The British Cookbook: authentic home cooking recipes from England, Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland

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This is the real recipe, made with a cheese paste that includes a spot of dark beer rather than a white sauce. The dishes appear alongside stunning food images and beautiful landscapes of the countryside of the UK by photographer Sam Harris.

After a trip through Mexico in our last review, today we decided to take you on another trip, but this time through Britain with The British Cookbook. This book will teach you all you really need to know about the food styles of the 18 th century (the rage for French food versus plain English fare),how it was eaten and how recipes etc were disseminated throughout the 18 th century. New models of femininity and gentility conspired to keep the mistress of the household out of the kitchen, and increasing numbers of ladies neglected domestic management for more decorous accomplishments. It is comprehensive, however, and full of recipes that many here in the US will actually find familiar, particularly if your roots are in Virginia, the Carolinas, Georgia and the Appalachians. Yet as Janet Theophano has shown in Eat My Words, this culture was alive and well into the nineteenth century (a trip to the Wellcome Institute or the Winterthur Library bears this out).

The book is published by Prospect, so the edition is beautiful, even if the index is surprisingly sparse. Very few of the recipes are in any way complicated and most use ingredients you can readily source on this side of the pond. Back in the 70's when the entire world agree to change to the metric system the USA opted out, giving as grounds that it would "cause too much confusion. Some people complained that the small typeface is hard to read in a kitchen environment - I am well beyond the first flush of youth and had no problem using it in the kitchen.

Having grown up on a diet of morning rolls, empire biscuits, and clootie dumpling, I am delighted that there is a comprehensive recipe for each - all in the same book. I will say that I have cooked a lot of British recipes and good kitchen scale is a must if you want to try any of these recipes. Nigella Lawson, Gordon Ramsay, Jamie Oliver, Delia Smith and many more provide their insight and expertise into some of the most iconic British meals.It is a wonderful feeling after taking a walk in a beautiful National Trust garden to come into the café for a hearty lunch to warm yourself. Part home-cooking bible, part visual and cultural tour of the UK, The British Cookbook brings together the vast range of dishes – new and old – encompassed in this wonderful cuisine.