Reviewed by Rachel A Hyde, MyShelf.com
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If you love pizza - and who doesn't - then this is the book for you. But the best thing about it is that it isn't just about pizza, but is chock-full of other things as well. Read about the history of the Pizza Express chain of restaurants from the Soho branch, with its cool jazz, to the Exeter branch, with Fred the ghost and how it all started back in 1965 with creator Peter Boizot.

Some cookbooks just contain recipes, but here you can find out about the right herbs and aromatic flavorings to use, the best wines to drink and how to make several types of base. It isn't all just pizza, either, but a fine range of antipasti, pasta dishes and desserts. Some of them are available at the restaurants, others are originals. It is one of those books - the lush photography is a help - that get the imagination going and is going to make you feel very hungry the moment you open the cover.

So far it sounds a bit like hard work perhaps, an enthusiast's book when the rest of us can pick up a takeaway pizza but this isn't the case. None of the recipes is difficult to make and the instructions have been pared down to the minimum. A superb, user-friendly primer.