You don’t really want to know what goes on in restaurant kitchens, do you? You’d be a lot happier not knowing about the fights, the blood, the drugs, the amoebas, the “hypermacho posturing and drunken ranting”. You don’t want to know why you shouldn’t order an elaborate special, particularly if there’s fish in it, or where good pasta goes when it dies. If, however, you’re up to it, Anthony Bourdain’s KITCHEN CONFIDENTIAL (Bloomsbury) is enlightening and funny and anyway, these things only happen on the American east coast, where Bourdain has been a major chef for 25 years. They couldn’t possibly happen here could they?
Rocco de Villiers takes cocktails very seriously. So serious is he about mixing drinks that his book ROCTAILS (Struik) is a sort of autobiography memories of family outings (to a wedding, his sister wore “an orange and brown satin floor-length evening gown and wooden earrings. I was in a white safari suit”), trips overseas and parties with famous friends. De Villiers is one of the country’s hot new musical arrangers, and the book is imbued with the same easy style one finds on his albums. There are classics, recipes for non-alcoholics and a unique chapter using indigenous ingredients.
If you aren’t a Jamie Oliver devotee then HAPPY DAYS WITH THE NAKED CHEF (Penguin) could change all that. Once you’re converted you’ll appreciate the hundred or so photographs of food’s boy wonder, pensive in the kitchen, merry at lunch. There’s only one thing Jamie loves more than food: and that’s himself. A beautifully produced book that includes loads of chicken and meat (vegetarians beware), and an off-beat look at food for kids recipes they can make themselves. Oliver’s sense of humour is on a par with his brilliant ideas for bread.
This is the gargantuan work that every food aficionado leaves, “unselfconsciously” on the kitchen shelf, to let guests know their chef is well-researched. First published in 1938, the LAROUSSE GASTRONOMIQUE (Hamlyn) was produced under the aegis of French chef Prosper Montagne, but the latest edition was presided over by gastronomic committee president Joel Robuchon. No doubt about it, this has every standard recipe on Earth, as well as potted histories about the way humankind developed the use of food. The wise chef will memorise all 1300 pages before he starts to cook.