Three Good Things

Title: Three Good Things On a Plate

Author: Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall

Year published: 2012

Pages: 411

Time It Took To Read: About 10 days

This is the first Hugh book I've read since the River Cottage Fish Book. I wasn't massively impressed. I like the idea of cooking meals based on a few ingredients, as I don't like spending hours cooking with ALL THE THINGS. Saying that, his pheasant curry in the Meat Book is pretty damn good if you fancy something overly complicated that takes two days.

I like Hugh best in righteous fury against the meat and fish industry. This book has no such moral or ethical message. The three ingredient premise is fine, but most of the meals comprise rather more than three ingredients, not all of which I class as storecupboard standbys. He also mithers on about the amount of sugar in the dessert section. I dislike being told how to eat healthily by chefs, who make their fortune on tempting us into eating overpriced meals. There's no nutritional information on any of the recipes, which makes the knowing asides about sugar consumption ring rather false.

Each recipe takes up a double page, one page for instructions and ingredients, one for a large picture of the finished dish.The whole recipe to a page principle is one I heartily endorse, after having to hold a book open with elbow while mixing a cake and looking for the next instruction. 

I made a Courgette, Mozarella and Pasta bake for lunch for me and the kids today. It took 40 minutes, and I made slightly less than the recipe called for. It also included double cream and parmesan. I think it could have benefited from an onion fried with the courgette mush. It was nice, but rather bland. The kids refused to eat it. They prefer their pasta in swathes of tomato sauce. I enjoyed it though :-D

Book count: 14/50