River Cottage Every Day [Hardcover]

Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall (Author)

Book Description

Release date: March 29, 2011

British iconoclast and sustainable food champion Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall goes back to basics in the newest addition to his series of award-winning River Cottage books. In River Cottage Every Day, Hugh shares the dishes that nourish his own family of three hungry school-age kids and two busy working parents—from staples like homemade yogurt and nut butters to simple recipes like Mixed Mushroom Tart; Foil-Baked Fish Fillets with Fennel, Ginger, and Chile; and Foolproof Crème Brûlée.
 
Hugh brings his trademark wit and infectious exuberance for locally grown and raised foods to a wide-ranging selection of appealing, everyday dishes from healthy breakfasts, hearty breads, and quick lunches to all manner of weeknight dinners and enticing desserts. Always refreshingly honest, but without sermonizing, Hugh encourages us to build a close relationship to the sources of our food and become more involved with the way we acquire and prepare it. But he doesn’t shrink from acknowledging the challenges of shopping and cooking while juggling the demands of work and family. So while Hugh offers an easy recipe for homemade mayonnaise, he admits to having a jar of store-bought mayo lurking in the fridge, just like the rest of us!
 
Including helpful and encouraging advice on how to choose the finest meat, freshest fish, and most mouthwatering fruits and vegetables, River Cottage Every Day shows us that deliciously prepared and thoughtfully sourced meals can be enjoyed every day of the year.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Hugh Fearnley-Whittingsall's newest edition to the River Cottage series focuses on the recipes he cooks at home for his family. He sees our food culture as a continuum, with those who are thoroughly involved with the story of their food on one end and those who are entirely dependent on anonymous, industrially produced food on the other. His object, he says, is to help people move along in the direction of "more engagement with real fresh food, away from dependence on the industrial food machine." Chapters include "Making Breakfast," "Daily Bread," Weekday Lunch (box)," "Fish Forever," "Thrifty Meat," "Vegetables Galore," "The Whole Fruit," and "Treats." Fearnley-Whittingsall's anecdotes about the recipes his kids make for their breakfasts (pancakes, oatmeal, tomato toast) and the lunches he packs for his wife (sardine niçoise, frittatas, slaws) hit home. The fish chapter focuses on sustainable species (and the intro outlines why you should avoid others). The meat chapter, interestingly, deals only with "secondary cuts," and offers intriguing yet homey recipes for neck of lamb, venison and pork burgers, oxtail stew, and spring chicken broth, to give cooks the confidence to open up new avenues and reduce waste. Throughout this wonderfully illustrated book, Fearnley-Whittingsall's passion is palpable, his genuine, spiritual love of food inspiring. (Mar.)
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Review

“the most charming and irresistible cookbook I've come across in ages.”
—Mother Jones, Favorite Cookbooks of 2011, 12/3/11

“I would love to cook my way through this book one delicious meal at a time. The range of recipes, from simple to more complicated, makes it a great book for new cooks, but there's also plenty here for seasoned cooks, too.”
—TheKitchn, 6/22/11

“the food is ace”
—NYTimes.com, Summer Cookbook Roundup, 6/2/11

“This book’s overarching theme of fresh, local seasonal foods everyday for everyone comes naturally, with Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall’s charming voice leading the way. Whether you incorporate a few of his recipes into your repertoire or cook from it every day, it will go a long way towards keeping you on a good food track.”
—Devour The Blog, Cooking Channel, 3/29/11

“The perfect book for anyone looking for new recipes for feeding their family.”
—The Family Kitchen blog, Babble.com, 3/28/11

“A crowd-pleaser. . . . The past few years have delivered a library’s worth of ‘quick-easy-thrifty’ cookbooks. Global economic crisis will do that, and from Britain, where pulling your socks up in the face of austerity is a matter of patriotic pride, we have new books in this vein by Jamie Oliver, Nigella Lawson, and even the late Elizabeth David. A surprising one is River Cottage Every Day, an accessible collection of recipes from the farmer-cook Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall. Compare, for instance, Fearnley-Whittingstall’s River Cottage Meat Book, which opens with a photo essay depicting the slaughter, skinning, and sawing in half of a cow. River Cottage Every Day, by contrast, begins with a photo of the author scarfing honey-smeared bread. . . . Fearnley-Whittingstall is, at heart, a philosopher, and these new recipes make a case for approaching daily cooking with intention—or, as he puts it, finding ‘things to savor and share that don’t just fill up, but make us feel good.”
—Saveur, March 2011

“Throughout this wonderfully illustrated book, Fearnley-Whittingsall's passion is palpable, his genuine, spiritual love of food inspiring.”
—Publishers Weekly, 1/17/11

“Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall’s recipes are the solid, no-nonsense kinds of dishes you want to eat again and again.”
—Bruce Aidells, author of The Complete Meat Cookbook
 
“There is more cooking know-how in Fearnley-Whittingstall’s little finger than you will find in the graduating class of any cooking school in the country.”
—NPR.org

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 416 pages
• Publisher: Ten Speed Press (March 29, 2011)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1607740982
• ISBN-13: 978-1607740988
• Product Dimensions: 7.7 x 1.5 x 9.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (19 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #26,273 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #6 in Books > Cookbooks, Food & Wine > Regional & International > European > English, Scottish & Welsh

More About the Author

Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall has become widely known as a broadcaster for his uncompromising commitment to real food and honest home cooking. His three series for Channel 4 -- most recently River Cottage Forever -- have earned Hugh a huge popular following. His most recent book, THE RIVER COTTAGE COOKBOOK, scooped the top food writing awards in 2002, winning the Glenfiddich Trophy, the Andre Simon Food Book of the Year and the Guild of Food Writers' Michael Smith Award. Hugh lives in Dorset with Marie and their son Oscar.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Real fresh April 25, 2011

By wogan TOP 50 REVIEWER

Format:Hardcover

`River Cottage Everyday' brings recipes that are a bit different than the normal ordinary everyday cookbook; although these could be served day after day and also for some special occasions too.

There are some excellent descriptions in the differences between cooking oils and flours. There are many pictures of the recipes and ones illustrating Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall's narrations of his cooking experiences. Entertaining line drawings are added into many of the pages.

He introduces each section, which include recipes for; making breakfast, bread, lunch boxes, fish, thrifty meat, vegetables, which includes soups, fruit and treats. These are recipes that are a bit geared to European tastes and cooking rather than the heavy American comfort food. They are healthy and make use of fresh ingredients and provide some great alternatives for ordinary cooking. Hopefully you would have a taste for thyme, since many of the recipes seem to lean heavily on this seasoning.
There are many delicious smoothie recipes and some interesting healthy alternatives for lunch. Surprising hits with our family have been; kippers with smashed new potatoes, scotch broth salad, slow roast beef brisket with potatoes and onions, salad of baby peas ricotta and green onions, green beans with tomatoes, stuffed butternut squash and especially his version of Eton mess with raspberries. That will give you an idea of some of the types of food that you can find in this book

The recipes are clearly written and printed out, with enough white space around them, that even when a page has 3 on it, one can read and interpret what you should be doing very easily. This would provide an interesting addition to many cookbook collections.

13 of 14 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Really Fantastic and Very Practical April 19, 2011

By EmAClimber

Format:Hardcover

I have to admit that I buy more cookbooks than is truly practical and unfortunately I often don't cook as many recipes as I should from the books I purchase. Unlike some that I currently own, this cookbook has so much more than pretty pictures and interesting ideas - a bit unlike High's earlier books the recipes in "river cottage every day" are practical day-to-day undertakings and can be accomplished by the home cook in a reasonable amount of time. His focus on seasonal cooking and fresh produce make this a year round winner - there are of course many recipes that take advantage of the summer and fall bounty of crops but these are balanced by a wealth of appealing recipes to carry the cook trough the less abundant winter and early spring seasons. The hand drawn images that are strewn throughout the book bring whimsy and unique detail to Simon Wheeler's beautiful photos. I am on a mission to cook through this book and so far have made the chicken and mushroom casserole with cider, roast beef, six seed soda bread, seedy spinach salad, and beef with mustardy lentils and mint - all included enough direction for the novice cook while leaving room for more experienced practitioners to improvise, some recipes even include variations. I are very much looking forward to experimenting with home made sourdough and fish curry (likely leading to fish curry pies) this coming weekend and am excitedly anticipating tackling many more of the books recipes in the coming months.

Thanks Hugh!

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Simple tasty easy-to-prepare cooking April 25, 2011

By A. STYLE

Format:Kindle Edition

I've just spent the past week cooking several recipes from the this book.

My title says it all. The recipes are straight forward and easy to prepare using fresh ingredients. They all turned out well.

Highly recommended.

This is an English book, so a few recipes contain ingredients which are hard to find in the US, eg kippers. But this is not a big deal.