Book review: Catalogued Ideas and Random Thoughts by Stuart Ralston

Stuart Ralston’s mind does not rest, this much is clear.

His debut cookbook, Catalogues Ideas and Random Thoughts, is beautifully bound with a fabric ochre spine and a butter-hued elastic band, and it contains some of the acclaimed chef’s most in-depth and carefully tested recipes from his 20-year career.

The book may be a catalogue of ideas, but his random thoughts are neatly sectioned into seven chapters: the first three, labelled NYC, Aizle and Noto, mark significant moments in his culinary life; another chapter is dedicated to recipes for staff tea, and the remaining three to condiments, oils and bread.

In true Ralston form, every recipe demands time, full attention and upmost dedication. Take the potato dauphine with miso mustard mayo where, even although it was concocted as a bar snack at Noto, the high skill and standards required to deliver this dish are clear. At first glance, it contains four ingredients with a method spanning just three lines, but overleaf Ralston breaks down every element of those four ingredients so that everything is made from scratch. No cutting corners here.

The same goes for his staff tea recipes, such as his prosciutto and tomato herb tart, which would be worthy of any high-end restaurant given the time and skills required to create it.

The book will appeal to professional chefs who want to test their skills and stretch their abilities, but also to those who might be considering their own restaurant journey.

As the book traces Ralston’s evolution from chef to restaurateur, it gives useful insights and tips into the leaps and steps he made to get to where he is.

The chef says the book took him two years’ work, and its launch coincides with the opening of Ralston’s fourth restaurant in Edinburgh, Lyla. According to him, the book took twice as long to compile as it did to launch Lyla.

Chef, restaurateur, and now perhaps mentor, Ralston’s devotion to food percolates out of the pages and is an exciting insight into this Scottish chef’s talent and mind.

Catalogued Ideas and Random Thoughts by Stuart Ralston (Kitchen Press, £35)