Around the world in 18 cookery books

Long before she became a finger- lickin’ television star Nigella Lawson’s ability to conjure tastes in vivid prose and her celebration of the pleasures of eating were known to readers of The Spectator as she was this magazine’s first restaurant reviewer. And it was the writing in her first book, How to Eat, with its confidential tone of voice, her larky attitude to cooking and eating, as well as brilliant, original recipes that brought her legions of fans. To them she became what Elizabeth David had been to their grandmothers. Nigella’s latest book, Feast (Chatto, £25), which arrives without benefit of a television boost, is another big, comprehensive book, its subject nothing less than ‘food that celebrates life’. It includes food for the great religious feasts (many faiths are included) when even the non-cook must wield the pans, to private pleasures — a midnight feast for the first time your lover stays the night — and simple pasta teas for children.