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Steven Ley says in the article about What's Cooking in Chemistry? ("An invitation to dine at the periodic table", THES, July 18), a collection of recipes from organic chemists around the world, that such a book could not have been written by physicists because they "would have theory recipes or in silico recipes rather than dirty their hands making something".

Well, sorry, but a physicist has beaten you chemists to the punch. Peter Barham wrote The Science of Cooking (Springer-Verlag) in 2001. Perhaps leakages from his fume cupboards stopped Ley from reading the reviews?

Gary Lea
Queen Mary
University of London