Along the lazy lunch idea, but lazier. What do you people put on toast – or Ryvitas (mmm) – that’s quick, easy and interesting, not too laden with delicious fat, that you can pull out of the fridge when, say, you’re on a writing roll but hungry?
If I ever have another writing roll I will need this.
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Love & Hunger: Thoughts on the Gift of Food is a book about the emotional & symbolic meaning of cooking for people you love. It's a distillation of everything writer Charlotte Wood has learned over 25 years of home cooking, about the pleasures of simple food well made.
"Wood writes beautifully about food. Partly it's because she has something to say about life, not just about food ... Wood's nimble food writing shifts seamlessly from the hotly contested topic of table-setting on one page to grappling with hunger on another. No philosophy, snobbery, one-upmanship, no competing with restaurant cooks. Just a lot of honesty and admission of failings, mistakes, triumphs and pleasures.
- Helen Greenwood, Sydney Morning Herald
"In this wonderful cookbook-cum-literary memoir, novelist Charlotte Wood evokes memory and emotion as she explains why she loves to cook and what it means to her. Slotted in among the reveries are recipes as diverse as an Elizabeth David-inspired milk-cooked pork and the hedgehog slice of a childhood in Cooma. It's a book that's satisfying to mind AND stomach."
- SBS FEAST magazine
"Charlotte Wood writes so openly about her cooking habits and history and her thoughts about the ethics of good eating that it’s impossible not to be swept up in her enthusiasm. Novice and experienced cooks alike will find something to inspire them here, as Wood has included a range of wonderful, tempting recipes. Reading Love & Hunger is like being invited into Wood’s home, seated at a table crowded with delectable dishes and encouraged to eat until you burst."
- Kylie Mason, The Newtown Review of Books
"This book has the power to reignite a passion for life, friendship, food and the everyday. Part memoir and part recipe book, Love & Hunger can be read cover to cover, as I did, just like a novel, or can be dipped into when the moment requires. Charlotte's unusual cook book is the wise friend many of us do not have ready at hand 24/7. Love & Hunger is a guide, an encouragement and an inspiration.
- John Purcell, Booktopia
"Love & Hunger manages to be a cookbook for the kitchen, a gentle read for the bedside table and a positive affirmation of the pleasure of cooking for family & friends ... This collection of 27 essays gently and sensitively explores the rich complexity and spiritual sustenance that good food with family & friends imparts to our lives. Each chapter explores, a different aspect of ‘the gift of food’ with a number of recipes ‘attached’; all of them good, none of them complex and many wonderfully comforting. There were many moments when reading, we nodded in heated agreement with the almost commonsense views espoused. As one other reviewer noted, it’s rare for a cookbook to move you to tears; be warned you may succumb. ... If there is a criticism to be made, we would only want more…"
- Tim White, Books for Cooks
"Author Charlotte Wood writes like a dream, wrestling with some of those common cooking conundrums, such as dealing with 'polenta paranoia', getting back your kitchen mojo and pondering just what the difference is between a chutney, a relish and a pickle. Her blog is also packed with scrumptious recipes - beetroot palak paneer, anyone?"
- MasterChef Magazine, June 2011
How to shuck an oyster
In a post on another matter, Shanghai Hamish says “If you are looking for things to put on toast…you can go no further than Ida Davidsen and Mia Davidsen’s fantastic book “Open Your Heart to the Danish Open…”
Sounds mysterious. It does look rather nice, here: http://www.bonnierrights.dk/nc/books/categories/NON_FICTION/food_drink/Open_your_Heart_to_the_Danish_Open_The_Davidsen_family_and_their_best_recipes/
I like avocado, capers, salt and pepper on toast.
I count the avocado and capers as a serve of fruit and vegies. Salt and pepper are roughage. It’s all good.
I made “cassoulet toasties” for a brunch the other week that proved to be popular…I rekon your chic pea recipe would work just as well!
phwoar, cassoulet toasties! did the cassoulet have duck in it? say yesssss… and lowfatlou, excellent use of (almost) all good food groups to hold in one hand.
I consider a jar of confit canard in the fridge a standard condiment….its definitly a lifestyle choice!
well Hamish, you would have confit canard as a condiment lying about. Partly that’s because you work a thousand hours a day and night. If I had a jar of that stuff in the fridge it would be there for about forty-five minutes and if S was home, about ten. And then we would be off to the hospital with solid carotid arteries requiring the human medical equivalent of the plumber’s electric eel … perhaps someone should make teeeeeenyweeeeny cans of confit duck, like little drug bombs you can just open when you feel like really getting out of it but can’t go back for more … and more …
When i want to get toasted
Savory: tahini and vegemite (am a thinly spreading vege girl)
Sweet: strawberries forked into the toast or if my fridge is feeling flush, strawberries on ricotta on toast
Spamburger told me about this blog and i love it!
Thanks for dropping by, Ms Sophie. Now tahini, there’s a whole new world of spreadable love! I must remember that. And ricotta & strawbs sound veddy marvellous indeed. Keep up the good work.
Kate just reminded me of my all time favourite toast topper, which my Grandmother first introduced me too… Sardines on toast with a little touch of tomato sauce! These days, there are some great tinned sardines that can be bought, and the tomato sauce could be replaced with just about any relish, pickle or preserve in the pantry…but I will stick to the original. By the way, Gran is still eating them today, and also still makes a mean Osso Buco!!
That must be her secret. And what is your favoured sardine brand? i haven’t eaten tinned sardines since i was a kid and hated them -but now I love the fresh ones, perhaps it’s time to give the canned variety another crack…
I’m with Hamish’s gran re the canned sardines and tomato sauce (and salt and pepper, bien sur). Yes, it could be any relish but the good ol’ tomato sauce, any brand, is pretty hard to beat. And I recall our dear friend Ms J Grist likes mashing tinned sardines with malt vinegar before spreading them on toast. Go Gristy!
Slices of roma tomato, smoked oysters, salt and pepper. Yum.
Ham off the bone and English mustard. Yum.
Avocado, semi-sundried tomatoes, any cheese. Yum.
I could honestly go all day. There is no end to my toast love.
I hesitate to add this, lest it sound rather like something that old woman on The Vicar of Dibley would make, but I’ve just discovered quite a delicious little combo – peanut butter and chilli jam on a Ryvita. Call me Phil(istine) but it’s good – a little split-second nod to satay …
If you have bugger all in the fridge except a carrot, then you could do worse than carrot on toast: grate (coarsely) one carrot, heat a small saucepan, add some (ideally, real) butter and once melted add the carrot. Stir it around a bit, then ram a lid on and turn heat down low. Toast the bread. In about 5 minutes the carrot should be cooked. Add s&p, then pile on top of the toast. You won’t regret it.
oh, fig jam and tasty cheese melt.
Good white bread, plenty of unsalted butter and anchovy fillets from a freshly opened tin – I held a supermarket line talking anchovies with the checkout woman recently because she loves anchovies and there were so many tins in my basket. The anchovy sandwich is a must try for extreme anchovy lovers.
And white bread, butter and green olives. Or just good white bread and good butter.
I look forwards to seeing you at the Byron Bay Writers festival soon.