Over the last week I have been following the debate on the Guardian newspaper website that has been triggered by the publication of Delia Smith’s latest book “How to Cheat at Cooking” and her new television series on the BBC. The most amusing article was the Delia Taste Test. The whole debate has since been taken up by more of the dailies in the UK.
I’ve never seen Delia on the TV. My first introduction to Delia Smith was when my mother-in-law gave me Book 2 of Delia’s first BBC Cookery Course. I was hooked and bought Book 1 and Book 3 too. My mother-in-law continued to be a big fan and bought most of her cookery books. I have them all now and they do get used a lot. The reason being that the recipes are interesting, don’t contain a large number of impossible to obtain ingredients (here in Germany) and are quite healthy too. Although her later books did start to contain “exotic” ingredients that were not so easy to find here.
So I have to say that my sentiments do echo those being put forward by the majority of commentators. I feel cheated too. I just can’t imagine how horrible tinned fried onions must be. And tinned mince takes me straight back to childhood holidays abroad, where the high price of meat compared to the UK, meant that my Mum took tinned meat with us for our meals. We were either in self-catering flats or later in the caravan. It was ok as a compromise – spend the money on travelling and entrance fees rather than on expensive food, but we never ate the stuff at home and I really wouldn’t want to start now and not just because in the meantime I’m an almost vegetarian 
