I’m no kind of domestic paragon: however much I love cooking, when I’m utterly wiped out at the end of a long day, all I want to do is slump on the sofa. And yet I know that after a little chopping or stirring and some low key kitchen action, I will feel myself beginning to unwind and that, plus the prospect of dinner ahead, is genuinely restorative. What I will never be, however, is the sort of person who derives comfort from clearing up. And it’s that aspect, for me, that can make cooking sometimes feel daunting. This is why I love a traybake: I get to cook a little, eat well, and still have some slumping time on the sofa! I’m far from alone in feeling like that, as the well-deserved success of Rukmini Iyer’s Roasting Tin books, as well as the popularity of the various traybakes on nigella.com, indicate.
So we’re all in luck this week, with the publication of The Greatest Traybake Cookbook Ever by John Gregory-Smith. It’s a bold title, but a richly promising and wide-ranging book! It covers, and I cite just the chapter titles here: Speedy Recipes; Chicken Recipes; Swanky Recipes; Slow Recipes; Rice and Pasta Recipes; and, finally, Sides and Dips Recipes; it thus incorporates all manner of approaches and types of dishes. I have my eye on many of them, but the one that most grabbed my fancy is his Persian-Style Saffron Chicken Rice which I’m delighted to be sharing with you today!
The Greatest Traybake Cookbook Ever (Penguin Michael Joseph) by John Gregory Smith is out now.
Photography by Martin Poole.
