GOOD, BETTER, BEST
Recipe developer and writer Dianne Bibby gives us a bite out of her third and favourite cookbook, ‘Bibby’s More Good Food’
Are you a coffee or tea person?
A 100% coffee person. You’ll find me in my kitchen early in the mornings making coffee. Before we get to the table it’s rusks and coffee in bed. What was on your breakfast table this morning?
Regulars are smoothies, granola — with berries and yoghurt — and on a good day, maybe a batch of waffles or crepes. This morning it was Greek yoghurt, honey and walnuts.
The newly published ‘Bibby’s More Good Food’ is your third cookbook. Is there a personal favourite among the trio, and does publishing become any easier the more you do it?
Without a doubt, Bibby’s More Good Food is my favourite. After my first book I said I’d hang up the apron and yet I’m here again. I said it would become easier, but it doesn’t — not for me, anyhow. Though the structural process becomes more familiar, it still requires the same amount of research, time and dedication to put meat on the bones. To some extent, there’s an even greater expectation with each publication.
You do all the photography yourself. Do you have any tips or special equipment for those who enjoy photographing food?
I don’t use any fancy equipment, just a good camera and tripod. That’s it. And natural light, it is the ultimate illuminator. Unfortunately, the only advice that really works is practise and repeat, then practise some more. As an early riser, what makes you get out of bed in the morning? Enthusiasm and discipline. When enthusiasm wanes, discipline keeps you going. Once entangled with food, its grip will have you up at unimaginable hours, cooking in pyjamas.
You write so evocatively about food and all your recipes carry an enticing introduction. Is it something that comes easily to you?
For me, writing about food in an engaging manner that doesn’t have the reader nodding off mid-sentence is undoubtedly the most challenging part of a cookbook. It definitely does not come naturally. Oftentimes it’s like striking a rock and waiting for water. Nothing. Even Google struggles with alternatives to the “delicious” dilemma!
What kitchen equipment or gadget can’t you live without?
I’d like to choose two, please. A good zester — there’s hardly a dish that doesn’t benefit from the addition of lemon zest. With hummus being a staple in our home, a robust blender is a must.
If you could have only three ingredients in your kitchen, what would they be?
Good-quality extra virgin olive oil, lemons and sea salt flakes.
What two dishes in your latest cookbook do your family request you to make over and over again?
The chicken and chorizo pasta, a dish I cooked for a well-known Italian restaurant years back and it was so popular they put it on their menu. It remains my family’s most loved pasta to date. And weeknight Tuscan chicken, because every time I make it, the pan hardly needs rinsing.
For a celebration dinner for friends and family, what would you prepare from your new book?
I’d make the pan-grilled feta with chilli honey butter followed by gingery chickpea curry and roast harissa aubergines and for dessert, red wine and cardamom fig ice cream. This menu celebrates the limitless potential of plant-based food — and it’s anything but bland.
What would you prepare as your last meal and who would you invite?
Darren, my husband. I know he’d like scouse, Liverpool’s finest beef stew — but seeing as it’s my last meal, it’s going to be something vegetarian, maybe Parmigiana di Melazane, with extra Parmegiano.