The Old Rectory:escape to a country kitchen is no ordinary memoir: it is also a cookery book and the story of the renovation of an old country rectory. It focuses on the centrality of the kitchen as the pulse of the family and home, and shows the importance of food and cooking throughout the history of the house, the changing seasons, and the moods of the English countryside.

When author Julia Ibbotson and her husband first saw the old Victorian rectory in dire need of renovation, a mile out of the nearest village in the midst of the English moorlands, they fell in love with it and the lifestyle it represented, with its farmhouse kitchen range at its heart. They hoped they could make the sad, neglected house glow again and that they could integrate themselves into the small traditional village, with its cottages, hall and outlying farms.

This delightful memoir describes the trials and tribulations of their quest to make their vision come true.