Hugh’s Three Good Things… on a plate
Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall
Bloomsbury
In conjunction with a new Channel 4 series of the same name due to start in the coming weeks (the date has yet to be confirmed ), Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall has gone back to basics with a simple question: using only three ingredients, what recipes can you come up with? And, as usual, Fearnley-Whittingstall is on the money simplifying cooking by putting three ingredients together with more thought than heartache to produce 200 recipes that anyone can easily combine to make a tasty lunch or evening meal, with a little help from a good store of essential components.
The chapters are laid back and in touch with Fearnley-Whittingstall’s ability to be natural and uncomplicated and include those such as ‘three in a bed salads’; ‘one, two, three go… starters and soups’; ‘triple quick snacks and sides’; ‘vegetable trios’; ‘fish and two friends’; ‘meat and sometimes two veg’; ‘pasta, rice and company’; ‘fruity threesomes’; and ‘triple treats’, with a final short section on store-cupboard standbys. The best of the recipes include those that utilise courgettes; mangetout and lemon; beetroot, apple and pecans; fennel, tangerine and pumpkin seeds; smoked fish, leek and potato; spinach, leek and béchamel; porridge, nettles and bacon rind; potato, cheese and thyme; lobster, cucumber and apple; pasta, tomatoes and blue cheese; and ricotta, honeycomb and hazelnuts. That said, while the simplicity of each combination does not easily convey what Fearnley-Whittingstall creates, this is, overall, a fresh take on cooking in Fearnley-Whittingstall’s inimitable style that should make good television when the series is broadcast in the coming weeks.
