook that my mother gave to me some years ago that contains many wonderful Iranian recipes that were handed down to her […]
Juliet Harbutt, one of the world’s leading experts on cheese The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking The Edmonds cookbook! It is a published by a New Zealand company that manufactures baking goods from flour to cake sprinkles and has everything from shortbread to shepherds pie. My granny gave it to me The food […]
Robin Gill, chef and restaurateur The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking There are two books; The Silver Spoon which I used from a very young age and initially got me into cooking, then in my early professional career it was The French Laundry Cookbook, a truly inspiring and influential book The food of […]
Jose Pizarro, award-winning Spanish chef (one of the ‘100 espanoles’), author, co-founder of Brindias restaurants and chef-owner of Jose Pizarro, tapas bar The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking Many of them but mostly The Food of Spain by Claudia Roden The food of love… What would you cook to impress a potential date? […]
Diana Henry, award-winning food writer and author of eleven books The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking I bought the Chez Panisse Menu Cookbook and Claudia Roden’s Book of Middle Eastern Food on the same day, when I was about 22 years old. Claudia’s book I found intoxicating because it was food in a […]
Nina Caplan, arts, wine, and travel journalist; winner of the 2018 Fortnum & Mason Drink Writer The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking Moro: The Cookbook. There were plenty of classics in my childhood (Elizabeth David, Jane Grigson, Ken Hom) but I didn’t cook from them… just read them The food of love… What […]
Katie and Giancarlo Caldesi, restaurateurs, cookery school owners, food writers and chefs The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking Katie: Delia Smith’s Summer Cooking. I think over the years I have cooked almost every recipe. Such a lovely selection that still work with today’s tastes Giancarlo: I never cooked from a book in my […]
Bart van Olphen, co-founder of Fish Tales and winner of the 2018 Edward Stanford Food and Travel Book of the Year The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking Paul Bocuse’s La Cuisine du Marché. When I was young my father always cooked out of this book. I could say I made my first steps […]
Lentil Purbrick, Australian farmer, blogger and advocate for sustainability The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking The honest answer is I rarely cook from a recipe. If I had to pick one, it would probably be the homemade cookbook my mum left me – it has all her recipes written down or recipes cut […]
Rose Prince, food writer and journalist The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking So hard to answer but I would say that it is English Food, by Jane Grigson. Very accurate recipes that have strong visual instruction. When (the best) cookbooks have no photographs, you rely on the writer telling you what something should […]
Commendatore Antonio Carluccio OBE, Italian chef, restaurateur, godfather of Italian gastronomy The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking Scienza in cucina e L’arte di mangiar bene by Pellegrino Artusi The food of love… What would you cook to impress a potential date Something simple but utterly delicious, for example, scrambled eggs and white truffle for […]
Niklas Ekstedt, Swedish chef, restaurateur The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking If I absolutely had to pick one, it would be White Heat by Marco Pierre White. While I was at culinary school, we studied mainly old-school, French and prestigious cookbooks that were all quite similar. White Heat was full of energy, inspiring […]
Prue Leith CBE, GBBO judge, restaurateur, caterer, journalist, cookery writer, novelist The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking Elizabeth David’s Mediterranean Cooking. The food of love… What would you cook to impress a potential date A Pancake Pie. As homely as bolognaise but less messy to eat than spaghetti Your top five dinner […]
Elspeth Biltoft, award-winning Yorkshire jam and preserve maker Who has most influenced your cooking, and how did you first get into jam making? Katie Stewart and in particular her Times Cookery Book first published in 1972. I still have my copy, given as a present in 1974, with a hand-written note on the fly leaf: […]
Rachel Roddy, award-winning food writer based in Rome The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking Jane Grigson’s Vegetable Book. My mother cooked from it a lot and I remember the painting on the cover of a woman with a chair and a cabbage. English food has taken on a new significance since I’ve been […]
Sat Bains, Michelin-starred Chef Proprietor, cookbook collector The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking White Heat by Marco Pierre White. Looking back on it now, it’s just a perfect snapshot of where British gastronomy was at that moment in time. Marco was the original ‘enfant terrible’ and the images of him and the food […]
Jessica Seaton, enthusiastic cook and co-founder of Toast The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking There have been so many! From hours poring over the pictures in Cookery in Colour by Marguerite Patten as a small girl, to Tassajara Cookery and Indian Vegetarian Cookery in my early adult life and The River Cafe in the years we […]
Tessa Kiros, cookery writer and world traveller The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking? The Hamlyn All Colour Cookbook – I think from 1970. It was the one I came across in our home when I was young. I remember always looking through this book and thinking how glamorous the pictures were and wanting […]
Fuchsia Dunlop, cook and expert on Chinese cuisine, winner of the 2016 André Simon Award for Food Writing… The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking? Leith’s Cookery Course by Prue Leith and Caroline Waldegrave. An Italian family friend gave it to me when I was 11 and it was my cooking bible throughout […]
Damien Trench, cookery writer (aka Miles Jupp: writer and star of BBC Radio 4’s In and Out of the Kitchen) The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking? Something by Elizabeth David, I suspect. But which? It’s tricky. I’m not sure I’d have got very far in life without reading her French Provincial Cooking. But […]
Pierre Herme, chef patissiere, the ‘Picasso of pastry’ The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking Praline Passe-Partout – my father’s bible! It is a professional chocolate maker’s manual, published in Zurich in the 1950s, I borrowed it from my father, never to return it! It was from this book that I learnt the history […]
John Williams MBE, Executive Chef at The Ritz The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking The book which has been most dynamic in my life is the Great Chefs of France: The Masters of Haute Cuisine and Their Secrets by Quentin Crewe. It’s about the author’s journey through France experiencing Michelin starred restaurants. He […]
Simon Rogan, owner of L’Enclume and winner of AA Chef of the Year Award 2016 The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking The father of one of my best friends at school was an ex-army chef who had a copy of French Country Cooking by Elizabeth David that I was infatuated with. Most […]
Adam Byatt, chef, restaurateur The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking I find myself always coming back to Forgotten Skill of Cooking by Darina Allen. This book touches on the importance of passing cooking skills on to our younger generations; a wonderful tradition that seems to be somewhat diluted in recent years. The recipes […]
Nadiya Hussain, baker, writer and winner of the sixth series of The Great British Bake Off The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking I got a cookbook when I was 16 as a gift for doing well in my GCSEs. It’s an old book, full of classic British bakes, and I couldn’t live without […]
Andre Lima de Luca, Brazilian pit master The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking Hard to say one cookbook… Maybe Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking by Marcella Hazan (1992). Tremendous book, classic, big inspiration. One of the first cookbooks that I got, beautiful… Most memorable food you ate in childhood Probably my first […]
Miriam Gonzalez Durantez, Lawyer, food blogger The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking How to Eat by Nigella Lawson (1998) Most memorable food you ate in childhood Squid in ink with white rice Your favourite food shop Brindisa in Borough Market (The Floral Hall, Stoney Street, London SE1) Most memorable meal in film/literature/painting […]
Simon Hopkinson, English food writer, critic and former chef The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking The Constance Spry Cookery Book (1956) The most memorable food you ate in childhood Poached salmon with parsley sauce and cucumber Your favourite food shop Garcia, the Spanish deli and supermarket in the Portobello […]
Anna Jones, cook, food writer, stylist The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking Nigel Slater’s The Kitchen Diaries Most memorable food you ate in childhood Much of my dad’s side of the family worked at Cadbury’s when I was growing up. My uncles and aunts would come home with big bags of chocolate […]
Sally Clarke, restaurateur and food writer The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking Elizabeth David – all her books but especially French Country Cooking and Summer Cooking, which I steadily worked my way through from the age of about 11. I still have the original copies which my mother gave me from her […]
Russell Norman, restaurateur, writer and television presenter The cookbook that has most influenced your cooking The first River Cafe book The most memorable food you ate in childhood Sausage pie. Once a week my mother would buy pork sausage meat from the mobile butcher, spice it with white pepper, make a dense, greasy pastry and […]
Sarah Raven, food writer and gardener Which cookbook has most influenced your cooking? I learnt to cook with Constance Spry complete cookbook and Elizabeth David – reading most of her books from cover to cover. Since then, I rarely use cookbooks, but sometimes read new books from cover to cover for new inspiration eg Honey […]
