Theo Randall - My Simple Italian

The definitive recipe collection from one of Britains most talented chefs.

Theo Randall at the InterContinental Park Lane is consistently voted one of the best Italian restaurants in Britain. At home, ingredients remain Italian and top quality, but Theos methods are relaxed and simple meaning less time in the kitchen and more time for sharing food with family and friends.

Whether you have 15 minutes to spare or over an hour, need something quick for weeknights, relaxed for lunch or impressive for entertaining, Theo offers his favourite recipes for large and small sharing plates, easy one-pot dishes and inspiring starters, mains, puddings and baking. This is restaurant quality Italian cooking made easy.

Theo Randall, who served his apprenticeship with Max Magarian in London and Alice Waters in San Francisco, was head chef at the Michelin-starred River Cafe for ten years. He now runs his own restaurant, Theo Randall at the InterContinental Park Lane, in London, and has earned unparalleled rave reviews from critics and food-lovers.

A natural teacher, his monthly classes at the restaurant are ever popular and he regularly appears on television shows like Saturday Kitchen. Theo lives in London with his wife and two small children.

For Chloe my god daughter

Under 20 minutes

Small plates

Soups, salads and egg dishes

Side dishes

Desserts

2025 minutes

Small plates

Pasta, gnocchi and risottos

Large plates

Main dishes

Desserts

3035 minutes

Small plates

Soups, salads and egg dishes

Pasta, gnocchi and risottos

Large plates

Side dishes

Desserts

4045 minutes

Small plates

Soups, salads and egg dishes

Pasta, gnocchi and risottos

Large plates

Side dishes

Desserts

5055 minutes

Large plates

Side dishes

Desserts

Over an hour

Soups, salads and egg dishes

Pasta, gnocchi and risottos

Large plates

Main dishes

Side dishes

Desserts

I love cooking! Its such an enjoyable and fulfilling experience. I know youll think that its very easy for me to say this, but I truly believe that everyone should know how to cook and, I hope, take pleasure from it.

Cooking is not all about presentation and technical methods. Its about making some delicious food and then sitting down and sharing it. There is nothing simpler than a boiled egg with some buttered toast, but if you have really good fresh eggs and lovely bread and butter then you have a feast. Good-quality ingredients have a great flavour already, so the cooking or preparation needed is minimal.

This book is all about simple recipes that do not require lengthy preparation. Some of the recipes have very few ingredients, but dont let that tempt you to add extra unnecessary ones. As the architect Mies van der Rohe said, Less is more.

With simple dishes, the quality of the ingredients you use is very very important, and it helps if you have a storecupboard that is well stocked with jars and cans of things like olives, fish, capers and tomatoes, as well as packets of polenta, risotto rice, pasta and dried porcini. Combining these with fresh vegetables, meat, cheese and so on, you can put together a tasty dish with ease.

Be on the lookout for ingredients when you travel too. I always say that if you are in Italy and you see olive oil, dried porcini mushrooms, Parmesan cheese or balsamic vinegar, buy some because it will invariably be good quality and cheaper than at home and it will add a bit more inspiration to your cooking. Nothing sounds better when you have friends over than telling them you got this amazing olive oil from a small market in southern Italy. Food always tastes better when it has a story.

Heres one of mine. A fish supplier phoned me up one afternoon when I was at The River Caf. He was on the other line to one of his contacts on a dayboat that was fishing around Poole in Dorset. They had just caught a huge 10kg turbot and he thought we might buy it. Well we did. It just so happened that Steve Bird, the owner of the fish supplier Cove Shellfish, was coming into London that evening and promised me the huge turbot would be with us before service started. As always the traffic coming into Hammersmith was terrible so he was delayed, but during the waiters briefing I told them we had this amazing fish on the menu that had been caught that afternoon. As the restaurant began to fill up, the orders started to come in on the main course for roasted turbot. Luckily Steve arrived just in time, and bold as he was walked through the restaurant holding this beautiful fish. I prepped it and we were cooking the turbot steaks within 10 minutes of it arriving. The fish sold out and everyone who had it still remembers eating it. That story is still being told.

Good, flavoursome ingredients are key to the simple and straightforward recipes in this book, so here are a few tips on what to look for when youre shopping to stock your pantry.

Olive oil

Olive oil is THE essential ingredient, and I think you need two different olive oils in your storecupboard. The one to use for salads, bruschetta and soups should be a cold-pressed olive oil. All that means is that the crushed olives have not been heated during the pressing of the olive paste that produces the oil. An oil that is cold-pressed will be darker than a basic oil and the viscosity will be thicker. Make sure you keep this oil in a dark, cool place to ensure that it retains its green grassy flavour olive oil is perishable so never keep it in the window or by the cooker.

For the second oil to use for frying garlic for a tomato sauce, brushing over a whole fish to be roasted or making mayonnaise buy an extra virgin olive oil that is not too light but has a fruity flavour. The lighter the oil, usually the more commercial it is commercial oil is extracted from the olive paste but heated to high temperatures, so it tends to lack character and flavour. You can always tell these oils as they have a taste of cooked olives and tend to be a bit greasy.

If you cook a lot you might find it worthwhile to buy a 5-litre tin of olive oil from a supplier. A very good online supplier, with a fantastic selection of olive oils and vinegars. is www.theoliveoilco.com.

Balsamic vinegar

Most of the balsamic vinegars sold in shops and supermarkets are Balsamic Vinegar of Modena. This is an inexpensive version of the real thing Aceto Balsamico Tradizionale, which is produced from a reduction of cooked white Trebbiano grape juice and has been made since the Middle Ages in Modena and Reggio Emilia.