My bucket list is a pretty ambitious thing I must confess. Oh there are the usual things, visit certain countries and eat or do certain things. However on the list is to be a guest at one of Heston Blumenthal’s Fantastical Feast dinner parties as well as eat at The Fat Duck and Dinner. The latter two are much more achievable but I’d love to actually meet him and find out what makes him do the creative things that he does. Because if anyone melds imagination, science and food perfectly it is Heston Blumenthal.

The last book I received of his was Fantastical Feasts which was a fairy tale type of book with how he made the items that he did for the show. His graveyard inspired me to make my Halloween party graveyard. This year however sees the release of quite a different offering from Heston, a tome on how to cook at home titled “Heston Blumenthal at Home” with a picture of Heston taking out some goodies from the fridge on the front.

In the book there are classic dishes like onion soup, roast chicken, prawn cocktail, Scotch eggs, shepherd’s pies and lemon tart but there are also dishes that come from Fat Duck, albeit the simplified at home version, including scallop tartare with white chocolate, his famous bacon and egg ice cream as well as a salad that resembles a garden and an intriguing cinnamon and vanilla ice cream that can switch from one flavour to the other. His tips are invaluable along the way-after all this is a scientist that experiments and shares with you the results of his experiments.

He starts with the basics of taste and explains that salt is actually the best item to counter bitterness, not sugar, then discusses the fifth taste of umami and then launches into the recipes with each chapter starting with an in depth explanation on the item. There are basic stock recipes like white chicken and brown chicken stock (not the actual colour of the chicken but rather the brown uses browned vegetables and meat). There are also very doable salads, sauces, mains and side dishes (and most recipes are about a page long) from the Italian Bagna Cauda vegetable dip, chicken and ham pies, tea smoked salmon, the cleverly presented scotch egg picture above, slow roasted rib of beef with bone marrow sauce and a very simple but effective liquorice poached salmon. Desserts range from a tiramisu, banana Eton mess and a delectable golden syrup creme brulee. Not every recipe has a picture but the ones that do you may find yourself automatically bookmarking.

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I used to have terrible dreams about going back to university-not that I didn’t enjoy it but I couldn’t wait to get out of the lecture hall and work! But there is one type of class I will always gladly sign up for and wholeheartedly enjoy-a cake decorating class! And I know how popular they are with you out there and today I am giving away a place at Whimsical Cakehouse’s brand new school in Dolans Bay!

There are all sorts of classes you can do there including some flower making classes, cupcakes to 3D cakes like the very cute Arctic Antics cake above. They range from two hours to three day courses and class sizes are capped at 6-8 people and they also offer private tuition. Founded by the lovely Linda Harden, former senior teacher at Planet Cake she is joined by Margi Carter who was one of Planet Cake’s co founders and also illustrated and designed the very popular Planet Cake cookbook.

Their Foundation 1 one day courses are a great introduction to the art of cutting and ganaching a cake, covering it with fondant and achieving those elusive sharp edges. You then get to take your cake home where it will keep for one week.

You will learn to:

Cut a cake into 3 even layers (without cheating!)
Ganache your cake
Cover your cake with fondant, smooth it and achieve sharp edges
Colour your fondant using paste colours
Cover a cake board with fondant
Create smooth balls from fondant and bedazzle them
Cut out fondant shapes and apply them to your cake
Attach fondant shapes to wires
Apply ribbon to your cake board

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I know that I give a lot of cookbooks away but I know that you’re about as food obsessed as I and that food can permeate not just cookbooks but fiction books too! Today I am giving away 5 copies of Kerry Greenwood’s new book Cooking The Books which is a detective story based around food. The main character Corinna Chapman is a baker and owner of Earthly Delights bakery and bakes all manner of delicious breads and pastries. Corinna also has a hot young boyfriend Daniel whom she regularly cooks for in the book. I’m about a quarter of the way through the book stealing time to read it when I can.

This copy of Cooking The Books has a special recipe booklet attached with recipes for beef goulash, risotto Corinna, tournedos Parisienne as well as basic bread, pasta douro, Barm Brack (a good bread for Halloween!) as well as some basic sweets. The recipes are very simple and with a short ingredient list so they look quite doable indeed!

Thanks to Allen & Unwin, five lucky Not Quite Nigella readers will each win a copy of Cooking the Books by Kerry Greenwood with the bonus recipe booklet! For a chance to win all you have to do is tell me who your favourite mystery writer is and why! Simply add your answer as a comment to the story. The competition ends at midnight AEST on the 12th of November, 2011. You can enter this  competition once daily and it is open to anyone within Australia.

***The winners are:

Margaret J. of NSW

Kristy D. of NSW

Samantha S. of Victoria

Pamela W. of NSW

Taya P. of NSW

***

Best of luck!

Lots of love,

Lorraine

xxx