Dairy Products and Eggs

Milk and butter and cream and cheese – for most of us a fridge without all four is effectively empty, since the produce of the dairy is essential in a vast range of dishes. For a cook trained in a Western tradition, cooking without dairy products is a prospect of limited opportunity, but it is interesting to think that there are large parts of the world, like Southeast Asia, where dairy is unknown.

Eggs too are central to our cooking. Perhaps of all foods a truly fresh egg is a thing of enduring beauty and perfection. It may literally rise to culinary heights in a soufflé, but we need do no more than briefly boil one to be reminded when eating it that absolute simplicity illuminates quality more brilliantly than any complex sauce.