I’ve lost count of the number of cookbooks I own but I have thousands, all ordered by type of cuisine, specialist subjects, and by chef and food writers. They are crammed into floor-to-ceiling bookshelves in my study and take up most of the book space in a corner of my sitting room. The biggest concentration…

My front garden is tiny, the soil lousy and half the patch is taken up with the roots of a vigorous magnolia tree. It is, though, a sun-trap and shielded by a tall fence. Last summer, as an experiment, I planted five courgette plants, three types of French beans and five beetroot plants. There were…

Other people’s kitchens are a bit like other people’s wardrobes, full of surprises and fascinating. Mine is at the rear of a typical Victorian two-up, two-down terrace house with a back extension and postage stamp London garden. I bought the house as a wreck after my marriage broke down and have subsequently lived through all…