About
Welcome to the food4u&me family!
This really is a family cookbook, so don’t expect Michelin Star recipes, or presentation, although we do try on this as you also taste with your eyes! Do expect to make the most of fresh ingredients, along with simple and interesting ways to create great tastes to share with family and friends.
Flexibility is important to us, so there is plenty of room to make the recipes your own. Some days are invention tests, when you have a glut of pears or simply a range of unplanned ingredients, so have some fun with what you have to hand.
It all started as “Mum’s cookbook” for a son heading off to university, who wanted tasty, healthy, quick and easy recipes that worked with a two-ring hob and a microwave. (We won’t mention that chocolate orange mousse cake is not a food group.) Those recipes live on in the “Z & friends” category, and they’re particularly good for students or anyone with a limited kitchen.
Over the years, the cookbook has grown into a record of the food we’ve enjoyed with family and friends.
Everyone has had a hand in it. There are the spice and seafood lovers, the barbecue enthusiasts who cook even with snow outside, and a long-running debate over whose salsa and whose Bolognese is best (we’ll keep you posted). A family love of gardening means home-grown produce in season, from windowbox herbs to dinosaur kale, along with tips handed down the generations, including a fantastic crumble made with wild blackberries.
Friends have been a great inspiration too. We love entertaining and being entertained, and there’s always something to learn from other people’s cooking.
After many years in Switzerland, we now live in the Pyrenees, with easy access to the wonderful markets and cuisines of France and Spain, so expect plenty of local inspiration.
Travel has always been a voyage of culinary discovery for us, from Vietnamese pho (now a
staple the day after roast chicken) to Spanish-inspired cod with chorizo, simple Italian pastas, Mexican-style salsas, Asian burgers and Portuguese seafood.
Thanks for joining the family. We look forward to hearing the food ideas you’d love to share!
Bon appétit!
