Book review: It's Just Food by Mark Poynton
Mark Poynton's life story, littered with recipes from throughout his career as a chef
Mark Poynton's book It's Just Food starts with a preface by Murray Chapman from industry charity A Passion to Inspire, who says: "I would love to be an ingredient and travel through Mark's imagination – what a tasty journey that would be."
Chapman alludes to the hurdles Poynton has overcome, as does the chef himself, talking about his early years in pressurised kitchens and time with Daniel Clifford at Midsummer House in Cambridge, but the book is upbeat and full of learnings about a journey that started with him working in a hotel as a waiter "to earn a few quid".
The story begins with his time in Macclesfield, where he went to college; at Juniper in Chester, where he worked with chef Paul Kitching and was nurtured by the team; and then to the "testosterone-fuelled environment" of Midsummer House. He says he's not breaching any confidences by saying the kitchen was tense and he acknowledges, as Clifford has, that the image of the shouty, aggressive chef that was true back in the day has now changed dramatically.
Poynton eventually left Midsummer House on a two-Michelin-star high, but not before reaching his breaking point. A move to Alimentum in Cambridge and his own Michelin star followed. Almost nine years later, after the liquidation of the restaurant, Poynton explains how MJP Restaurants was born in June 2018 at the Ancient Shepherds pub in Fen Ditton, just outside Cambridge. Now known as MJP at the Shepherds, Poynton runs the site as a leasehold restaurant with rooms.
The recipes in the book include dishes such as a starter of smoked pork belly and English snails on toasted focaccia, sirloin of Peter Hannan salt-aged beef (opposite), and a black pudding sausage roll and walnut ketchup.
The book's photography moves from stark black and white at the front to arty restaurant-style dishes towards the end. Significant perhaps? Poynton has grown during his journey as a chef, and his recipes are all the better for it.
It's Just Food by Mark Poynton (A Way With Media £40)
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