This is such a lovely idea by Stuart Brown. Mma Ramotswe from The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency has got a cookbook out. Featuring a foreword by Alexander McCall Smith, this is a recipe book for the traditionally built. Stews, fruit cakes and redbush tea all feature along with lavish photography and well laid out instructions.
There is also a chapter entitled 'Making Time for Cake' which sums it up nicely.
The Cake Wrecks blog (a blog featuring the most appalling and hilarious
baking and decorating disasters) sometimes features cakes of beauty and
this round up of book-themed baking is amazing.
I absolutely love the
The Very Hungry Caterpillar cupcakes, but (and despite not being
familiar with the book) I think the Poky Little Puppy inspired cake is
my favourite. Beautiful.
I don't like to cook. But I do like to eat. So I was thrilled when the lovely Kirsty at Novelicious sent me model Sophie Dahl's cookery book as a gift.
Dahl is not a trained chef, but she is an enthusiastic cook and, reading this book, I felt almost like it was a scrapbook-type gift from a glamorous friend. Dahl writes beautifully (reading this made me want to read
her novels) and she's so enthusiastic about food and open about her own
experiences of overeating, being overweight, underweight and, now, a healthy and happy weight.
I love, love, loved Julie Powell's Julie & Julia, the blog-turned-book which chronicled Julie Powell's attempt to cook everything in Julia Child's iconic The Art of French Cooking, Volume I in the space of a year.
I'm hugely excited to see the film of the book of the blog (!) which splits the story between Julia Child's journey to become a cookery writer in Paris and Julie Powell's year-long New York odyssey, showing how both women were transformed by their new callings. Oh, and it's directed by Nora Ephron. Whoop!
It is released in the US next month but doesn't hit the UK until 11 September (pah). However, you can see a preview of the film right now as the trailer was leaked last week. See:
(Kudos to Meg Cabot for tipping us off on Twitter).
One thing I'm less excited about is the launch of Powell's next memoir. Although I've been eagerly anticipating what she would do next, I never thought this would be it... Powell's new book, released on 6 August, is called Cleaving and tells the true story of a love affair and a passion for... cleaving. As in butchery. Expect graphic tales of cutting into animal flesh and bones and all that lovely stuff.
Vegetarians (and those with sensitive stomachs) beware.
