From Amazon.co.uk
There may be many pretenders to her throne, but as
The Delia Collection: Fish comprehensively demonstrates, Delia Smith can still see off all her rivals, no matter their trendy haircut or manic TV personality. She is still seen by most who tackle the Art of Cookery as the most sane and balanced voice in the field and there are few houses which don't boast one of her invaluable books.
This volume may not replace earlier Delia books in a similar vein, but it provides as useful and basic a resource as any cookery enthusiast is likely to need. The large, attractive format is always at the service of the individual recipes, which are drawn from 33 years of recipe writing and television. While Delia followers will find much here to stimulate, this is an excellent entry-level book for those new to the doyenne of TV chefs. Fish confines itself to the main categories: white fish; salmon; trout; oily and other fish; and smoked fish. The recipes varying from the concise, such as a very straightforward Fried Plaice Fillets, to the more advanced (a mouth-watering preparation for Fillets of Sole Véronique). A particularly attractive recipe is that for Smoked Salmon Tart, which is an object lesson in concision and practicality--if the pastry isn't--we're told--rising in the centre, we should prick it a couple of times and press it back down with our hands.
Instructions are as direct and uncomplicated as one would expect (this, of course, is Delia's trademark) and up-to-date conversion tables are included, along with an impressive section on fish extras, making this an invaluable and user-friendly guide. --Barry Forshaw
Review
Delia Smith is a household name and as far as many people are concerned, she is THE goddess of the kitchen. With her foolproof recipes and clear instructions you are guaranteed 100per cent success and it is never a problem to make a dish for a dinner party for the first time, wondering if it will turn out alright or not. It always does. Moving on from her phenomenally successful previous titles, she has amalgamated her recipes into four new cookery books grouped by subject - chicken, chocolate, fish and soup. Lavishly illustrated, they are Delia's personal choice of what she views as the best and most popular recipes. And combining them into individual volumes ensures fast access to a particular recipe rather than ploughing through half a dozen in search of that elusive favourite. Chocoholics will revel in the chocolate fudge cake, four nut chocolate brownies, squidgy chocolate log and frozen chocolate bananas. Comfort eaters will find soups to die for with scallop cream soup, smoked haddock chowder with poached quails' eggs and watercress and buttermilk vichyssoise. For chicken fanciers there is chicken jambalaya, coq au vin and chicken cacciatore and for fish lovers there is chargrilled squid with chilli jam, salmon in champagne sauce and luxury smoked fish pie. These are sure to become bestsellers and it is to be hoped that the collection will grow to include other culinary collections and make it a definitive guide to cooking no cook should be without. - Lucy Watson