Heston's In Search Of Perfection Or Absurd Recipes and satisfying Reading

When I began this blog, as one of my four followers may, or may not, care to remember, the point was to write about food writing.

Derivative, yes. But incredibly enjoyable.

I have since realised a couple of things:

1. I've been doing far too much cooking for anyone's liking.

2. I need to focus more on the delightful writing, and name my blogs accordingly for ease of reference in the future.

I might go back and rename some but I'm not quite decided on that.

I am decided though that making all these damn cakes and tarts has made me incredibly porky so from tomorrow I am going to give up food entirely and survive on a diet of food writing alone (she writes with one hand clutching a pie).

I will keep you posted on whether this works or turns out to be as impossible and dangerous as it sounds.

For now a frollick through Heston Blumenthal's In Search Of Perfection (Bloomsbury; £25) from 2006, which tied in with his TV series.

Look at the photo above. Look long and hard. No cheating.

You guessed correctly: it is a pleasing pile of perfectly cooked steak. A good fatty cut just as I like them (always go ribeye if you can; fillet is for girls and the clueless) and pink in the middle. I'd actually go more bloody, but that's just me.

So who'd have thunk it took 30 hours of cooking time, an oven thermometer, digital probe and blowtorch to prepare what takes most people a few minutes on a decent griddle pan?

It has to be Heston.

The conceit of three Michelin stars and Fat Duck famed Heston's In Search of Perfection is that he picks eight British classics - the food we eat most, not necessarily of British provenance - and goes in search of the ultimate example of each dish: eight earnest foodie adventures to track down the best ingredients and finest cooking methods so that we comfort-food loving civilians can cook up the ne plus ultra dogs bollocks version of our favourite food.

Or not. Because even though I swore to myself I would have a bash at at least one of the eight - Roast Chicken & Roast Potatoes, Pizza, Bangers & Mash, Steak, Spaghetti Bolognese, Fish & Chips, Black Forest Gateau, Treacle Tart & Ice Cream, even the bangers and spag bog are so darn complicated I decided any attempt to emulate Heston ran the risk of making me a very angry little cook indeed.

Instead I just revelled in his attention to detail, taking solace in the fact I'm not the sort of pedant who would faff about with these absurdly complicated recipes, which call for 50 Euro chickens (the famous Bresse chickens, mmmm), paint guns and soda siphons.

But what Heston has done here, in a book which is essentially just the obligatory spin off from the TV show, is rake up a little food history - what we Brits love eating and why - and remould it according to contemporary tastes and availability, and of course daft don't-try-this-at-home techno whizzery jiggery.

This makes it a great read for greedy types (though may I suggest you skip the actual cooking method bits).

Yet I'm not entirely with Heston's choices. I do love a pork out on proper fish and chips and pizza is my favourite "junk" food, but seriously, who would make this stuff at home?

No one, unless you're trying to entertain kids by scattering ingredients on a ready made pizza base.

And no crumble? Or fruit pie of any sort? But we do have a black forest gateau?

Anyone who enjoyed a slice or seven of this cake in the eighties or nineties knows full well it came out of a Sara Lee box, which itself had come out of the freezer.

Where is the roast beef and yorkshire pudding?

I am guessing the great man corrects these omissions in the follow up book, but what he does deserve a highly commended for is creating a hefty scoop of ultimate food porn. It's ideal as by-the-side-of-the-bed gluttony, split as it is into the eight self-contained adventures.

What's more, In Search of Perfection is as close as I'm going to get to the afterglow of a family Sunday roast chicken and treacle tart on this boring Tuesday afternoon, punctuated only by some crappy crudites and the low fat and low fun dinner I'm going to eat now, at six pm, because those crudites for some reason left me feeling rather hollow.

Will this rhubarb tart bring me eternal happiness then? (I did make three just in case)

not yet cooked but already delicious-looking

I'm not sure if now is the right time to write about rhubarb. It is in season, sure. And it's as beautiful as ever, bright pink as pink as pink candy canes and as sour and sharp as Dorothy Parker.

But Easter is over. The whole long weekend whistled down the wind. I'm clean out of chocolate and still no sign of the Messiah.

I am hoping that writing about rhubarb will return some cheer to an otherwise gloomy reality.

Rhubarb picking was not one of the favourite jobs in my family home. It was one of the least favourite jobs, because one knew while picking that the rhubarb would be baked in a crumble and eaten every Sunday for the foreseeable.

We were too little to know that rhubarb is a right proper treat. When it doesn't grow in one's own garden, a bundle of those stiff glinting canes is manna from heaven. That's how I feel about them now anyway and wrote about it in The Independent here.

I'm not ashamed to say I never made of the suggested recipes. But the lines from Monty Python's Rhubarb Tart Song must have hung around in my subconscious somewhere because that's just what I found myself making this weekend.

Apparently,

"Eternal happiness is rhubarb tart

A rhubarb what? A rhubarb tart!

A Jean Paul who? A Jean Paul Sartre!

Eternal happiness is rhubarb tart"

I chose Oliver Peyton's Rhubarb and Custard Tart from Observer Food Monthly February 2009.

As he didn't specify a pastry recipe, I decided to borrow from Lucas Hollweg's Blood Orange Tart recipe in The Times, substituting Stork for butter, which was a complete sloppy disaster. It also meant I didn't struggle on with the intention of making mini rhubarb and custard, blood orange and lemon tarts to be sliced up and served reconfigured on the plate as a whole tart of three flavours.

A bit Masterchef yes, and a lot over ambitious and stupid.

The tarts did bring me happiness, though I can't say whether it will be eternal or not. Nonetheless I highly recommend making the effort. Buy in some pastry or stick to your own trusted recipe.

Beautiful Becca seems to be enjoying her's at least

I assisted my friend AC in making this Rhubarb and Ginger Fool last week, also from Hollweg, who I rate very highly. I helped her by zesting a few oranges and sprinkling it onto the tray of rhubarb the night before her dinner. See below.

AC tells me it was a huge success but at the time she was worried the amount of orange going into it was going to overpower the lovely rhubarb. AC does all things properly and cooking is no excuse. She would not be fucking about trying to resurrect sloppy pastry. Uh-uh.

She's also rather amazing and treated me to a posh birthday dinner on Saturday at Marcus Wareing's two Michelin-starred caff at The Berkeley. I love her for many reasons but her ability to chat food with passion, precision and unflinching dedication is high up there.

Her commitment to good food is partly because she is partly French (the hints of Northern European in her are evident in the zeal with which she falls about fried food). I also suspect it was ramped up a notch or seven the time she made a crumble with salt instead of sugar. God that was funny. I wasn't even there and it still makes me titter.

You can read with envy all the luscious nosh we noshed on Sunday here (except the main was venison with the cutest mini beetroots and sour cream) and I'll highlight the Pan fried foie gras, yoghurt, rhubarb muffin top, ginger crunch, thyme cress. Here it is -

Oh how we laughed at the idea we needed extra muffin tops, and would pay top dollar for the privilege. And obviously eating foie gras is several steps beyond my ethical interests. Who's that coughing?

Next week I'm going to make Riverford's Rhubarb & Cardamom Fool, but instead of the fool serve the rhubarb compote with my secret white cheese mousse recipe, which I will un-secret for you. It doesn't sound wildly exciting, but boy, it is.