Changes

The picture on the front cover did make me wonder if we were revisiting the bad old days of stodgy, heavy British food, but I was reassured when I looked at the recipes. Some traditional recipes are reworked and given a modern twist - such as delicious smoked haddock, poached egg and spinach on toast which gives a nod to Eggs Benedict. The picture suggests that you can eat this almost as an open sandwich. Please don't try this at home - you'll end up with egg in your lap - but do try it as it really is very tasty. It's down as a breakfast recipe - but it makes a very good lunch around here!

Some traditional dishes are lightly reworked - such as the ploughman's lunch or toad in the hole - but there's a real taste of the way we eat now in 12-Hour Rabbit Bolognese, with it's acknowledgement that the roots of our food are quite often beyond our shores and that foraging for food (or - go on - buying it from your local butcher) is becoming more common. Unfortunately the fruit and vegetables in this section are restricted to one recipe for seared peppered steak with wild mushrooms and watercress. There are no warnings that not all wild mushrooms should be eaten (there's more information in [[Fungi by Michael Jordan]]) and it would have been good to see him make more use of wild brambles or crab apples. This is an area which is close to the heart of [[River Cottage Cookbook by Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall|Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall]].