The Flavour Thesaurus

Can't get enough flavour pairings? Pick up a copy of The Flavour Thesaurus: More Flavours, the follow-up to the culinary sensation'Delightful and informative ... I love Niki’s style of writing – packed with knowledge and information, but conveyed with such a lightness of touch' YOTAM OTTOLENGHI'The books I value most are those I return to again and again. Such has been the case with The Flavour Thesaurus' NIGEL SLATER'An eclectic combination of dictionary, recipe book, travelogue and memoir ... A deceptively simple little masterpiece' SUNDAY TIMESEver wondered why one flavour works with another? Or lacked inspiration for what to do with a bundle of beetroot?The Flavour Thesaurus was the first book to examine what goes with what, pair by pair and is divided into flavour themes including Meaty, Cheesy, Woodland and Floral Fruity. Within these sections it follows the form of Roget's Thesaurus, listing 99 popular ingredients alphabetically, and for each one suggests unique flavour pairings that range from the classic to the bizarre.You will find traditional pairings: pork & apple, lamb & apricot, cucumber & dill; contemporary favourites like chocolate & chilli and goat's cheese & beetroot, and interesting but unlikely-sounding pairings like black pudding & chocolate, lemon & beef, blueberry & mushroom, and watermelon & oyster. There are nearly a thousand entries in all, with 200 recipes and suggestions embedded throughout the text.Now featuring a new foreword by Bee Wilson and a fold-out poster of the flavour wheel, The Flavour Thesaurus is a highly useful, and covetable, reference book for cooking - it will keep you up at night reading.Observer Book of the YearBest Food Book – André Simon Food & Drinks AwardsBest First Book – Guild of Food Writers Awards

Short-listed for Galaxy National Book Awards: Tesco Food & Drink Book of the Year 2010

“The Flavour Thesaurus is a fascinating book for culinary geeks who like to know the origin and science behind ingredient combinations”

Delightful and informative ... I love Niki’s style of writing – packed with knowledge and information, but conveyed with such a lightness of touch. This is full of ideas for those who don’t want a prescriptive approach to recipes Yotam Ottolenghi
An eclectic combination of dictionary, recipe book, travelogue and memoir … Erudite and inspiring, practical and fun, it will make you salivate, laugh, take issue and feel vindicated … Segnit does for flavour what Lucca Turin achieved for scent in Perfumes: The A-Z Guide. A deceptively simple little masterpiece, set to take its place by McGee on Food and Cooking as a household Bible Sunday Times
I’m a huge fan of cookery recipes, and I heartily recommend The Flavour Thesaurus by Niki Segnit. It lists more than 4,000 possible combinations of 99 flavours, with lots of recipes to inspire you Kate Winslet, Harper's Bazaar
An exquisite guide to combining flavours Observer
Every time I return to it, which is often, it makes me tingle with happy greed Bee Wilson
Segnit cleared the path for me to break free of the hackneyed old classics and develop interesting pairings of my own Ruby Tandoh
An original and inspiring resource Heston Blumenthal
It has intrigued, inspired, amused and occasionally infuriated me all year, and will for years to come Nigel Slater, Observer Books of the Year
Every cook should own a copy ... [it] will revolutionise your cooking John Torode
Follow this book and you will impress your guests like never before Atul Kochhar, The Times
A forensic yet fun exploration of flavour combinations and why they work Guardian
A bible for anyone who cooks by grabbing ingredients from the fridge Independent
The Flavour Thesaurus is a fascinating book for culinary geeks who like to know the origin and science behind ingredient combinations Caterer
Inspiration for figuring out what to do with the random tins left in my cupboard Evening Standard
A fun and often eyebrow-raising read Fuchsia Dunlop
This imaginative and beautiful little book deserves a place on the shelves of every serious home cook Spectator

Niki Segnit’s first book, The Flavour Thesaurus, won the André Simon Award for best food book and the Guild of Food Writers Award for best debut. It has been translated into fifteen languages. Her second book, Lateral Cooking, has been called 'a staggering achievement' by Nigella Lawson, the 'book of the decade' by Elizabeth Luard and 'astonishing and addictive' by Brian Eno. It has been translated into nine languages. She lives in London with her husband and two children.

Niki Segnit was inspired to write The Flavour Thesaurus when she noticed how dependent she was on recipes. As she says: 'Following the instructions in a recipe is like parroting pre-formed sentences from a phrasebook. Forming an understanding of how flavours work together, on the other hand, is like learning the language; it allows you to express yourself freely, to improvise, to find appropriate substitutions for ingredients, to cook a dish the way you fancy cooking it.' What Niki felt she needed was a manual, a primer to help her understand how and why one flavour might go with another, their points in common and their differences - something, in fact, like a thesaurus of flavours. But no such book existed, so she decided to put one together herself...The result is a compendium of flavour pairings which offers endless diversion and inspiration. In this lively, easy to follow and exceptionally enjoyable book, Niki Segnit takes 99 popular ingredients and explores the ways they might be combined in the kitchen. She has scoured thousands of recipes in countless recipe books, talked to dozens of food technologists and chefs, and eaten in many restaurants - all in her quest for flavour pairings. The book follows the form of Roget's Thesaurus. The back section lists the ingredients alphabetically, and suggests classic and less well known flavour matches for each. The front section contains an entry for every flavour match listed in the back section and is organised into 16 flavour themes such as Bramble + Hedge, Green + Grassy, and Earthy. There are 980 entries in all...It examines classic pairings such as pork + apple, lamb + apricot, and cucumber + dill; contemporary favourites like chocolate & chilli, lobster + vanilla, and goat's cheese + beetroot; and interesting but unlikely-sounding couples including black pudding + chocolate, lemon + beef, blueberry + mushroom, and watermelon + oyster...Here are a couple of entries:..Lamb + Mint: The French say bof to the Brits' love of mint with lamb, and they might have a point when it comes to the brutally vinegary strains of mint sauce. In 1747 Hannah Glasse wrote that a roasted, skinned hindquarter of pork will eat like lamb if served with mint sauce, which must have more to do with the overpowering nature of the sauce than any true similarity between the meats. But mint as a partner for lamb should not be dismissed wholesale. Lamb has a natural affinity for herbal flavours and, like citrus, mint's cleansing properties serve the useful purpose of deodorising some of lamb's funkier notes. Consider, for example, the lamb and mint ravioli served at Mario Batali's Babbo restaurant in New York. Or sauce paloise, which is like Bearnaise but swaps the tarragon for mint and is served with roast or grilled lamb. And in Azerbaijan a minted soup called dusbara is served with teeny lamb-filled tortellini bobbing in it. It's most often garnished with soured cream and ga

This item is eligible for free returns within 30 days of delivery. See our returns policy for further details.