MY CUP RUNNETH OVER

Sitting on my desk are three most gorgeous books. They are superb examples of fine publishing with the highest design and production values having been applied.
They are exquisite coffee table books, but they are also three great reads.
The three titles are:

MY AMALFI COAST – Amanda Tabberer - $80 – Lantern

IN SEARCH OF PARADISE - Graeme Lay - $90 – Godwit

SAFFRON – Pete Gawron - $90 - Godwit

Let’s look at them individually:

MY AMALFI COAST
Lantern is a Penguin Books Australia imprint that specializes in beautiful books, usually, but not only on the subject of cooking, gardening or travel. They have had some huge best-selling titles in their short publishing history, (established 2004), including The Cook’s Companion by Stephanie Alexander, Maggie’s Harvest by Maggie Beer, Carla Coulson’s Italian Joy, and last year’s international blockbuster, My French Life by Vicky Archer.
Other chefs on their list include Tobie Puttock, Matt Moran, and Kylie Kwong.

Four years ago we spent a wonderful week on the Amalfi Coast but oh how I wished My Amalfi Coast had been available then.

The author lived on the Amalfi Coast with her Italian partner for 10 years. She now lives back home in Australia with her son Sergio but pays regular return visits and this sumptuous book is the result of her latest stay there. It is a huge, handsome hardback, with a compelling text, lavishly illustrated by hundreds of gorgeous photographs by Carla Coulson. Check out some of her stunning pics at the author’s website – www.amandatabberer.com/
I want to go back to Amalfi!

IN SEARCH OF PARADISE
Artists & Writers in the Colonial South Pacific

Another absolute gem, this time home-grown from Random House New Zealand’s fabled Godwit imprint.
There is no question that Random House now set the pace on the local publishing scene. In terms of quality, quantity and variety they are streets ahead of anyone else. The enormous care they have lavished on every aspect of this book is testament to their design and production values.
And the publishers note that this title was produced for them by Linda Cassells of Calico Publishing with whom they have enjoyed a strong partnership.

In his new book Graeme Lay uses his own huge travel and writing experience of the South Pacific to bring us an engaging literary and visual feast.
He presents the lives of twenty-three of the finest artists and writers to have been inspired by the South Pacific, and a rich selection of their works. They include:
* The candid chronicles of Joseph Banks
* Louis-Antoine de Bougainville’s discovery of Tahitian free love
* Herman Melville’s very first fiction
* Robert Louis Stevenson’s life and death in Samoa
* The radiant paintings of Paul Gauguin
* Gottfried Lindauer’s depiction of a presumed-dying Maori race
* The love affair of Rupert Brooke’s life
* The inspiration for Somerset Maugham’s best-known short story

Handsomely packaged (great understatement) in large-format hardback, In Search of Paradise is divided into three sections. The first is Chroniclers, early explorers including de Bougainville, James Cook, Joseph Banks and Charles Darwin. The second, Artists, ranges from Sydney Parkinson, botanical artist on the first Cook voyage to Paul Gauguin. The personalities in the third, Writers, are an eclectic collection – from Robert Louis Stephenson to Herman Melville, Rupert Brooke and Somerset Maugham.

Graeme Lay is exceptionally well qualified to write this history. He first visited the Pacific Islands in the 1980s, and since then has travelled to, and written about, many of the islands of French Polynesia, Tonga, Samoa, the Cook Islands, Fiji and Vanuatu. Inspired by the physical and cultural richness of these islands, as were the artists and writers he features in In Search of Paradise, Graeme has published several works of fiction and non-fiction which are set in the tropical South Pacific.
These books include his three collections of travel stories, Passages, The Miss Tutti Frutti Contest and Inside the Cannibal Pot, the young adult novel trilogy Leaving One Foot Island, Return to One Foot Island and The Pearl of One Foot Island, the adult novel Temptation Island and a non-fiction work, The Cook Islands. Two of his short story collections, Motu Tapu and The Town on the Edge of the World, also include several stories set in the South Pacific islands.

SAFFRON
Food from the Central Otago heartland

Straight off I am going to say that this magnificent book is my pick to win the BPANZ Design Awards next year, along with the Lifestyle & Culture category of the Montana NZ Book Awards. It is many a day since I have held such an utterly beautiful piece of publishing as this. It would stand out in any international competition.
And I can tell you this too that I am sorely tempted to jump on the first plane to Queenstown in order to go and eat at Arrowtown’s famed SAFFRON restaurant, to drink fine Pinot Noir, and to feel again the magic of Central Otago. Such is the power and allure of the place as presented in this simply sumptuous book.
There are several stars here – first off chef Pete Gawron and his wife Mel, who first came to the area in the early 1990’s and subsequently set up their superb, now much acclaimed restaurant; then there is Aaron McLean, master photographer, whose gorgeous photographs are a real feature; Grahame Sydney for a number of photographs, and his essay, and also the rich endpapers; Sam Neill for his essay; and finally publisher Nicola Legat and her team at Random House NZ. Together you have combined to produce a truly fine book of which you should all feel enormously proud.

Sumptuously illustrated with both marvelous photographs of classic Central scenes and outstanding food photography by Aaron McLean, and featuring a section on the history of Arrowtown, this is not just a book for cooks. It goes much further as it celebrates the food, wine, producers, seasons, landscape and spirit which make this region so very special.

The book is for anyone who wants to have a little bit of Central at home with them – whether they live in Queenstown, Wellington, Gisborne, Napier, Auckland, Melbourne, Sydney, Paris, London, Toronto, New York or anywhere else.

Two outstanding guest essays round out the gorgeous package. Sam Neill writes of the establishment of Central’s flourishing and internationally acclaimed wine industry and, in addition to a selection of beautiful photographs, Grahame Sydney warmly reminisces about family holidays in Arrowtown as a young boy.
My fantasy now is to meet up with these guys at Saffron and talk about this book and about life in their beloved Central.

Saffron: Food from the Central Otago heartland is a marvelous evocation of this most special part of New Zealand. It is both a tribute to a great restaurant and perhaps New Zealand’s first true regional cookbook, the most mouth-watering book you are likely to view this year.
A selection of pics follows to further whet your appetite including Pete with a goose, a couple of the dishes for which Saffron is noted, and a Central winter scene.

FOOTNOTE
For my New Zealand readers, Pete Gawron is on with Kim Hill on Radio NZ National tomorrow (Saturday) morning at 11.05am.