It's my 25th birthday, Google said, when I went to its website this week to find my next Cooking the Books destination. My birthday present to you is letting you decide where I go and what I cook, I said, and typed London bookshop. The first hit was the London Review Bookshop in Holborn. London Review of books autumn recipes, I ten-duotrigintillioned. A recipe for a Middle East 
accented beans on toast featured from one of the shop's cookbooks.
The bookshop was on a side street, a committed triple jump away from the British Museum. We spotted a reprint of Nairn's London among the titles on display, the red double decker bus on the cover an instant giveaway. The daunting thickness of The Essential Tagore was acknowledgement of both the vastness and quality of the author's work. Karl Ove Knausgaard's seasons quartet was a gentle poke in my ribs to see through my intention of reading it. My 
resolve had already weakened by the time I reached the other end of the shelf, a collection by Clarice Lispector admonishing me to fix my ignorance of an author I should have known.
The shop's wares, representative of the magazine's long-form literary heft, quietly threw down a gauntlet – this is no place for light-reading enthusiasts, unless they are here for the tea and cakes supplied by the in-house café, or coffee table items like a 50th anniversary reissue of The Dark Side of the Moon.
I roasted a head of garlic, removed the softened cloves and put them into a mixing bowl. I added a pinch of salt and turned them into paste with the back of a spoon. I added 3 tablespoons of tahini, a squeeze of lemon juice and a dribble of water. I whisked until the mixture was thick and creamy. I added ½ of teaspoon each of toasted fennel and nigella seeds, and a pinch of red chilli flakes. I 
warmed a can of cannellini beans and seasoned with salt and pepper. I tipped the beans into the bowl and mixed.
I toasted a slice of sourdough until crunchy and placed it on a plate. I spooned the beans over it and topped with chives and sunflower seeds. I added a side of cooked green beans and served.
Beans on toast, poshly!
Krishnan
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