Book Review

Cuisine Niçoise, by Jacques Médecin

Leslie William's article on dieting mentions his acquiring a copy of Michel Guérard's Cuisine Minceur in a second hand bookshop. Coincidentally, that was also how we acquired our copy of this book, one of the most important chef's collections ever published. The sort of stature Guérard enjoyed back in the 1970's can be seen in the tribute paid to him by Simon Hopkinson: "I thank him, and his translator Caroline Conran, for the introduction to his genius, which has inspired me and countless other cooks".

You will likely have to scour second hand bookshops to find a copy of CM, but it's worth the trawl, for it remains a provocative book, albeit one with some things that now seem - strangely, given its ethos and title - wildly excessive: there is a recipe here for a "Soup of Vineyard Thrushes!" But some of its ideas have proven to be long-lived. Much of the book's ethos influenced the birth of nouvelle cuisine, and whilst it was subsequently misinterpreted by others, Guerard's method is rigorous.

An altogether simpler book, but one which was as pivotally influential, is Jacques Médecin's "Cuisine Niçoise". Like Guérard's book, each recipe is numbered, and the book is equally polemical, for Médecin seems determined to show just how independent Nicoise cookery was and is, linked much more to Italian cooking than French. A pretty new edition of "Cuisine Niçoise" has just been published by the excellent firm of Grub Street (stg.£12.99), and with a bit of luck they will soon republish Guérard's masterpiece, and make it widely available once again.

As we go to press there is a used copy of Michel Guérard's Cuisine Minceur available on amazon. Click here to buy Cuisine Minceur from Amazon.

Click here to buy Cuisine Niçoise from Amazon

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