Eleanor Steafel is a features writer and columnist for the Daily Telegraph. Her popular column The Art of Friday Night Dinner, and her love of getting friends round for dinner to shake off the work week, is the inspiration behind her first cookbook.

The Art of Friday Night Dinner is a love letter to Friday nights of all kinds – a celebration of the understated glam our of a solo dinner on the sofa or a gathering of your closest friends, with more than a hundred recipes for the best night of the week.

Eleanor has you covered for every kind of Friday night. There are recipes for dinners to eat in your dressing gown – good things on toast and perfect pastas for cosy sofa suppers. There is seafood and steak to fall in love over, and big, bold, crowd -pleasing recipes for hosting the masses. And there are puddings. Proper puddings, to be eaten with glee in the bath. Recipes include Bloody Mary rigatoni, Hake and soft tomatoes with chili butter, Party potatoes with Za’atar salt, Hot tahini fudge sundae with sesame pine nut brittle and delicious drinks including Frozen jalapeño margaritas.

And amongst the recipes are Eleanor’s musings such as her thoughts on the glamour of mixing a martini for one, the lifesaving magic of a really good spaghetti carbonara, why it’s worth making the effort to cook a show-stopping meal even when just cooking for one, and the joy of a table laden with bits, waiting for hungry hands.

This is a book about friendship, and the heady intensity of platonic love; it’s about making memories, and how food is the connecting thread between it all. So, fill your favourite glass, choose something mouth-watering to cook and embrace all that Friday night has to offer.