I'm not sure how I ended up writing a cookbook. I started out with stories and found that they evoked memories of food. The more I wrote, the more fitting it seemed to accompany the text with recipes. There is no unifying theme to this compilation - it has arisen organically from the random ruminations on my past. These recipes, like life, encompass the fabulous and the ordinary, attractive and homely; some are full of history while others are recent adventures. This isn't some glossy production full of carefully composed images, professionally illuminated and photographically fussed over -...