The North Sea at Easter is no place for fancy dan cooking: chilli, spaghetti bolognaise, Somerset pork and a chicken stew all cooked before hand and frozen in two litre ice cream boxes. In Brandy Bottle’s coolbox they stayed frozen across to Holland and for the week’s sailing on the Dutch inland waterways. Most years the wind blew straight down from the Arctic Circle so we didn’t need the coolbox. Then there were the Fray Bentos tinned chicken pies for emergencies. Nobody complained about the food so long as there was plenty of it and it was hot.

Compromis is the name of Liz’s and my new boat down in the south of France which is a place for fancy dan cooking. From our base in Antibes we have sailed north east Nice to Monaco and on to Italy barely 25nM away, south east to Corsica and Sardinia, across to Rome and up the Italian coast to La Spezia and the Cinque Terra coast. Closer to base are the anchorages off the Cap d’Antibes, the Iles de Lerins and 30nM to the south west is St. Tropez.

Everywhere there is good food. In the restaurants we’ve had spaghetti with clams in San Remo, steak Milanese in Antibes, crab salad in Cagnes-sur-Mer, a seven course fish meal in Fuimicino, Rome, lamb chops for lunch in Valbonne and the plat du jour - always very rare roast beef and mashed potatoes it seems - at the Cafe de la Place in St. Paul de Vence.

On Compromis Liz prepares and serves Happy Hour after which she settles down with her book and that is the signal for me to start dinner. Down in the galley, which has a two burner hob and oven, three saucepans, saute pan, good sized fridge and a reasonable selection of utensils, I get to work. Compared to Brandy Bottle’s galley this is enormous but small in comparison to our kitchen at home and so preparation and organisation are essential. A chef’s tipple helps as well.

Every chef has a style.  Gary Rhodes is precise, Jamie Oliver is cavalier and I am trying hard. Trying hard to come up with a range of delicious meals that can be cooked with the available resources, fresh ingredients and a selection of spices from the ten we have on board.  The spice rack at home is full of flavours once used soon forgotten.    

Come July, August and September friends migrate south on Easyjet bringing with them an eagerness to jump into my galley to cook their signature dishes and they don’t need much persuading to write them up in the Visitor’s Log which is now home to recipes for superb meals cooked by wonderful friends and the settings in which they were served.  All this has gone into the “Compromis Cook Book”.

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