BTW, Pippa Middleton Is Something of an Epicurean

Critics — the Telegraph book critic Christopher Howse who looks like a Santa Claus that’s been turned into a Dracula Santa Claus (incidentally, a sure-fire title for a spec script for Supernatural (you’re welcome)) — have not been kind to Pippa Middleton’s new book, Celebrate, which is about how much Pippa Middleton loves to write, cook, and throw well-mannered tea parties with her stuffed animals.

If Celebrate was actually a novel narrated by a young recluse who’d only ever had stuffed animals for friends, it might be worth checking out, but, as it is, the book is only worth digesting in small bites courtesy of a Sunday article in the Telegraph, which is for the best because Pippa, fyi, is something of a foodie.

I’m a real foodie – something, I think, not a lot of people know about me. For instance, the last dinner I cooked for friends was slow-braised pig’s cheeks. I didn’t tell anyone what it was in case it put them off, but it was a huge success. Pigeon-breast salad and venison stew also appear regularly on my dinner-party menu.

Not only that, but she also used her unsuspecting (and plush) friends as test palates for kitchen experiments, like hare jugs (which is British for breast of rabbit, obviously) and seafood pies:

My friends at Edinburgh University were often my guinea pigs. I knew I could try anything on them as friends don’t really mind if something doesn’t quite work out, like my jugged hare (a recipe I won’t be trying again in a hurry). But the salmon and prawn pillow – which I have included in my book, Celebrate – always went down well. In fact, any pie was popular. As was making sushi as a starter, which was fiddly but well worth the praise.

If that’s not incentive enough to buy Pippa’s party book, rumor has it that with each purchase of Celebrate, Pippa will throw in one free birthday cake, an old-world British confection made from kippers, marmalade, and haughty disdain for flavor. [via Telegraph]