It’s been a great adventure, but I underestimated entirely what it would take,” he admits. The pressures of writing daily menus and working in a busy kitchen meant that structuring a whole book seemed overwhelming. Lee hastens to add that at least it didn’t take 20 years to put together, like Alan Davidson’s Oxford Companion to Food.

An old favourite of Mum’s was a recipe by 80s TV chef Michael Smith. It was a great mincemeat meringue tart that began life as a “Royal Pye”. Mincemeat is sat upon frangipane topped with caramelised pears, then heaped with meringue and baked crisp – it makes as good a show as it does a pudding. Cooking has quite rightly been described by ESQUIRE magazine as ‘cookbook of the year’ and also ‘long awaited’ which is equally true. What took you so long!

{% title %}

It seems almost redundant to point it out, so obvious is it, but I’ll say it anyway: Cooking by Jeremy Lee is the cookbook of the year. If you know anyone at all who loves spending time in the kitchen, buy them this book.

Heat the milk in a heavy-bottomed pan. Add the 2 tbsp sugar, the vanilla seeds and the strip of orange zest. Heat this gently until merely a wisp of steam rises from the surface. Lay a triangle of chocolate just inside one of the corners of the pastry square. Brush the edges of the pastry with a little cream. Fold the pastry in half diagonally over the chocolate, making a triangular turnover. Repeat with the remaining squares and arrange the turnovers on the prepared baking tray at least 3cm apart. Peel and finely chop the shallots and garlic. Place in a pan with the anchovies and olive oil. Sit this upon the gentlest heat and warm until the shallots have softened and the anchovies have melted. Cover the dish and bake in the hot oven until done, say 15-20 minutes. Remove from the oven and keep warm. Any residual juices left in the dish can be added to the sauce. The recipes in Cooking are arranged by favorite ingredients and occasions and include an introduction emphasizing the importance of the quality and provenance of ingredients. From plum compote with ricotta and hazelnuts to perfect anchovy dressing, this stunning collection of recipes is a love song to simple dishes crafted with the finest ingredients.Insert a small knife into the cake for doneness; there should be no resistance. Remove the cake from the oven, press down lightly with a frying pan one last time, then let sit for 5 minutes. We follow with little chocolate turnovers and a creme caramel – a soothing, cooling custardy respite from all the cakes and pies. Look out for more yuletide recipes over the weekend. 1 Mincemeat meringue tart (main photo) Lee made his bones under Simon Hopkinson and Alastair Little, among the architects of the renaissance in modern British cooking. Alongside contemporaries such as Fergus Henderson, of St John, Lee takes as much credit as anyone for the extraordinary flourishing in our national cuisine over the past few decades. Preheat the oven to 180C/350F/gas mark 4. To assemble the tart, roughly spread the frangipane on the bottom of the pastry case. Strew with the pears then heap on enough mincemeat to just fill the tart. Put this in the fridge to settle. To prepare the pears, peel and core them, then chop into small randomly shaped pieces and toss in the lemon juice to avoid browning. Put a pan on a medium heat and add the sugar. Let the sugar begin to colour and start swirling the pan until the sugar has caramelised. Tip in the chopped pear dressed in the lemon juice. Take care as the sugar will sputter. Toss the chopped pear in the caramel and cook until it softens. Set aside to cool.

Founded in 1926, Quo Vadis is named after the Latin phrase Quo vadis? (where are you going?) and has cemented itself as one of Soho’s most beloved culinary institutions. It has had various owners over the years – including a partnership between Marco Pierre White and Damien Hirst from 1996-2007 – but the restaurant is now in the hands of Sam and Eddie Hart, who are behind the immensely successful Barrafina.Heat a cast-iron frying pan over a moderate heat. Liberally and evenly pepper the pork chop on both sides and lightly season with sea salt. Put the oil into the cast-iron pan, lay the pork chop on top and let cook undisturbed until deep mahogany in colour, roughly 8-10 minutes. To serve, gently press down around the edge of the custard, then run a sharp knife around it. Put a deep plate on top of the mould, and in one fluid motion, swiftly flip the creme caramel. Wait for the plop, shaking a little if necessary before lifting the mould.

Jeremy Lee is an absolutely brilliant British chef . . . This cookbook is extraordinary, don't hesitate to buy it' Stanley Tucci After working for a few years in a Scottish country house hotel, Jeremy made the move down to London and landed a job at one of the most exciting restaurants of the 1980s. ‘Terence Conran was starting to take his restaurant business very seriously and had the brilliant idea to choose Simon Hopkinson as his head chef and partner at Bibendum, a restaurant on Fulham Road housed inside the old Michelin UK headquarters,’ explains Jeremy. ‘Cooking with Simon was a revelation; at the time, everyone was beginning to understand produce and we saw the birth of British cooking. After that I got to cook with Alistair Little, who worked in a very different style in a very different kitchen. He’s been a great friend ever since.’ It’s impossible to not get on with Jeremy Lee. Anyone who has seen him chatting to diners at the tables in Quo Vadis knows what a warm, friendly personality he has. But it’s once you’ve tasted his cooking that you know you’ll be returning to his restaurant very soon.

Decorate with golden sugared almonds and candied mint leaves, if using, and serve. 2 Little chocolate turnovers One vivid memory is of a great table of polished oak in our dining room, piled high with oranges and clementines, Mum being notorious for panic-buying citrus fruits. Another is the huge array of my mother’s extraordinary baking for the Christmas hols, surrounded by Christmas lights and candles and all manner of festive thingummyjigs. Especially cakes – and lots of them. One year I counted seven, and pointed out to Mum that we were only a family of six. Mum pointed to a cupboard where tins with more biscuits and cakes were piled high, and then, laughing merrily, pointed to the freezer, where she’d stashed even more “emergency rations for just in case”. At the restaurant, we like to spread marmalade on a tart case, dot with frangipane, then strew with chocolate and bake. Served with cream, ice-cream and custard, this is very good in those last days of winter when a treat is often much needed. A thought for the cook is to prepare it the day before, as frangipane cooks best when refrigerated. Any leftover pastry can be sliced thinly, laid on a baking sheet and baked in a low oven until crisp and lightly coloured, making rather wonderful biscuits. Place on the baking sheet in the oven and bake for 45 minutes. Lift the lid and remove the foil. Press the cake down lightly with the bottom of a frying pan, then cook for a further 30 minutes, until the edges of the cake have coloured deep gold. The book is very distinctive, in terms of writing style, content and design. Was it a conscious decision to try and do something different or just the way the book turned out?