This sophisticated cookbook reveals the key elements to good living and great honest food: seasonal cooking. Chef and gardener Laura Faire takes us back to our roots with her original recipes made from locally and seasonally sourced produce with temptations such as Warm Duck and Black Grape Salad from the Autumn menu, and Grilled Nectarines with Vanilla Mascarpone and Almonds from the Summer menu.

Broken into seasons with sample menus for each, this rustic cookbook includes recipes for starters, sides and lunches, mains, puddings, stores and tisanes. There are also ideas for homemade staples and tips for growing herbs, fruit and vegetables through the year with advice for purchasing the best quality local free-range meat and seafood.

This book of soul-warming and flavour-filled recipes made from natural wholefoods is charming, fully rounded and holistic – an inspiration for cooks and gardeners alike.

SAMPLE RECIPE

Broad Bean & Prawn Pasta with Sorrel (pictured left)
When buying fresh prawns look for intact shells and feelers.

350–400g spaghetti (dried)
¼ cup cold-pressed olive oil
12–15 young broad bean pods, podded and shelled (1 cup of beans)
12 large raw prawns (king prawns are best)
1 lemon, juice and zest
mineral salt and black pepper
6 large sorrel leaves, sliced (or dill and flat-leaf parsley)
lemon wedges to serve

Cook the spaghetti in ample boiling salted water for 10 minutes until just tender. Drain.
Heat the oil in a large frying pan, add the broad beans and cook for 1 minute before adding the prawns, lemon juice and zest, salt and pepper. Cook for 2–3 minutes until opaque.
Add the sorrel leaves and the cooked pasta, toss together and serve with lemon wedges.

Takes 10 minutes
Serves 4

Broad beans
Broad beans are spring – the first exciting crop of the year’s bounty. Plant in winter and pinch out the growing tips when they start flowering, to discourage whitefly and make the plant bush out. Harvest the pods when about a hand’s length. Save seeds for future crops or to use in winter soups and stews.

Author Biography

Laura Faire is a trained chef and a keen gardener, who lives simply with a small garden in Auckland, New Zealand. As a food writer she has contributed to a number of books, including Shop Local Eat Well, also published by New Holland, authored two books for Nestle, and she writes for several food and lifestyle publications. She appears monthly on the Good Morning television show making delicous, attainable food with flair. This is her first solo cookbook. Laura has worked extensively with Kieran Scott, an award-winning New Zealand food and lifestyle photographer and regular contributor to Cuisine magazine and over 25 cookbooks.