'A cracking book!' Tom Kerridge

The tradition of preserving meats is one of the oldest of all the food arts. Yet, most people simply associate charcuterie with a delicious platter of meats at a restaurant.

But real charcuterie goes well beyond that. At its most basic level it is the technique of seasoning, processing, and preserving meat, but the charcutier’s bounty ranges from sausages and hams to stuffed game birds and elaborate roasts. Charcuterie can be a succulent confit duck leg on a bed of crisp greens, a rich and meaty stew, or a picnic blanket laden with pâtés, pickled vegetables and slices of fragrant salami.

With over 125 recipes and fully illustrated instructions for making brined, smoked, cured, skewered, braised, rolled, tied, and stuffed meats, plus a primer on whole-animal butchery, this definitive cookbook explains professional techniques that will enable home cooks to experience restaurant-quality meat every day and take their meat cooking to the next level.

Start with a whole hog middle, stuff it with herbs and spices, then roll it, tie it, and roast it for a ridiculously succulent take on porchetta. Or brandy your own prunes to stuff a decadent duck terrine. If it’s sausage you crave, grind, case, link, loop and smoke your own kolbász. This book will help you fill your larder with jars of suet and drippings, tubs of flavoured butter and pots of confit. It will show you how to turn a haunch of pork into creamy lard, a heady broth or a smoked ham, and how to whip up an elegant pâté, a hearty pot of soup, or a mess of savoury scones.

With its impeccably tested recipes, this instructive and inspiring tome is destined to become the go-to reference on charcuterie – a treasure for anyone fascinated by the art of cooking with and preserving meat and an indispensable classic for years to come.