Hardie Grant signs debut cookbook from 'queen of barbecue' Graves

Hardie Grant will publish Live Fire, the debut cookbook from food writer Helen Graves, in April 2022. 

Eve Marleau, commissioning editor, acquired world rights directly from Kay Peddle at Kay Peddle Literary. It will be published simultaneously in the UK, the US and Australia. 

In her "homage to live fire traditions", Graves will showcase the best of barbecue throughout the seasons. It will feature 150 recipes that infuse char and smoke into meat, fish and vegetables, as well as interviews with chefs and home cooks from the multiple diaspora communities cooking with live fire around the UK. 

Graves is an award-winning food writer, recipe developer and editor, based in south-east London. She has been heralded as the "queen of barbecue" by food journalist Fiona Beckett and runs the website Food Stories. Graves is also the editor of Pit magazine and was awarded Food and Drink Editor of the Year in the 2020 British Society of Magazine Editors' Awards. 

She commented: "I am so excited to get this book out into the world! It feels like she has been forming in my head for many years, and I can’t wait to share the recipes with everyone. I’m so proud of this work and grateful to have collaborated with some of the best in the business to make it happen."

Marleau said: "Helen is such a respected voice in the food industry, so I was thrilled to receive her proposal. Her recipes are intelligent and inspiring, and her exploration of barbecue as a globally uniting food culture is thorough, considered and impassioned. She is the brightest of stars, and Live Fire is undoubtedly a barbecue cookbook like no other."