Viva Brighton Issue #56 October 2017

BOOKS
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Yotam Ottolenghi
On exotic ingredients
and gummy bears
Fans will know you mainly for savoury, vegetarian,
Middle Eastern food – is your new book
‘Sweet’ something of a departure? I suppose it
could seem that way. But I started out as a pastry
chef and even when Sami [Tamimi] and I launched
the first deli fifteen years ago, he cooked and I did
the pastries. My first book featured quite a lot of
cakes. But then Plenty and Jerusalem came out and
this book got delayed.
Which of the cakes have you made most
recently? A couple of weeks ago I made the
rum-and-raisin cake, which is just divine. I baked
it when some friends came over for lunch and it
was a big success. But I’d forgotten when making
this alcohol-drenched cake that they were bringing
their kids too. We ended up giving them a little bit
as well. Everyone was happy!
I was slightly surprised by the lack of Middle
Eastern recipes… I think that’s partly because I
got all of my training outside Israel, while Helen
[Goh], my co-author, is Malaysian but grew up in
Australia. Many of the recipes have little twists I’d
relate to our backgrounds. The chiffon cake with
star anise and dried pineapple nods to Helen’s
Malaysian heritage, and the brownies with halva
are a reference to my own.
In the book you coin the verb ‘to Ottolenghify’
– what does that mean to you? Ha! It doesn’t
roll off the tongue, does it? I suppose it refers to
the times when you make something that’s really
good and you’re happy with it, but it’s just that...
to me, to Ottolenghify something is to add a twist,
to take a recipe up a level. It’s about a more intense
flavour, a surprise, a sense of abundance…
Then there’s the famous ‘Ottolenghi effect’,
which has led to sumac and tahini being on
supermarket shelves. I notice this book isn’t
short on exotic ingredients – Dutch-processed
cocoa, 00 flour, Pandan leaves… [Laughs] But
they’re necessary! In normal cooking you can get
away with substituting things, but with baking,
certain ingredients really work so much better.
What we wanted to do - and this is why the recipes
are also quite detailed - is make sure people get a
good result.
What do your two sons like to eat? I’d be the
first to admit they’re typical children, in the sense
they like carbs and they’re obsessed with chocolate.
Good, wholesome vegetables are not their
first port of call. But I realised early on that you
can’t get too wound up about these things. And
they do like broccoli, at least.
Do you have any guilty pleasures when it
comes to food? In the glove compartment of my
car I always have stuff like gummy bears and Love
Hearts. Passengers are often a bit surprised when
they see them. I’m not proud of it, but it serves
a purpose. I really do have quite a sweet tooth…
Nione Meakin
Yotam Ottolenghi will be interviewed by Helen Goh
at the Hilton Metropole, on October 23rd. Tickets
from City Books. Sweet is out this month, published
by Ten Speed Press
Photo by Peden and Munk
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