Library Read // A Year of Pies by Ashley English

It seems to be that all I am doing is playing catch-up in life. Last year, at a point in time when I was suddenly all about pies, I’ve decided to borrow this book from the library. And I remember as I started reading it I didn’t entirely sit right with the author’s tone. Some might say it was a bit of a know-it-all tone. But I appreciate knowledge, so I decided I was gonna power through. I had sectioned the book off, ready to breeze on through, in parts, the book. But, as with life, things happen. Between shifting moods and major life events, I didn’t finish it all when I started it. And so here I find myself, having finished it in July of the next year.

It’s hard to read cookbooks. How was the writing? How many recipes am I going to/am I interested in making? Do I feel inspired by this book, the recipes therein? Now, I am not a fruit person. Maybe my mistake was in getting a book on pies where, innately, one might argue, I was never going to be inspired by a majority of the recipes. I did jot down three recipes. One was a potato and leek recipe, another a turkey shepherd’s pie, and the third a triple berry pie. And even that berry pie? I’d probably have to really purée that to even consider.

Aside from the author’s voice and the general lack of culinary inspiration I’m taking away from this, it wasn’t a bad book. I always appreciate good saturated and glossy photography of food in my cookbooks but I don’t appreciate it when sometimes we get pictures not of the finished product. If you are trying to sell me a recipe what good will pictures of the ingredients do me? Might I recommend this book to the right person? Yes. Do I know enough of said right persons? I don’t know. That said, I’m going to give this book 4 out of 5 stars. It was glossy and the ingredients sounded good to my hypothetical, non-picky eater mind. The recipes I did and did not take inspiration from, they were necessarily new or groundbreaking but they were written in an easy to read, understand manner.