Diana Henry

With the arrival a couple of weeks ago of "Cook Simple: effortless cooking every day" I now have three cookbooks by Diana Henry. It’s a gorgeous book full of really doable recipes, so I’m very pleased to add this to my small but growing cookbook collection. According to a little sticker on the dust jacket, she has been elected Cookery Journalist of the Year 2007 by the Guild of Food Writers.

The other books I have by her are "Roast Figs Sugar Snow" and "Crazy Water Pickled Lemons". She is also the author of another book entitled "The Gastropub Cookbook", a guide that focuses on the finest eating pubs in the UK. She appears to be quite a low key person, the only information I have about her is that she originally hails from County Derry in Northern Ireland, is the food columnist for the Sunday Telegraph magazine Stella, and lives in London.

I like her books enormously, they are all beautifully presented with lots of fabulous photographs, and, more importantly, really inspire with some wonderful recipes. A lot of superlatives there but well deserved I feel. She is not a celebrity cook, perhaps that is why she is not better known, but her enthusiasm and love of food and cooking shines off the page.

In "Cook Simple: effortless cooking every day" Diana Henry dedicates a chapter to each of twelve everyday ingredient groups: chicken, chops, sausages, leg of lamb, fish, pasta, leaves and herbs, spring and summer veg, autumn and winter veg, spring and summer fruit, autumn and winter fruit, and flour, eggs, sugar, cream. There are more than 120 recipes, from a wide variety of countries, and each takes only minutes to prepare. Spice rubs, marinades, and flavoured butters feature heavily in the book's many roasts and bakes, but there are lots of other ideas for quick cooking, too. Diana has also added some ideas at the end of each chapter that are very useful and motivating. For example at the end of the chops chapter there are two pages of recipes for “sauces, salsas and relishes for chops and other things”.

Some recipes that caught my eye include - Turkish Chicken with Oranges and Warm Spices, Pork Chops with Plums and Chinese Spices, Chermoula Lamb with Hot Pepper and Carrot Purée, Roast Cod with Anchovies and Bean Purée, Tagliatelle with Wild Mushroom Sauce, Roast Tomatoes with Herbs and Lemon Crumbs, Fennel and Gruyère Gratin, Pain Perdu with Clotted Cream, and Raspberries, and Pears, Raisins and Pine Nuts baked in Moscatel.


"Roast figs sugar snow: food to warm the soul" - the result of five years of travel and research. Diana Henry compiled this book of recipes from "colder climates" being originally inspired by childhood memories of "sugar snow", a "magic food" from inside a tree that could be turned into sweets. A fabulous book about the food we want to cook when it's chilly outside with recipes from New England, Quebec, Scandinavia, Russia, north-west Europe and other places where the winters can be fiercely cold. This is Diana's second book, I should cook from it more often except that it is rarely that cold here in the Mediterranean ... fortunately!




Diana Henry's evocative and beautiful book, "Crazy Water Pickled Lemons" is an exploration of magical dishes and exotic ingredients which transport us to faraway places and cultures. This is a jewel of a book bursting with ripe figs, sticky dates, scented flower waters, crimson pomegranates and wondrous foods and spices from the Mediterranean, North Africa and the Middle East. The dishes are tantalising - Andalusian Monkfish with Saffron and Honey, Breast of Duck with Persian Pomegranate and Walnut Sauce, Lamb Pilaff with Turkish Sour Cherry Hosaf, Mango Stacks with Labneh and Orange Blossom Syrup, and Amalfitan Stuffed Figs in Chocolate.