Table plays pivotal role through cook’s life

Trish Magwood’s latest book My New Table “a lifestyle cookbook of simple, seasonally-inspired recipes for every table” will be released later this month.
Magwood is a food and lifestyle industry authority, trend leader and experienced entrepreneur, who splits her time between Toronto and Creemore, or as she says, has one shoe in the city, and one boot on the farm.
She is a chef, award-winning cookbook author of dish and In My Mother’s Kitchen, television host, producer, creator, founder of the popular dish cooking studio, a judge for Food Network Canada’s Family Cook-Off, entertainer and mother of three.
Magwood said she set out to produce something more than a cookbook, she wanted it to be about lifestyle and design, with lots of gorgeous photos.
“For me sometimes – like lots of parents or cooks – I don’t always love to cook but I always love to sit and gather and I always love food so it’s really about eating and living, cooking and sharing and not just about the recipes and the preparation of food.
The title is a nod to big changes in Magwood’s personal and professional life with the blending of two families to include five children living under one roof with their parents, a move and a renovation. Magwood reflects on how the kitchen table has been an anchor throughout the various phases of her life.
“With food, I find a sense of purpose and meaning, and accomplishment,” writes Magwood. “I have long wanted to share the simple recipes that are a mainstay for my family, while also showing how the food on the table can bring the ones you love together.”
She said she is very inspired by the quality seasonal ingredients available in Creemore, including the food growing in her parents’ garden and what is available at the Creemore Farmers’ Market.
Magwood said the pandemic added certain challenges. The manuscript was finalized in March so the year prior involved working around COVID-19 restrictions. She sent recipes off to friends and family who couldn’t always make it out to the grocery store to get all the ingredients. Magwood said her daughter Olivia, who loves to bake, helped with recipe testing, along with her mother, and father, who was proofreading. What would normally have been done by a bigger team was accomplished in partnership with her photographer Ksenija Hotic, who was shooting on location at Magwood’s home while she was testing and re-testing recipes.
“This was a bit of a coming home, creating this book,” said Magwood of all the fond memories she has of her parents and grandparents and their places in Creemore, and now her own. Many of the photos in the book are taken in Creemore, with her parents at their farm.
My New Table is a collection of more than 100 simple recipes using simple ingredients, such as toast with smoked trout and caper cream cheese, colourful salads like the raw spring salad with shaved asparagus, snap peas, and radishes, hearty restaurant-style soups such as her forest mushroom, simple sides like honey-fired roasted carrots, dinners like grilled pepper striploin steak or tacos and desserts such as chocolate chip cookie ice cream sandwiches.
My New Table is published by Random House and will be available as of Oct. 26 at Curiosity House Books. Visit www.trishmagwood.ca and find her on Instagram.