Cookbook Haul | Autumn 2019

hi everyone and welcome to my youtube channel my name is Miranda Mills and I'm recording this on a Sunday afternoon in London it's quite a nice day out but I've had quite a lot of work to do so I've been mainly in today however on the Sunday I always like to cook something a little bit special for the evening and I also like to plan what sort of food I'm going to be cooking a little bit during the week so I thought today it would be quite appropriate to share with you some of the cookbooks that I've bought this autumn I absolutely adore cookbooks I have a huge collection of them and cooking and eating as a real passion of mine so there were some cookbooks coming out this autumn and I was really excited about and I thought I'd share them and my thoughts on them with you all so first up was the new Nigel Slater green feast for autumn and winter I bought his spring and summer cook book before and I really enjoyed that all of the recipes in the green feast cookbooks that Nigel Slater is doing are vegetarian and these books have actually had quite a big impact on my life because I would say for the past month or so I have swapped to mainly cooking vegetarian food at home and I was such a big meat-eater before I do still eat meat when I go out I eat meat and I do sometimes still cook meat at home but I have made the switch to eating mainly vegetarian and I'm really loving it and I think that a big part of why I'm enjoying that so much is because there's some really great vegetarian cookbooks out there now and these ones that Nigel Slater is doing are so good I mean I'm a huge fan of Nigel Slater anyway I've been collecting his cookbooks for a long time I love the way he writes about food and I really like his recipes I would say that you maybe need to tweak his recipes to your taste a little bit I find that he has very definite case himself so for instance I can tell that he likes things were quite a sharp sour taste and I think I have a much more of a sweet tooth than he does so I will sometimes adjust his recipe is a bit to just suit my taste a little bit better but what is great about his recipes that they are so adaptable and very user friendly in that way so if any of you are thinking of going vegetarian or just incorporating more vegetarian dishes and in your sort of weekly meals then I really would recommend looking into Nigel's vegetarian books I share some of my favorite recipes that I have been cooking so far yes so this one mushrooms chickpeas and Tiffani he's really got me into eating a lot more mushrooms and they do act as a great meat replacement in a way because they're so flavorful and in this recipe he's as those really sort of big portobello mushrooms that you stuff and roast and this is a really yummy dish I like the addition of sesame that just adds a little bit of texture and I really like chickpeas and tahini it's just a really nice flavor combination this one and it's really easy to do which is great another trick that my Jo does a lot is he uses muffins and a little bit like you would toast I suppose when I say muffins I'm talking about the English kind of muffins too not the American kind so they're savory and he tops them with lots of different toppings I mean here he's using mushrooms and blue cheese but you can kind of do whatever you want and I really love this idea because finn's keep very well then they often last better than bread they're really easy to toast and this makes just such a nice easy lunch though when I'm at home okay so another favorite of mine is this tahini sesame and but in that soup and you can probably tell there's a recurring tahini theme here I really like it though I like that sort of sesame taste I guess and this makes a really delicious soup that is perfect for winter and autumn nigel himself has said that he absolutely adores the Ottoman winter and that he actually really comes alive during those seasons and I think you can tell that from this cookbook I liked his spring summer one but I didn't love it this one I really love I think you can tell that these are Nigel's seasons he's so inspired with the food that he suggests making with the recipes that he creates in this book and I'm really loving it this it's just packed full of really great recipes for this time of year okay another book that I bought in the all term is food-related there isn't strictly a recipe book at all it's a cheesemongers history of the British Isles by Ned Palmer I adore cheese and I can be vegan because I couldn't give up cheese and I'm also just interested in British cheeses i partly grew up in France so I have a very deep-rooted love for French cheese of course but since moving to London one of my favorite places to go in Marylebone to meet with friends is laugh or mock laugh fromagerie on Marylebone high street and they do amazing cheese boards from their cheese room and I often try their British cheese board and it has introduced me to a lot of British cheeses that are really delicious and I think that British cheeses are really having a real comeback at the moment and I think that this book will explore that it will explore the bridge the history of British cheese may be why it went through a bit of decline and how it's coming back more now so I'm really curious to read this and I think this would be a great book to give to anyone who you know loves cheese okay another cookbook I bought but I in all honesty I don't know how much I will end up cooking from this book I am I am a fan of Downton Abbey though I haven't actually seen all of the seasons that they cover and you've seen the first years in which I lights and then the second season I just kind of lost interest in a bear she'll probably go back and try try it again sometimes I know how many people love it so I didn't actually buy this because I'm the biggest Downton Abbey fan I bought it because the author Annie grey came on t entitled podcast which is the podcast I host a few years ago and on that podcast she talked about her book the greedy Queen which looked at Queen Victoria's life through the food that she at and enjoyed and was a really fascinating book and on that interview annie mentioned that she was doing the Downton Abbey cookbook so when I saw that it was out I thought I really have to get this because I always like supporting authors that have come on the podcast and this looks really nice and minutes got really beautiful photographs if you're a fan of Downton Abbey then I think you would love this even if you're just interested in the history of British food which I am from this time period from the chrome 1920s and are geez then I think that this would be a really nice book Annie is very knowledgeable on the history of British food so there's some really interesting stuff in here and that's really why I'm enjoying this cookbook okay next is from the oven to the table by Diana Henry I adored owner Henry she's one of my very favorite food writers I've seen her speak about her books don't books in London and she's got such a warm lovely personality that I think really comes over in her books as much as it does in person and I was really excited that she had a new cookbook out and there's been a real trend lately I think in cookbooks and sort of recipes in general that are just really easy to do and kind of only require a roasting tin essentially and this cookbook sort of goes with that theme a lot of the dishes are just ones that you can easily pop in the oven and then pull out and you've got supper ready so that really appeals to me I'll share a few of the recipes that I've been making and enjoying this one is the seeded seared and roast duck breast you see them first and then you put them in the oven which makes them really easy to cook perfectly which is lovely and they're served with Asian flavored plums I I love duck and when I am cooking meat now I like to cook meat that's a little bit more special duck always feels quite special to me it's also a dish that in some ways brings up funny memories when I was just in New York with my dad and we went a couple of times to a local Chinese restaurant in Babylon in New York where he lives and we celebrated his birthday there and we had duck with the sort of Asian plum sauce so now brings back those memories for me now this is one I've also made as well it's really lovely and simple baked nectarines with pistachios and rosewater I think that baking or roasting fruit always makes such a wonderful dessert it's so easy but it's so tasty and it's a real way that you can also enjoy the bounty of the season and with that said I haven't made this one yet but I really want to especially for this time of year I think it would be really lovely baked apples with toasted rye mincemeat cider brandy cream so there are just some really nice easy recipes again ones that I feel will be especially good for autumn and winter because I saw that you can just bug in the oven and hopefully forget about and another real favorite of mine Mary berry I adore Mary berry I use her recipes the Christmas loads and she's just someone that I will always fall back on when I want to cook something and I want it to go right and I think that's what's really great about her books even when I want to branch out and try a new recipe when people are coming over which you know you're not really meant to do with her I actually feel safe if I can cook something new to me and it will still turn out well so there aren't many people you can say that about but Mary really does that so her latest cookbook is Mary Barry cooks up a feast this is really aimed for dinner parties and special occasion food which I don't really make so much now I live in a really small flat in London I have a very busy life so I don't necessarily have loads of people around for supper but you can also easily either double up or have her recipes which is really good so I've still been cooking from this and really enjoying it but if you are looking for recipes for serving a bigger group of people than this one would be really great I love making soup at this time of year and I've made this sweet potato soup with cumin and ginger and that's so tasty I love the flavors of cumin and ginger together and it's also just really easy to do which is fantastic mushroom stroganoff is a cerini tasty like I said I've been cooking a lot with mushrooms lately this is really easy to make but it is really flavorful and I love that about her recipes she's so practical with them she also gives that all tips so she tells you how best to prepare ahead she says if you can freeze or not and whether you can sort of make something a few hours or a day or something like that in advance and how long it will keep often to so it's for the really handy tips which I love and I absolutely adore loaf cakes there were a bear a real weakness of mine not just to eat myself but I also like to bake them as a present for people so this recipes really get great at her apricot and cherry loaf cakes it actually makes two so I think it's really nice one to make if you want should keep a loaf of cake for yourself and then give one as a gift to someone next up Jamie Oliver I'm a big fan of Jamie Oliver and as I am cooking a lot more vegetarian now I was really excited by his veg cookbook coming out um in general I've not cooked massively from this yet but I have made quite a few of the recipes my very favorite cookbook of his is I think it's called five things it's the one about just using five ingredients and I think that still is my very favorite cookbook there are a lot of vegetarian recipes in it that I've made and I just love it because it's so easy and the recipes in it are genuinely quite fast to do and this one they're a bit more complicated in that the rest of his the ingredients lists are longer but I still do really like this one and I've made a few things from it I've made this old black bean soup that was really tasty like I said I really like making soup this time of year I tend to make soup and then I'll heat it up in the morning and put it in a thermos and bring it into my office and I've done that with this seat it turned out really well and was really delicious Oh through the silky fennel soup I've made and that was really really good too so I haven't cooked a huge huge amount from this one yet I have made some of the soups I think I probably prefer Nigel's book in terms of the recipes are just really easy to adapt to my preferences but I still do like this one I think I'll be cooking a lot more from it okay and this one heritage apples isn't a cookbook but it is about food or more specifically apples and it's just a beautiful beautiful book it's by Caroline ball and it's illustrated with Victorian Apple paintings which are really really beautiful and she just talks about all different sorts of apples all the different varieties of English apples and their history and whether they're good for cooking or baking and I'm finding it really interesting I love going to local markets in London and there's a shop in Shoreditch I think it's called Leila's I always get the shop name slightly wrong I think it is Layla's and they sell really interesting varieties of fruit and vegetables and I've picked up apples from there with really curious names and now I can actually look them up and see the history of those varieties with this book which is wonderful another cookbook I bought more to read although I think the recipes will also be really nice in it is the little library year by Kate Young its recipes and reading to suit each season well I'm certainly someone who loves food as well as books so this was like the perfect book for me and I've been really enjoying flicking through it okay it has lots of really delicious looking recipes but she also talks about what books are good to read in each season and she chooses recipes appropriate to some of the books that she selects so for instance she talks about tuck boxes and recipes for that at the start of autumn when you might want to read a lot of back-to-school stories which i think is really charming so this is a really lovely read if you love books and food too this one I haven't actually cooked anything from it yet because it was quite a recent purchase it's nothing fancy by Alison Roman um Alison is a Brooklyn based food writer and I really loved her sort of chatty cool girl sort of vibe that she brings to her cookbooks I wanted to read a little bit from the introduction of this one just to give you a sense of her voice because I think she's got a really distinctive writing voice when it comes to food and I find it really fun so she says this is not a book about entertaining roasting a chicken for people is such a good way to say I love you I recently found this note to myself scrawled on the back of an electric of an electrical bill I had probably forgotten to pay written one night after a dinner party there was likely a lot of wine that night the best ideas always come from a lot of wine which explains my poor penmanship and well intentioned but fragmented deep chicken thought not exactly poetry but I realized after reading the note that it was the first time I articulated exactly what I wanted this book to be about and what I want you to get out of it because using your time and resources to feed people you care about is the ultimate expression of love and love is about expressing joy so the other thing I want you to get out of it is you can do this I've always been allergic to the word entertaining which to me implies there's a show something performative at best and inauthentic at worst but having people over well that's just making dinner but you know with more people unfussy food unfussy vibes and the permission to be imperfect no occasion necessary other than to eat of course so I think this is such a friendly sort of accessible book if you want to branch out into entertaining whom I know she doesn't like that word but having people round having as casual informal informal setting for inviting friends over for a meal this book looks great and I love some of her entertaining ideas and one of my favorite ideas of hers is she suggests to show you she suggests doing a hot foot what does she call it yet baked potato bar which I think sounds so much fun basically roast potatoes but then has it with really sort of luxury condiments like salmon roe and caviar to top it with she's serving champagne and then more normal toppings as well like sour cream and so on and I just think that sounds so fun I think that would be such a fun party to have maybe around bonfire night so definitely November would be a good time to do this and I just love that idea of making something really informal but just amping it up a bit I think that would be such a fun idea but there are lots of recipes as you can tell they're bookmarked and this one to try and I think it will be I would really love and finally another cookbook I've been really excited to get this autumn it's a new Pioneer Woman cookbook the new frontier so it's the Pioneer Woman cooks the new frontier by REE Drummond so this is an another American cookbook REE lives on a working cattle ranch in Oklahoma and she has the most incredible life and I've been following her work for years and years I love her recipes they're especially good for feeding larger amounts of people understandably because she feed so many Cowboys and her big family but I've made many of her recipes for things like birthday parties I made her trail etch a cake memorably for one birthday party of mine and people absolutely loved it whenever I cook any of her recipes for a party they always disappear people just adore them and I love Hanna down-to-earth attitude about food as well haven't made much from this one yet because I only got it very recently but I'm looking forward to diving into it more over the coming months and that's it all of the cookbooks that I bought this autumn I hope you've enjoyed this video and I'd love to know what cookbooks are inspiring you at the moment and do you have any of the ones that I've shared today now I will link all of the books in the description box down below so check that out and if you enjoyed this video then please do subscribe to see more from me but I'll be back with another video again soon so until then good bye

Channel: Miranda Mills

Views: 4,984

Rating: 4.9830508 out of 5

Keywords: cookbooks, jamie oliver, vegetarian cooking, cooking, food, vegetarian cookbooks, nigel slater, books, booktube, bookstagram, book haul, cookbook haul, diana henry, autumn cooking, recipes, vegetarian, the pioneer woman, ree drummond, alison roman

Id: tgEmguhyxxo

Length: 22min 59sec (1379 seconds)

Published: Sun Nov 17 2019