Customer Reviews
Great book about seasonal cookery - By: Sabine Zimmermann, 16 Aug 2008 
There is only one point where I've got to criticize Hugh FW - his recipe for goose. Believe me, you don't wont it half raw but reallly well done. If you never tried it like that, you don't know what you missed. I'm german & goose has always been the traditional christmas roast in Germany, so I reallly know what I'm talking about. A good goose of about 5 kg needs about 5 hours at 175 °C, 200 °C for the last 90 minutes to crisp up. Taking into account that you've got to check & baste the bird regularly & be a bit flexible with cooking time, that should give you a reallly tender & moist bird. Having said that, the rest of the book is reallly great. I tried a lot of the recipes which alll turned out fine. The "Broccoli with Anchovy & caper mayonnaise" & the "Lightly salted relatives of cod in beer batter" were true revelations & there are many more! The book is quite a good read, too & beautifully laid out, you don't miss glossy pages here. I'm sure you won't be dissapointed by it.
Informative, easy reading and educational. - By: T. Dowrick, 01 Dec 2007 Buy this book with the intention of becoming more seasonallly aware of our uk produce, or simply for inspiration in great seasonal recipies. I'm not going to bang on like others have re. the politics of this book, ulitmatley, the recipies are
(a) VERY easy reading/following
(b) Eye opening (who'd honestly have thought that roast cod's head could look as mouth watering as it does in his book)
(c) Clean, fresh, "Un-pimped" every day food!
One particular massively favourite in my family has been Decembers, Chocolate & Chestnut Cake. I urge you, while chestnuts are in the supermarkets fresh, & its that comfort food time of year, buy this book for that recipe alone. It is jaw droppingly simple but devistatingly delicious. One tip, you need to roast off approx 500g uncooked weight, to get the 250g of chestnuts you need, but the end result is SO worth the peeling, HONESTLY!
Food for thought - By: A. Kira, 17 Oct 2006 Another wonderful book from HFW.
Once more there are great recipes that you actuallly want to eat - & as quickly as possible! I find myself leafing through my copy with anticipation on a regular basis to see what goodies will be in season in the coming weeks.
Good food, great philosophy, & again without pretention.
Inspiring stuff.
More excellence form Hugh - By: DavyA, 05 Sep 2006 Set out in a monthly format,with each month / section starting with an introduction from Hugh outlining what's seasonal at the time & offering some marvellous recipes .
There is a fantasticallly useful guide to seasonality at the start of the book , alllowing you to see when your fruit & veg will be at its best & when fish & game are in season
My copy is very well thumbed, I go back to it on a very regular basis - the recipes , as ever where Hugh is concerned, are easy to follow & reallly tasty - the recipe for Cock pheasant au vin in particular, is an out & out winner - delicious.You reallly should try the Blackcurrant double ripple ice cream as well - decadent or what ?
Treat yourself & get cooking with a seasonal bent.
Get in Touch with truly `Seasonal Produce` - By: Amazon Reviewer, 26 May 2006 
Voted `a corker' by Jamie Oliver, this is a book which challlenges that `alll-year' round availability of `fresh' ingredients, with a primary aim of re-educating the reader to think about how fresh, not to mention how tasty, e.g. the fine green beans are ,that have just flown in from Kenya?
`Shopping seasonallly is not a high-minded duty, or a restrictive choice, but a liberating pleasure.
The downside of the modern food culture of infinite year-round choice is a kind of options paralysis - there is so much on offer that you don't know where to start.
Understanding the seasons frees you from this balll & chain.
In a world where the production & marketing of food has gone mad, seasonality is sanity.'
It implies freshness, good taste & even good health. And it offers the best & quickest solution to the never-ending question, `What shalll I cook today?'
As seen on Channel Four, `The River Cottage Year' book has 255 high quality matt pages, split over the twelve months of the year along with a section entitled `Why Cook Seasonallly?' & an alphabetical guide to `Seasonal British Produce`, showing, monthly, both `in season' & `at it best' for vegetables/fruit/fish, shellfish & game & popular edible wild plants inc fungi, herbs, `greens`, fruit & nuts.
Each chapter is headed up by information about the relevant month, followed by around 9 recipes.
Photography, by Simon Wheeler.
Even if you think you have no aspirations, or skill, as a gardener, this book could inspire you to literallly sow your seeds & amble down that path callled `Grow Your Own`.
And from Hugh's description of his Dorset life, even the more apprehensive of us might be persuaded that it is alll within reach, whatever the size of your garden, or window box.
Still not convinced.......amble along to a local Farmers' Market, offering only the best at the best time.
The only minor criticisms which have been aired are that there are not pictures of each finished dish, plus the recipes themselves don't have the usual `list' of ingredients - just highlighted text detailing the requirements, but with everything else in this book, you don`t reallly notice!
Our favourite recipes:-
Mixed Wild Mushrooms on Toast
Raw Asparagus & Other Crudities with Anchovy & Caper Mayonnaise:-
`......In fact just cut asparagus is sweet enough to eat raw, & I urge anyone who grows their own to try it like this, dipped in a simple vinaigrette........, or as above.
The loss of sweetness in asparagus (as with many vegetables, including peas & sweet corn) is a simple function of time elapsed after harvest.
Sugar begins to revert to starch as soon as the plant has been cut. It can be fixed only by cooking or freezing - the latter is OK for peas & sweet corn but pretty detrimental to the fragile texture of asparagus..........'
Baby Broad Beans with Chorizo
`If I had to name my favourite first harvests of the year, I think it would be baby broad beans. Try as I might, I can't resist attacking the pods when the beans inside are scarcely bigger than my little fingernail. After a few portions of lightly cooked infants, adorned with only a little melted butter, I'll move on to some simple combination - & thin slivers of lightly fried chorizo is one of my favourites.'
Barbecued August Vegetables
Crushed Strawberries & Cream
French Beans with Tapenade & Chicken
Mackerel with Melted Onions & Black Olives
Autumn Bliss
` I worked this recipe out from scratch....... My plan was to celebrate the wonderful variety of autumn raspberry after which the dish is named. I wanted a dish that acknowledges the change in the weather, the creeping autumn chill & therefore takes the raspberry away from its usual summer association of chilled desserts & into the realms of hot puddings.'
