If you were expecting to see The Observer's cookery writer and universally adored culinary deity, Nigel Slater, in his regular position here in OFM, then you'd better look away now. I have been given a once-only lease on the slot, and I'd like to tell you a bit about Nigel.
This issue of OFM is basically a homage to the guy. And rightly so. You remember when we serialised Nigel's brilliant memoir, Toast, a couple of years ago? I know our readers loved it, as did the country, and it went on to become one of the year's massive best-sellers, as well as winning many awards. Well this month, we have exclusive extracts from his stunning new cookery book, The Kitchen Diaries. I defy anyone not to start making the dishes at once. The book is a brilliantly-written combination of recipes and daily life, meticulously recorded over the course of last year, and dished up in Nigel's trademark relaxed style. The emphasis, as always with Nigel, is on availability and seasonality and shopping locally.
What is it about Nigel? Why is he simply the best-loved food writer in Britain? I can give you some of my own thoughts. Personally, I can't really cook at all, though what I can do very well is eat. So I do a lot of that, courtesy of friends, and they're so often Nigel's dishes. Actually I do have a signature dish myself - cheese on toast, with Worcester sauce on the bread and the cheese. It's also my only dish, but I like to think it's the kind of recipe that you'd find lovingly described in Nigel's books. He's not snobbish about food. You don't have to go to a food market at 5am or a specialist deli with an unlisted number outside Florence to buy your ingredients. And he's not patronising either.
They're the only recipes that one friend has ever used, and she couldn't make toast without first disabling the smoke alarm. She'd write comments like 'yummy' next to a recipe after she'd cooked it. Nigel makes it easy - you don't really have to even measure anything. He understands that if you only make food for one, you want it to be delicious, but you don't want to be spending eight hours locating, buying, preparing, cooking food, then 10 minutes eating it, and a further four hours washing up afterwards. He also knows that if you like to cook for your friends, you don't want to spend the entire evening in the kitchen sweating over nine menacingly bubbling pans.
This is what Nigel has written about roast potatoes. He says, 'Cut them up - you know how big you like your roast potatoes'. It makes you realise that in fact you do know how big you like them, you know what you like about food, with all its joys and sensualities, its memories and its love. And with Nigel you realise that good food, good cooking, good eating is really all about love.
