Even if you’re a keen cook, you may never have heard of Lindsey Bareham. Yet she’s produced 15 cookery books and writes a daily recipe in The Times - Dinner Tonight. 

I met Lindsey when she was talking to a group of us aspiring to be cook book authors. Her key message was, you don’t have to be Gordon Ramsay or Delia to get a book published: it’s down to luck, hard work and perseverance.

I tried a couple of her recipes with fabulous results. The dishes were simple, ideal for an after-work meal and very tasty even if the methods need a little concentration - she has a very limited space to write. 

Curried parsnip risotto with bacon sounded an odd mix but it’s become a firm winter favourite and as Lindsey admitted, chicken and tinned pears sounds a strange combination but it works.

There’s always a lovely introduction to whet the appetite. Who could resist wanting to make ‘a pizzaesque upside-down tart cooked in a frying pan with silky soft leeks in a creamy sauce seasoned with lemon and thyme, scraps of crisp bacon and torn leftover chicken’?

The dishes are all ones I want to make again. So, the Lindsey cook book was born - a reporter's notebook with recipes cut out and stuck one to a page, with an index at the front and notes of how we adapted or ideas for the future. 

So, despite being home-made, with no glossy pictures, it’s one of the first books I reach for when the question, ‘what shall we have for dinner tonight?’ arises. 

This made me think about the books I rarely look at: whilst some women have over 40 pairs of shoes (I have less than 10), I do admit to owning 100+ books. They range from food bibles with an encyclopaedic knowledge of food, to kitchen-table books with fabulous food photographs of dishes I’d never make but are great to look at.

Others are small paper backed freebies: the BBC food magazine, Olive, has given away a range that is often reached for. 

Delia Red Jumper (because she’s wearing a red jumper on the front), is also a favourite and I’ve created all the recipes from her summer and winter collection time and time again.

So what makes a good cook book? You might like pictures, a good index or a book tailored to a specific subject -  eg dishes that freeze. 

However, I’m becoming increasingly reliant on the internet searches as it’s much quicker than hunting through a set of books if you want to find, say, a quick and easy chocolate pudding or want to use a specific ingredient. 

I find www.riverford.co.uk brilliant for unusual ways of using the contents of my organic veg box as I can search by category or vegetable.

So, is the internet taking over from the cook book, and what’s your favourite book and why? Do let me know by e-mailing foodintheforest@btinternet.com.