Cosmopolitan Recipes That Use New Zealand Ingredients

Press, Volume CI, Issue 29897, 10 August 1962, Page 2

Cosmopolitan Recipes That Use New Zealand Ingredients

Cookery books of Continental and Chinese dishes made popular gifts among Christchurch hostesses for a year or two. But most of these books now stay at the back of a kitchen cupboard because too many of the ingredients used in the tempting recipes are not available.

A recent publication, “Cosmopolitan Cookery for New Zealand Tables,” changes the frustrating situation. Ingredients in all its recipes can be found in New Zealand shops.

The book is a collection of Russian, Chinese. Greek, Indian, French. Norwegian, Baltic. Spanish, Ukrainian and Jewish recipes, compiled by Rosa Peacock.

Mrs Peacock was bom in Siberia, and has lived in many parts of Europe and China. She was in Hong Kong with her Canadian husband when World War II broke out, and was evacuated to Australia. Her husband was taken prisoner, and died in a Japanese camp. She later married a New Zealander, and lived for 10 years in Dunedin.

■ Jn her travels. Mrs Peacock has collected her o*n favourite recipes, tested them, and presented them with imagination in an inexpensive book. The recipes are set out clearly and are easy to follow by a cook of even limited experience. Salads A section on salads w.U be a source of inspiration to the mother of a family who tires of lettuce as the summer proceeds. Some of the most fascinating recipes for salads use no lettuce at all. Knowing that caviare is expensive in New Zealand and not Always easy to procure. Mrs Peacock has included two appetisers entitled eggplant caviare. Both are, authentic European recipes—one from the Balkan states, the other from Russia. The hostess who is at her y. .ts’ end trying to think of something different for her

••hors d’oeuvre” tray, will find a list of nine suggestions at the beginning of the book. Hints, learnt as a New Zealand housewife, are also included by the author. For recipes which require oil. for instance, she recommends soya bean or peanut oiL "These seem to suit the NewZealand palate better ' than pure olive oil. and are also much cheaper.” she says. Soups

Not all her recipes have the same regard for economy, but the hostess who prepared to serve Continental food to dinner guests expects to stretch her housekeeping budget for the occasion. Many of the soup recipes reouire half a cup of sour cream: others, however, need

only the usual stock-pot ingredients put together with a touch of genius. In the meat section cheap cuts of steak and mince are transformed into the gourmet class by serving them with, say, a sweet-sour sauce or by the addition of a tablespoon of sherry to what sounds like a glorified stew. With poultry she has the same glamorous touch. A small boiling fowl becomes chicken pilau with the addition of a few vegetables, and the right quantities of rice raisins, and .peanuts to the saucepan. Pryaniki Recipes are included for Continental breads and pastries; for biscuits, such as pryaniki and Jewish butter biscuits.

European cake recipes open up a new field for the New Zealand home cook feeling venturesome on baking day. Many include cottage cheese in the ingredients, pastry as a shell, and a few, like pasha 'Russian Easter cake), are fried. Chestnuts and Fruit Pastry is also used extensively in the dessert section, which includes several new (to New Zealand) recipes for pancakes. The most fascinating of all are the recipes which combine cooked chestnuts with a variety of fruits, and brandy, either mixed in whipped cream or used as a fuel for igniting. The book, which is well indexed for quick reference, has 239 recipes. It is published by Paul’s Book Arcade.