A Dorset Kitchen
Price as reviewed:
£20.00 hardback
A Dorset Kitchen
Author: Patty Lowe
Photos: Archie Lowe
Published: 2022
Available as hardback
View now at adorsetkitchen.com
About A Dorset Kitchen
A recipe book with more than 100 recipes inspired by ingredients grown in a Dorset kitchen garden. It’s a family affair – a mother and her children collaborating over growing the vegetables, fruit and herbs, working on the recipes and photographing the dishes.
Review
There is an abundance of cookery books on the market, but A Dorset Kitchen is just a little bit special. Patty Lowe was encouraged by friends to publish the recipe book following the sudden death of her 21-year-old son Archie, due to a rotational fall from a horse in September 2020, and is raising money for charity through its sales.
Fifteen years ago, Patty and her daughter Gertie started to grow their own vegetables, fruit and herbs in their garden, and working out recipes they could use in everyday cooking. Patty’s twin sons, Archie and Jamie, were seven at the time, and Archie “quickly became [the] primary food connoisseur – helping with the kitchen garden, preparing meals, advising on flavours and sampling everything”. As he grew up, Archie took over the photography for the cookbook, and each dish has an artistic colour photograph to go with it.
Archie’s photos are superb, beautifully lit (by his brother Jamie), and creatively arranged. Alongside the fresh, vividly coloured produce, they feature lots of herbs, pretty linens, flowers, and appealing layouts that entice you to test out the recipe. There are also photos of Archie and his siblings and horses, which remind you of the poignancy of this book’s publication.
The recipes are split up into nine sections: Before, Vegetarian, Fish, Chicken, Lamb, Beef, Pork, Duck & Game, and After. While the emphasis is on family everyday cooking, there’s a sense of adventure about the recipes, with Malaysian, Thai and Singaporean influences, rather than the typical British family fare of shepherd pie and lasagne.
The instructions are thorough but straightforward, and with the recipes set for four people, it’s easy to scale up or down.
I enjoyed the vegetarian stuffed peppers – a simple risotto packed with veggies spooned into baked peppers – for a weeknight supper, while the light Asian salmon salad tasted exotic and certainly a few notches up from what’s usually served on my own kitchen table. The “After” chapter is fairly sparse; more time and energy has been devoted to the savoury dishes, however the poached pears in marsala were super simple and very popular, and I’m looking forward to sampling the banana soufflé with toffee sauce.
Sales from the book are raising funds for “The Archie Foundation”, set up in memory of this committed and passionate young rider. Money is being donated to the Air Ambulance, which worked so hard to save Archie’s life at the scene of the accident, and the Archie & Manni Bursary. The bursary is aimed at helping committed young riders, particularly boys, build a partnership with their horses. Recipients will have a year’s training with William Fox-Pitt, Sam Griffiths and Sarah Bullen.
A thousand copies – the first print run – sold out almost immediately, via word of mouth and social media. The second print run of a further 1,000 went on sale in February.
Verdict
How I’d love to be a guest in the Lowes’ Dorset kitchen! Every recipe I’ve tried was delicious, relatively simple to produce and of a higher calibre, with more exotic flourishes, than the average family dish. The accompanying photos are outstanding, with vibrant colours and masses of herbs tempting you to try out the recipe.
View now at adorsetkitchen.com
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