How to be Nigella

THE Independent had just published a spoof article on the Eighties style bible, The Sloane Ranger Handbook, when Nigella Lawson wafted into York, new cookbook in tow. Who should have been chosen for the main picture for The Unofficial New Posh Handbook but Nigella. There she was topping the list of celebs "it matters even more to love".

Nigella had seen John Walsh's article, and on re-acquaintance as she sat in the bar of City Screen, she laughed, not taking her new status entirely seriously. "May I just tell you I once shared an office with the writer, when I was deputy literary editor of The Sunday Times," she said.

This was inside information, yes, but nevertheless, more than an office in-joke surely lies behind the choice of Nigella: journalist, cookery writer, Channel 4 chef, and author of How To Eat (The Pleasures And Principles Of Good Food) and now How To Be A Domestic Goddess, the creamy, dreamy cook book she had just been promoting at a signing session at Waterstone's.

Nigella is the chef du jour, the new kitchen goddess, Felicity Kendall for the new Good Life age. "But for a long time I was told my voice was too posh for TV. What can you do but develop an estuary English accent?!" wondered Nigella, who has not bent her RP tones one inch towards Essex.

On Nigella Bites, her debut TV series for Channel 4 this autumn, Nigella was natural Nigella, organic Nigella, and being true to herself has made her the cookery-show flavour of the moment. "I don't feel like the pony that won the gymkhana," she said, distancing herself from fickle fame. "You can never know what you represent to other people and you must not get wound up by that.

"There are people who are obsessed by their press cuttings but funnily enough, maybe one of the good things about doing this at my age Nigella is 40 is that I don't dwell on the bad ones, which I might have done when I was younger. But then it's also important not to take them seriously or you might become a monster."

A monster? Surely not. Dressed from head to boots in her favourite black - even her pen has black ink - and flicking her hand through her hair regularly she seemed wholly at ease with herself: a "cheese and bread woman", as she called herself. "I was asked how real Nigella Bites was, and I said it's truthful but that doesn't mean it's accurate. Life is not just made up of 15 to 20 programmes, and it's important to keep that distinction. Life is quite complicated and you're not always in one frame of mind."

A second series will follow. I suggested she should call it Nigella Bites Back, laughing heartily at my own wit. "Everyone's said that," she said, a little wearily. "I said no because it sounds defensive." She had a point.

"We haven't settled on a time scale yet. Channel 4 wants it sooner, I want it later. I'd like to hang around with the children for a while; one of the reasons why I chose this life was that it would not always be work, work, work, so there's no point doing that now."

She is all too aware of the danger of burn-out.

"I don't want to be over-exposed, but it's not just that. My children are young, they're four and six, I'm aware of how quickly time goes, and I want to be around them: otherwise, I may as well have stayed in the office on the executive ladder, and that was not the right route for me."

Writing another book is the path ahead, along with her regular newspaper and magazine contributions. What subject next?

"How To Eat was my realist volume; How To Be A Domestic Goddess is my escapist volume - I think of it as high-calorie eating and low-calorie reading - and the next one will be called Kitchen. I want it to be more like the recipes in How To Eat, simple food you'll eat at home, with a social history of the kitchen at the beginning because that interests me," says Nigella.

Whereas her streamlined ex-Chancellor father has become as obsessed with the lbs as he once was with the £, publishing the Nigel Lawson Diet Cookbook in 1998, Nigella Lawson celebrates life. "His book was how not to eat, mine are how to eat!" Beautifully put.

Dense Chocolate Loaf Cake

Makes 8 to 10 slices

Ingredients

225g soft unsalted butter

375g dark muscovado sugar

2 large eggs, beaten

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

100g best dark chocolate, melted

200g plain flour

1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda

250ml boiling water

Use one 23 x 13 x 7cm loaf tin

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 190C/gas mark 5; put in a baking sheet in case of sticky drips later, and grease and line the loaf tin. The lining is important as this is a very damp cake: use parchment, Bake-O-Glide or loaf-tin shaped paper case.

2. Cream the butter and sugar, either with a wooden spoon or with an electric hand-held mixer, then add the eggs and vanilla, taking care to blend well but being careful not to overbeat. Nigella says: "You want the ingredients combined: you don't want a light airy mass."

3. Gently add the flour, to which you have added the bicarb, alternately spoon by spoon, with the boiling water until you have a smooth and fairly liquid batter.

4. Pour into the lined loaf tin, and bake for 30 minutes. Turn the oven down to 170C/gas mark 3, and continue to cook for another 15 minutes. Nigella says: "The cake will still be a bit squidgy inside, so an inserted cake-tester or skewer won't come out completely clean." Charles says: "Unlike King Alfred, keep an eye on the top of the cake, to avoid burning."

5. Place the loaf tin on a rack, and leave to go completely cold before turning it out. Nigella says: "I often leave it for a day or so: like gingerbread, it improves."

Nigella's serving suggestions: Eat with ice cream; or with a bowl of straw-berries and a jug of white-coloured rum custard; or cold cream cheese.

Recipe

Dense Chocolate Loaf Cake

Makes 8 to 10 slices

Ingredients

225g soft unsalted butter

375g dark muscovado sugar

2 large eggs, beaten

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

100g best dark chocolate, melted

200g plain flour

1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda

250ml boiling water

Use one 23 x 13 x 7cm loaf tin

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 190C/gas mark 5; put in a baking sheet in case of sticky drips later, and grease and line the loaf tin. The lining is important as this is a very damp cake: use parchment, Bake-O-Glide or loaf-tin shaped paper case.

2. Cream the butter and sugar, either with a wooden spoon or with an electric hand-held mixer, then add the eggs and vanilla, taking care to blend well but being careful not to overbeat. Nigella says: "You want the ingredients combined: you don't want a light airy mass."

3. Gently add the flour, to which you have added the bicarb, alternately spoon by spoon, with the boiling water until you have a smooth and fairly liquid batter.

4. Pour into the lined loaf tin, and bake for 30 minutes. Turn the oven down to 170C/gas mark 3, and continue to cook for another 15 minutes. Nigella says: "The cake will still be a bit squidgy inside, so an inserted cake-tester or skewer won't come out completely clean." Charles says: "Unlike King Alfred, keep an eye on the top of the cake, to avoid burning."

5. Place the loaf tin on a rack, and leave to go completely cold before turning it out. Nigella says: "I often leave it for a day or so: like gingerbread, it improves."

Nigella's serving suggestions: Eat with ice cream; or with a bowl of straw-berries and a jug of white-coloured rum custard; or cold cream cheese.