OWNER Chef Carina Cooper, author of Notting Hill Cookbook
APPROXIMATE BUDGET £5,000 (excluding appliances)

KEY ELEMENTS OF CARINA COOPER'S KITCHEN
• Viking range cooker and a large American fridge-freezer
• Generously proportioned Belfast sink.
• Hardwood worktops
• Limestone floors
• Colombian terracotta casserole dishes

Carina Cooper has spent much of her life travelling around the world, so it's hardly surprising that her first volume of recipes, Notting Hill Cookbook, is packed full of delicious treats inspired by meals eaten in Morocco, the Caribbean and Italy. Nor is it surprising to discover that the design of her warm, friendly family kitchen was influenced by her visits to America.

“I lived in California for a long time,” she explains, “and I've always loved that 1950s cream-coloured dairy look. I designed the kitchen myself and got an odd-job man to install it. The structure is basically MDF with four layers of paint, which makes it feel like it's been there for a long time and has been painted over time and again.”

A good kitchen, Carina stresses, doesn't have to be expensive. “Our kitchen didn't cost much more than an Ikea design; instead, the money went into buying good appliances. After all, you can always take them with you when you move out.”

Carina's kitchen appliances include a vast American fridge-freezer, with freezer drawers that pull out to make things easier to find, and a Viking cooker. “It's the Cadillac of cookers,” she says. “But when you're buying an oven you have to think about how often you cook and how many people you cook for. You don't have to buy the oven equivalent of a BMW when a Mini Metro will do the job.”

Carina maintains her minimalist approach when it comes to gadgets, too. “I'm not a great believer in them,” she says. “They help you to pretend you can cook when you can't. I have a good set of knives, a couple of chopping boards, some good wooden spoons and a blender. I don't even use a Magimix.”

WORDS NATASHA HUGHES
PHOTOGRAPH JO FAIRCLOUGH
JUNE 2004