In this timely new book, Darina reconnects you with the cooking skills that missed a generation or two. The book is divided into chapters such as Dairy, Poultry and Eggs, Bread, and Preserving, and forgotten processes such as smoking mackerel, curing bacon, and making yogurt and butter are explained in the simplest terms. The delicious recipes show you how to use your homemade bounty to its best, and include ideas for using forgotten cuts of meat, baking bread and cakes, and even eating food from the wild. The Vegetables and Herbs chapter is stuffed with growing tips to satisfy even those with the smallest garden plot or window box, and there are plenty of suggestions for using gluts of vegetables. You'll even discover how to keep a few chickens in your backyard. With over 700 recipes, this is the definitive modern guide to traditional cooking skills.
Review
"Ms. Allen runs the great cookery school at Ballymaloe, Ireland, near Cork, and this whopper of a book includes foraging among its 'forgottens,' along with how to draw and pluck birds, make butter and cheese, and tend hens. It doesn't tell how to milk a cow, though." --Wall St. Journal (London), Best Food Books of 2009
This transporting book ... will delight anyone who wants to connect with such endangered domestic tasks as churning butter, foraging, and making homemade apple cider. Allen is an astounding teacher, and her enthusiasm for good things and old-fashioned thriftiness is impossible to resist. She shares stories, recipes, tips, and techniques that will inspire you to craft all sorts of staples that these days usually come in packages from the grocery store. Once you taste your own vinegar and bread and cheese, and get into the swing of making them, chances are, you won't go back to the modern way. --Fine Cooking, March 2010 issue
A 12-week course at Darina Allen's Ballymaloe Cookery School in East Cork, Ireland, costs more than $13,000. What a treat if you can swing it, but those who plunk down $40 for her beautiful new book will be treated to much of what's covered. Deserved praise has been heaped upon Allen, who founded the school 27 years ago, and on her many cookbooks. The dishes Allen makes at Ballymaloe might produce more smashing results because she works with ingredients from her 100-acre organic farm. Still, the book might inspire cooks elsewhere to use the freshest, most sustainable foodstuffs they can find. At the very least, she urges us to reconsider our disposable society: Scrape the mold from a piece of cheese or the surface of a pot of jam. We can eat what's underneath and survive. --The Washington Post, March 17, 2010
Forgotten Skills of Cooking is a 600-page treasure trove gleaned from Darina's experience working on the front lines... She knows that many of her students often lack skill simply because the knowledge hasn't been handed down to them.... The book is hefty and indeed Darina cracks the culinary code on every page. Of course, she includes carefully written and tested traditional recipes, but she expands on those recipes and clearly explains the hows and whys.... I believe that Darina's latest tome is bound to become a classic. As we reach for more local foods and strive to create more out of less, it's critically important to have books such as this one on hand and at the ready. Thank you, Darina! --Amazon's Al Dente Blog, March 16, 2010
A beautiful and substantial text, full of Irish charm.... This book condenses years of cooking wisdom, gleaned over Allen's lifetime. There are hundreds of recipes, but Allen's chief concern is to pass along knowledge one usually learns only at the hands of a grandparent or other trusted elder - and not from books.... Though based on ancient, from-the-land strategies, Allen's recipes are hardly old-fashioned, even those that are distinctly Irish, such as Mary Keane's Listowel Mutton Pies. --Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, March 16, 2010
Really, you just want to linger in Allen's homemade world for as long as possible, sipping black-currant-leaf lemonade before wandering from the 100-acre garden to the smokehouse to check on your mussels and hogget. --New York Times Book Review, Summer Roundup, June 6, 2010
From the Publisher
Winner of the Andre Simon Food Awards Best Food Book of 2009
From the Author
So many of our happiest childhood memories are connected to food. Picnics by the sea, afternoon tea with Granny, Mammy's lamb stew, or treacle pudding around the kitchen table. How many times have I heard, "I remember Aunt Margie used to make a wonderful apple pie. I wish I'd asked her for the recipe." So don't leave it until it's too late. Maybe even start a little booklet of favorite family recipes and add to it from time to time. It'll make a terrific and worthwhile present for your youngsters when they eventually leave home.
In the past 20-30 years, many people have concentrated on careers and a certain set of academic skills. The subliminal message coming through our educational system, and in many cases from parents as well, was that cooking and gardening were skills that one shouldn't be bothered with and would never need to know. But the path of life doesn't always run smoothly and so many confident young people who were riding the crest of a wave are suddenly forced to face the reality that they are virtually helpless in a changed situation. So part of the mission of this book is to urge parents and grandparents not to allow any more of our young people to leave home without the life skills they need, not only to survive, but also to enhance the quality of their lives. With oil supplies diminishing and energy prices rising, we are likely to need these skills even more in the future.
The other reason for writing this book was to provide a resource for the growing number of farmers and food producers with excellent raw materials who are interested in adding value to their produce. There is also a new generation whose interest in artisan food production has taken them to careers in small-scale cheese making, meat curing, or beer brewing. If we want to keep them alive, we need to support them too. I hope this book will be a valuable resource for them all.
About the Author
Darina Allen runs the world-renowned cookery school at Ballymaloe in County Cork, Ireland, which she founded with her husband in 1983. She runs the highly regarded three-month diploma course as well as various short courses, including the Forgotten Skills series, which is the inspiration behind this book. Darina is the award-winning author of Irish Traditional Cooking, Ballymaloe Cookery Course, A Year at Ballymaloe, Healthy Gluten-free Eating (with Rosemary Kearney), and Easy Entertaining. She is Ireland's most famous TV-cook, having presented nine series of her cooking program, Simply Delicious, on television around the world. Darina founded the first Farmers' Markets in Ireland and is a tireless campaigner for local produce. She is a natural teacher and was awarded IACP's 2005 Cooking Teacher of the Year Award.
