Gastronaut book
Gastronaut is due to be published on 20th Oct 2005 in the UK (BBC Books), in April 2006 in the USA (Harcourt) and in February in Germany (Gerstenberg Verlag).

Here are some bits to read. Not the whole book, obviously. That would be mad. But seeing as you’re interested, and therefore probably rather lovely, here’s the Blurb. And a few extracts including: Introduction Teaching Grandmothers to Suck Eggs Aphrodisiacs Bum Sandwich recipe Reindeer Stew recipe Full contents list What is Gastronaut? It’s a book of culinary adventures and extraordinary food. It’s a questbook, a practical guide through the funny, strange, eccentric world of gastronomy. In many ways, it’s a manual for culinary show-offs. I don’t expect you to use this book every day, but once or twice a year or even a lifetime when you have the time and inclination to create something truly spectacular. It’s written in two sections, the first is to be read in bed and includes chapters such as How to Stage a Bacchanalian Orgy in the Comfort of your own Home, Cooking with Gold, Why Not Eat Insects and Fully practical explanations of How to Make Margarine, moonshine, biltong and cheese. Here is the full contents list.

The second half is all recipes, and lives in the kitchen. It includes Cooking with aftershave, Gruel, Reindeer stew, Peruvian Skin-on Guinea-pig, Deep-fried Mars bars, Headcheese and even Imu: Whole pit-baked pig. This last one is a massive recipe – it’s 9 pages long, but it’s the definitive work on the subject, and feeds up to 200 people.

It’s true that some of these are 2-week long projects that you might only try out once in your life and clearly, if you’re after quick and easy recipes, I’m not the man for you. But if you want to go on some exhilarating culinary journeys, if you want to eat foods that rattle your bones, that make you think, make you fart, that make you feel guilty, or that take a week to make, if every now and then you like to annihilate the kitchen in a whirlwind of culinary fervour, this book should be right up your street.

 

 

 

Ó Stefan Gates 2005