A New Zealander who developed a taste for pakoras and pukis on a cheap overland homeward trek from Europe, David Burton declares in his introduction that Asian cooking is largely a simple exercise in "shopping, chopping and assembly". Which is all very well until you read the first of his recipes, "Phoenix-tailed prawns", a Hong Kong delicacy which involves removing the black vein from the back of each prawn without reducing said prawn to a mangled mess. As to where you might buy galangal - or indeed how you would ask for it - well, it's enough to send you scurrying for the pasta sauce. But the inter-recipe anecdotes are amusing and informative: read them until you feel peckish, then phone your local oriental take away emporium and have them deliver some crispy fried noodles and a drop of their best hot and sour soup.
