I grew up in a small coastal town in New
Zealand, with parents who grew and cooked
most of what we ate. Occasionally, wed eat hot
chips for dinner or, for a special occasion, wed
eat out at one of a handful of small restaurants
but, 99.9% of the time, we ate at home. Even
when Ive lived in cities, I preferred to cook at
home than eat out, which may sound weird for
a chef, but that home-cooking foundation runs
deep within my family. While no two days are
ever the same, and Im sure yours are different
from mine, I think we can all agree that the
foods we crave, every day , are those that are
nourishing, beautiful, simple to make and
absolutely delicious to eat. As a chef turned
food writer and recipe developer, my life
revolves around food growing, cooking and
eating food is ALWAYS on my mind, from dawn
till dusk. I adore cooking but, like most people,
I dont have tons of spare time, so my everyday
food is quick and easy, using readily available
ingredients and simple techniques. Over the
years I spent working as a chef and now as a
mother of two, Ive learned little tips and tricks
to make cooking simpler through planning
ahead, utilising leftovers and mastering basic
recipes. It was with this in mind that the idea for
this book began
Ive heard many cries for help over the years,
from people struggling to create affordable,
achievable and nourishing food for themselves
and their families. I hear from people worried
they cant make a recipe because they dont have
one specific ingredient listed, one that could be
easily swapped out for something they have on
hand, if only they knew it was OK to do so.
As a young chef, I carried a couple of
notebooks with me containing handwritten
basic recipes, to which Id refer daily. At a local
caf, it was the morning shifts job to make a big
batch of sweet muffins every day. We didnt use
different muffin recipes each time; instead, we
used the same base recipe, adding whatever
seasonal or frozen fruits we happened to have
on hand at any given day. This is how chefs
have always cooked but, Ive noticed, its not
something home cooks always know how to do.
I want to help change that, to empower you to
be bold and cook with confidence. If you only
have rosemary and peaches, but the recipe calls
for thyme and apples, go with your gut and try
it with rosemary and peaches instead! So long
as you keep the base recipe the same, you cant
go wrong with simple seasonal changes. Dotted
throughout my Every Day recipes, youll find my
base or anything recipes, with examples of how
you can change things up to suit your tastes
or what you might have on hand at different
times of the year. I encourage you to use your
intuition, look to whats in season and available
around you, and have a play.
I like to think my recipes have always leaned
more to the simple side of things, using
everyday ingredients and focusing heavily on
seasonal produce, but moving home to New
Zealand after 5 years spent living in Perth,
Western Australia, brought home to me the
need for even simpler recipes. Once again, I
found myself living in a small town with limited
access to the vast array of ingredients Id
become accustomed to using while living in
Australia. Little did I know, when I first started
INTRODUCTION
working on this book, that the whole world
would go into lockdown during the process.
All of a sudden like everyone else I was
only able to cook with what I had on hand,
limiting my supermarket shopping to once
every 2 weeks or so, instead of popping into the
supermarket to pick up ingredients daily, which
is how Id usually work on a cookbook. The
need for everyday recipes became more than an
ideal; in fact, it was a reality, which pushed me
to consider every ingredient that went into each
recipe.
As a lifelong vegetarian, the recent shift
towards eating less meat excites me and, while
Ive never been one to believe everyone should
be vegetarian or vegan, I do think its awesome
that more people are looking for nourishing
ways to fuel their bodies, using less (or no) meat
and embracing real food cooking, instead of
simply relying on the heavily processed meat
alternatives that line the supermarket shelves
nowadays.
Because my daughter and I are both intolerant
of gluten, weve eaten gluten-free (and strictly or
mostly dairy-free) since she was born, and youll
notice my recipes reflect this. With our modern
farming practices, excessive daily stressfilled
lives, genetically modified organisms (GMOs)
and over-use of chemicals such as glyphosate
(the active ingredient in the herbicide Roundup,
something Id like to see banned worldwide!),
were seeing more people reacting to foods
containing wheat (among many other things).
Since I starting sharing my recipes online back
in 2010, it has been my goal to create delicious
and nourishing gluten-free recipes that taste as
EVERY
DAY
good as, if not better than, the wheat-based
originals. With gluten-free baking, its really easy
to get carried away using different flours and,
before you know it, you have 1015 different
flours in your pantry. For the purpose of this
book, Ive tried to limit the number of flours to
just a handful of dependable ones. My main
goal is to create recipes that are easy and totally
do-able, every day of the week. I want you to
feel like its no big thing to throw a batch of
muffins in the oven at the last minute before
someone comes over, using that base recipe,
of course, and adding whatever fruit you have
on hand. I want you to feel confident in the
kitchen and know that, by cooking at home, with
simple real-food ingredients, youre making one
of the most powerful decisions we can make
as humans. The decision of what goes into our
bodies.
I hope this book provides a little spark that
sets you on the path to discover the joys of
cooking nourishing, simple and tasty meals at
home, every day.
mydarlinglemonthyme.com
@mydarlinglemonthyme