Kitchen books

An essential piece of kitchenware is the chef's selection of books. In these books there will be everything that the chef ever needed boiled, grated, fried, toasted, blitzed, mashed, macerated, chilled, broiled, blanched, pickled, chopped, peeled or even just poured out of a packet.

Whether it's a book about what is supposedly the world's best restaurant, Noma, or even just the most basic student recipes for chili and spag bol, every kitchen needs its cookbooks.

Of course, some chef's take cooking that bit further than everyone else. Heston Blumenthal (who else) recently did a programme on medieval feasts, which was inspired by his research of centuries old cookbooks. Most of us would probably make do with an old Keith Floyd book from the 1980s.