Tim Hayward's Cast Iron Wisdom
The skillet is not something you merely acquire. You are going to move in with your skillet and share your life with it. It’s best if you think of it as a pet, not a pan.
A piece about cast iron wisdom in the FT Weekend Magazine would have been exciting. That the piece is written by Tim Hayward, a food writer Nick and I have admired since subscribing to his quarterly magazine Fire and Knives way back in 2010, would have been all kinds of fascinating. That Tim's article references and rates our own pride and joy skillets is phenomenal. We're pinching ourselves. Thank you Tim!
Read the full article and Tim's recipes for Fried Chicken and Cornbread here.
A word about Fire and Knives
In 2010 Nick and I were living together for the first time and still romantic enough to occasionally buy each other gifts. Around Nick's birthday I came across Fire and Knives. I bought him the first issue with a subscription for the year. We both loved the writing and the artwork that followed every quarter. I daydreamed about submitting an article but never plucked up the courage.
At the time we were reading Fire and Knives, we were also cooking regularly from the St John Nose To Tail books. We fed our friends with custard doughnuts, Kentucky Fried rabbit, brown bread ice cream, pig cheeks. Fergus Henderson inspired us to tackle a whole ox heart. It was the first 'proper' restaurant we went to and were fortunate enough to visit a few times, including on the day I graduated.
Nick in particular has followed Tim's writing ever since. When Tim wrote an homage to St John on the occasion of the restaurant's 30th anniversary, it was just a couple of weeks after our Kickstarter closed. Nick decided it was time to pop an email to Tim, mention his admiration and ask if he'd like to road test a Hornbeam skillet.
We're honoured that Tim is cooking in our skillets. His early support was a huge boost to our confidence. In this piece he's brilliantly conveyed the rewards of caring for a cast iron skillet and the way you learn to cherish it. It sums up why we're doing this and we're looking forward to making his fried chicken this week!