Introduction

Good food is a right, not a luxury
Food is an important part of our lives – not simply because it keeps us alive, but because it gives us great pleasure. From the moment we are born, when most of our waking minutes are spent eating, to our very busy adult years, when we have to plan and shop for our food, eating should always be an enjoyable and satisfying experience. Too many times in today’s hectic society, however, the thought of preparing our own food ends up feeling like a chore. The aim of this book is to change that feeling forever – by introducing you to the benefits and pleasures of good home cooking.

Everyone can have a go
We have come a long way from our parents’ or grandparents’ time, when the only convenience foods that existed were tins of meat or fish, or novelties such as canned soups. In contrast, we have modern luxuries such as microwaveable lasagne and boil-in-the-bag rice, yet I think we have actually missed out because of all these easy meals. We have forgotten our heritage of preparing and enjoying our own real food.

For this reason, I think it is important to re-learn some of the skills of our grandparents – and by this, I don’t mean those of just our grandmothers. After all, it’s not just the women in our families who are able to cook; my father and grandfather both enjoyed cooking and each had his own signature meals. Today, my husband is much better at making pastry than I am, and both of our sons are interested in making their own food and experimenting with flavours and ingredients.

All that aside, many of the recipes in this book are ones that both my daughter and I have developed together. We have made some terrible mistakes along the way (and still do!), but we have learned by them. It really is the only way.

This book enables you to make basic foods in the easiest and most convenient methods. We are more fortunate than our forebears in that we have labour-saving gadgets and more advanced ingredients that speed up the preparation of meals. My favourite example is fastaction yeast. These little sachets have halved the time and effort of bread-making, and the results are excellent and taste wonderful.

The most important message here is to have a go at a recipe. It won’t necessarily be a total success the first or even the second time you try it, but I have discovered that the more you make your own food, the more you are certain that shop-bought meals are both inferior and also very expensive. If you keep at it, the day will come when you say to yourself, ‘I could make that myself for half the price – and it will taste better.’

How do I go about it?
As the title says, this book was written to help you on your way to enjoying good home cooking. To start you off, the following tips are worth bearing in mind:

• Plan a few days’ meals before going shopping. This prevents you from having to worry about what to make that night, when you’re tired and hungry – and you won’t spend as much money.

• When trying a new recipe, read it completely before you begin so you’ll know the basic order of the method and have all your ingredients to hand. It’s annoying to have to scrabble around at the back of cupboards looking for an ingredient, only to find, once you do have it, that it’s out of date. (I’ve done this myself!)

• Create a store-cupboard so you’re always ready to make basics such as pasta sauces, curries and cakes. The various chapters in this book will indicate the most useful basic ingredients to have to hand, but they will also teach you how to make some of your own ingredients such as pasta, pastry, cheese and even bacon.

• Have a go at dreaming up your own recipes by changing or adapting ingredients to suit your tastes. For example, if you don’t like basil in one of my recipes, don’t use it; try another herb that you do like, and if that doesn’t work, try something else next time. You’ll find a blank ‘My Notes’ page at the end of each chapter. Use this to write down any of your own recipe ideas, ingredients changes or other thoughts on the recipes you try so that you can refer to them in future.

• Taste as you go along. Personally, I don’t like much salt, but I do like lots of pepper. Add just enough salt to give the right balance of taste to your dishes when preparing food. This will stop you and your family from showering food with salt before eating, and eventually you may not even need to put out the salt shaker on the table.

It may seem like a long way off now, but there will come a time when you’ll be glad you are able to make your own food and not have to rely on meals prepared by people you don’t know. Yes, it is a treat to buy easy-to-prepare foods or have a take-away; we do occasionally, and there’s nothing wrong with that. But as you make more and more things yourself, the take-aways will become less and less frequent. You’ll see that time can be found to cook your own food – because you want to do it, and so will your family and friends.

And just like you, they will all see that home-cooked food really is best.

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