Philli Armitage-Mattin - Taste Kitchen: Asia

To my best friend, cheerleader and partner, Tom: thank you for your endless support, excellent palate and for helping me organise my thoughts and the kitchen sink. This book wouldnt have happened without you.

To me, the art of flavour is an obsession. Understanding how flavour is created is fundamental to making food we love to eat. Years of tasting, testing and experimenting have led me to discover how to craft excellent food every time by using an orchestra of ingredients that come together to create a harmony of flavour. As cooks, its our job to balance these different tastes and make the flavours we love.

I have had so much fun on my journey with food, and I would like to share how my flavour obsession began.

WHERE IT ALL BEGAN ...

I wasnt always familiar with the kitchen. I was brought up in the nineties and was extremely headstrong. I loved nothing more than a TV dinner made up of potato smiley faces, chicken nuggz and half a plate of tomato ketchup. We lived in America when I was young, and this is where I found my sweet tooth, when I was first introduced to Lucky Charms. For breakfast, I would insist on this high-energy, high-sugar cereal. I still love sugar and can admit Im fully addicted; I still run around the flat full of energy until the inevitable sugar crash. Growing up, I noticed my mum didnt reach for the sweets, chocolates or biscuits; she didnt have a sugar monster inside her. Instead, while watching a movie, Mother would snack on unroasted, unsalted cashews or almonds. I found this strange. Why would she want to eat something without salt or sweetness? Then my dad, after a Sunday afternoon spent playing golf, would come back home to a cold beer and cheese and onion crisps grim. Beer, bitter and intense, with the worst salty snack. I would wind him up by saying his breath smelled. We were all in the same environment, the same family, but we each had very different taste buds.

My love of food didnt start until I was a lot older, watching chefs like Gordon Ramsay on the telly working like dancers in the kitchen and producing dishes I could only imagine. Not knowing that in a few short years I would be working in one of his restaurants . . . I had never tasted food like these chefs made before, but I was intrigued. Food was my happy place; it brought art, science and, most importantly, passion together. However, I was not always a good cook. It took years of experimentation, reading many cookbooks. When all the kids were headed to the toy section of the department store, Id be found in the middle of the kitchen department, wondering what all these gadgets and instruments did. I landed on baking, as many young teenage girls do. I would spend hours perfecting the macaron after many failed almond puddles, or trying to engineer cakes to look like ships or pigs. It was all about precision and science and I could also go a bit crazy with glitter.