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Using the Plot: Tales of an Allotment Chef
 
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Using the Plot: Tales of an Allotment Chef [Illustrated] (Hardcover)

by Paul Merrett (Author)
3.3 out of 5 stars See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
RRP: £16.99
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Frequently Bought Together

Using the Plot: Tales of an Allotment Chef + The Allotment Book: Seasonal Planner and Cookbook + Vegetable Growing Month-by-month: The Down-to-earth Guide That Takes You Through the Vegetable Year
Price For All Three: £20.73

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Product details

  • Hardcover: 320 pages
  • Publisher: Collins; illustrated edition edition (2 Jun 2008)
  • Language English
  • ISBN-10: 0007252617
  • ISBN-13: 978-0007252619
  • Product Dimensions: 23.6 x 15.5 x 3 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 3.3 out of 5 stars See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 38,603 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

    Popular in these categories:

    #16 in  Books > Home & Garden > Gardening > Garden Styles > Urban Gardens
    #38 in  Books > Food & Drink > Reference & Gastronomy > Gastronomy

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Product Description

Review
"! Paul writes with good humour, brutal honesty and happens to be a Michelin-starred chef. Cue 85 seriously good recipes !a compelling read." Garden News

Product Description
Michelin-starred chef and family man Paul Merrett swaps his shopping trolley for a wheelbarrow in this tale of self-sufficiency and 21st century urban survival. This is the story of how a famous foodie turns to a small plot of communal land to feed his family. Having become tired of poor-quality supermarket food and disillusioned with the dubious ethics of large corporations, Paul Merrett takes an allotment to see if he and his family can live off the fruit and vegetables they are able to grow. Along the way Paul reconnects with his grandparents' legacy of self-sufficiency and discovers the unbeatable flavour of a home-grown green tomato (especially when it's turned into salsa with spring onion and mint). He also learns that our romantic notions of a simpler life are not as simple as they seem...Using the Plot follows Paul, his wife and two reluctant children as they learn to garden, make what they hope is their final trip to the supermarket, build relationships with fellow allotmenteers and slowly watch their crops flourish and sometimes fail. They contend with the inevitable disappointments along the way with good humour and perseverance, and only the occasional temper tantrum.As the asparagus poke through the soil and the battle against the lettuce-munching slugs is won, Paul turns his humble vegetables into recipes worthy of his epicurean background. He includes over 85 allotment-inspired recipes, including simple dishes such as One Pot Vegetable Stew and Meringue Cake with Summer Berries as well as more involved dishes such as Pumpkin Ravioli, Tea-Smoked Chicken Breast on Allotment Vegetables and Steamed Walnut and Allspice Sponge with Roasted Plums. Paul's charming narrative is interspersed with his personal take on food ethics, celebrity chefs and the legacy of his self-sufficient grandparents. Reportage and food photography accompanies his story. Part recipe book, part memoir, Using the Plot is an engaging, informative and humorous read.

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What Do Customers Ultimately Buy After Viewing This Item?

Using the Plot: Tales of an Allotment Chef
78% buy the item featured on this page:
Using the Plot: Tales of an Allotment Chef 3.3 out of 5 stars (7)
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The Allotment Book: Seasonal Planner and Cookbook 5.0 out of 5 stars (2)
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Customer Reviews

7 Reviews
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4 star:
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3 star:
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2 star:
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Average Customer Review
3.3 out of 5 stars (7 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

 
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars None of us are perfect!, 7 April 2009
After reading the other reviews on this book I thought it was still worth adding my thoughts. In common with one of the other readers I did find the number of (unnecessary) exclamation marks throughout the book annoying. Even if I hadn't read the review before reading the book, I suspect they'd still have grated. I also felt that reading a book where the author discussed (continually) deciding to write, and writing, the book somewhat irritating - I'd bought it to read about the trials and tribulations of living off the land, not how Paul Merrett makes his money.

So - recipes include:

Panfried Goats Cheese with Serrano Ham, Fig and New Zealand Spinach
Salmon Skewers with Majoram and Red Peppercorns
Beetroot Baked in Foil
Smoked Haddock Risotto with Sweetcorn and Spring Onions
Lamb Srew with Allotment Vegetables and Spinach and Ricotta Dumplings
Mum's Apple Snow
Warm Baked Victoria Sponge wirh Red Berries and Whipped Cream
Having said all that, I did find Paul's account of his aspirations, and how real life gets in the way, refreshingly honest. I'm sure most people have set off merrily on some new venture only to find that it's alot more difficult than they thought (or it's raining and the supermarket is far simpler). Setting aside the exclamation marks it was an amusing read.

The recipes are good. But..... I get the impression that Paul Merrett is trying to break into the 'recipe book' market (a quick search on Amazon reveals one other book that he has authored with two other chefs). I get the impression that this was Paul's aim from the start - how can I get my recipes out there? What is my hook??? I think he had a list of recipes he wanted to include and, if they didn't include some vegetable or another, he'd wedge one in.
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8 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars Hmmmmm....., 26 Aug 2008
By emma who reads a lot (London) - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)   
I wanted to like this book. It's extremely beautiful, printed on lovely paper with lovely photos. Paul Merrett seems like a cheerful enough guy and he has quotes on the cover from Gary Rhodes and Novelli. And he is from Ealing, supports Brentford, so for me it's a local local food book!

But something stopped me. I just found the book to be a bit all over the place. Merrett constantly tells us he's only going to eat home-grown food, then ends up in Tescos; he talks about wanting to be green then admits to having a patio heater, he gets an allotment and only manages to grow one thing by the first spring, he wants to persuade his children to eat more veg but behaves like a typically anal chef, not letting anyone eat bananas (which don't have too bad a carbon footprint as I understand), only just about tolerating his kids' playing and pulling up a whole row of baby spinach Because It Wasn't Straight Enough....

I think the brief of the book should have been clearer - is he doing it to eat fresher tastier food, or to be more sustainable, or to get his kids to eat more veg, or to save the world? It's confusing that sometimes it seems to be about all of the above, though Merrett doesn't totally seem to understand how any of it might be achieved.And he keeps referring to his editors and what they want from him, which is a bit too meta for me, in a cookbook.

The second half of the book is entirely recipes, but not many of them seem expressly designed to use stuff from the allotment - for example, fish pie? Or roast lamb?

And there is a sea bass recipe. Sorry, but that's just so oooooo unenvironmentally friendly! Despite the little section at the beginning of "fish" where he talks about line-fishing etc. And Merrett doesn't even bother with the really crucial allotmenteer question: what to do with all that marrow? He just says real chefs don't cook marrow.

I wouldn't have minded at all if this book had just been a chef's allotment book - why not just take the saving the world out of it, and have a caring, unhypocritical book about trying to grow more local ingredients?

However, you will get good, good recipes for:
Lamb stew with allotment vegetables.
courgette pickle
tomato and chilli jam
red onion jam
mint sauce
roasted plums
and many others.

it is a beautiful book, and perhaps I should applaud Merrett's honesty about his sense of confusion! It certainly didn't make me like him less, as I found the whole book charming and I would definitely check out future publications by him. I just think: don't try and please everybody next time...
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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars An interesting mix, 12 Oct 2008
By J. Sykes "physiojen" (UK) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   
I bought this book as I am a keen cook who is on the waiting list for an allotment. I thought it would be interesting to see how this book bought those two aspects together. I knew little about Paul Merrett but have seen him on a couple of food magazine type programmes.

As a diary/account of how to (or is that not to?) start an allotment I found it generally amusing and interesting. However, not as good as Allotted Time: Two Blokes, One Shed, No Idea, a book which Merrett mentions. There isn't enough real detail to help you avoid the pitfalls that Merrett himself makes, but maybe thats the whole idea of having an allotment and learning from your own mistakes. The story, which covers just over a year, flows well and held my attention enough to get through it in only a couple of sittings.

The recipes, which take up just under 150 pages, cover the usual suspect veg you would find on an allotment and range in complexity from 'root vegetable mash' (can this really be classed as a 'recipe'?) to 'slow-roast shoulder of lamb' (whose allotment ingredients consist only of garlic & rosemary). The section on preserves and sauces seems decent and I feel this is the section I would use the most.

Overall this is a really well presented book, with lovely pictures throughout both sections of the book. The recipes seems well written and easy to follow. I did enjoy this book, and found myself laughing out loud at certain points however, there are better accounts of allotment life out there and there are more useful recipes too. Saying that this is a book which brings the two together quite nicely, and gives you more information about the allotment side of things than Jamie Oliver's Jamie at Home: Cook Your Way to the Good Life
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Most Recent Customer Reviews

4.0 out of 5 stars not losing the plot!!
I bought this book in anticipation of acquiring my own allotment,which I now have and can certainly relate to alot of the trials and tribulations that go with owning an allotment,... Read more
Published 2 months ago by C. Roper-hall

2.0 out of 5 stars I wanted to like this but...
...it's a bit of a letdown. Too many exclamation marks (really? yes!), too many mentions of his Michelin stars, and a general feeling of something that has been produced to order... Read more
Published 5 months ago by CB Haines

4.0 out of 5 stars Inspiring and funny
We're at the same stage that Paul was in at the beginning of the book - an allotment that is wild and overgrown - so we bought the book to be inspired. Read more
Published 10 months ago by shill157

4.0 out of 5 stars Ripping Yarn
The book recreates the bemusement, hard work and ultimately triumphant feeling of those starting out on an allotment career. Read more
Published 11 months ago by John Bradley

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