The BIG Metric Ninja Foodi Cookbook: Over 100 recipes using European measurements

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Though indubitably British, they are also very foreign to modern tastes; there were quite a few I read several times and just couldn’t visualise what they would be like (on the other hand, it’s perhaps a good thing that I can’t imagine what camembert in aspic is like). Just to encourage us, she adds, “Do not throw up your hands in histrionic despair when inferior ingredients result in a dish that falls short of your old, exacting standards”.

I used not-very-stale sourdough baguette, whereas I think the recipe assumes factory-made white sliced, so my “fingers” came out looking rather messy. It wasn’t a patch on my classic eggy, rum-flavoured, sultana-studded bread and butter pudding; the apples just made a soggy layer in what should have been a creamy mass of custard-soaked bread. What's not good in this book, is that it doesn't cover the full range of Foodi devices, including the 15-in-1 model for UK market (the same thing is 14-in-1 for US market, just a bit different programmes). I found it invaluable when I was learning to cook, because it’s organised by month and focuses on fresh ingredients that are good and cheap (in the UK) in that month.

Ingredients have been checked for availability in the UK and Ireland and the names of many ingredients will mean nothing to an American.

The selection of recipes is both small and uncompromising; you will work at them but they will work for you. There’s still room for improvements in future editions, though: having been diagnosed as coeliac last year, I’m still trying to get my head around substitutions for a long list of ingredients I have been surprised to have robbed from my kitchen (Marmite!

I knew there would be demand for the book as it was something that so many UK-based Ninja Foodi Facebook group members kept repeating. A cashew nut stir-fry and coconut rice that’s all the best sweet and spicy bits of Thai cuisine (but I believe owes a debt to The Wok for my improved stir-frying); Lamb Shank Massaman are three words that just can’t fail; and their more unique dishes like Chubby Pork Cheek Stew or butternut squash hollowed out and stuffed with vegetable curry are all decent fodder. But she often shows real flair in combinations of ingredients and, especially, textures; Middle-Eastern influences are omnipresent since she spent part of her youth there. Cons: As a Christmas-themed baking book, it’s ideally used starting early December to make the most of its festive content, which somewhat limits its suitability as a Christmas gift.

Perfect for: a great gift for any child from 5-10 years, needs parental supervision for most of the recipes. It seemed to me that sprinkling sugar on the uneven top and trying to burn it wasn’t going to work that well anyway.

Last year’s challenge was a bit of a damp squib insofar as I didn’t get anywhere near cooking all the recipes in Delicious Days. Many of the recipes found within will be more familiar to the user of this cookbook, but they have been tweaked or reimagined so that they fit to the Ninja Foodi 7-in1 multi-cooker and many recipes will be completely new. Hey there, I'm Dan Lepard, the globe-trotting, dough-kneading, sourdough whisperer from London to Tokyo.