Everyone has a favourite recipe for a special occasion, whether handed down from generation to generation or discovered anew. In HOMECOOKED FEASTS ABC Local Radio listeners share with you 150 of their favourite dishes and the heart-warming stories that surround them.

Selected by Maggie Beer and Valli Little, this book contains great recipes from family feasts, including weddings, birthdays, christenings, anniversaries, Australia Day, Valentine′s Day, Easter, Mother′s and Father′s Day, Halloween and Christmas. From Irish Spiced Beef to Nana′s Shortbread, Chicken and Chorizo Casserole to Danish Cherry, Almond and Rice Christmas Pudding, this delightful treasury is both a celebration of Australian home-cooking, and a resource for cooks who want to make everyday meals special.

′This is a very popular Irish dish my mother obtained from THE NEW WORLD RADIATION (a gas cooker) COOKERY BOOK, 1935. As a child I would sit on the table and watch this cheap piece of meat being transformed into a Christmas dinner. I carried the recipe with me to Australia. Now I make several rolls every Christmas for my family.′ Barry O′Keeffe, Irish Spiced Beef.

′I never met my Nana; she died when my mother was only fifteen, but if her shortbread was anything to go by, she was an excellent cook. This recipe comes from a wonderful handwritten cookbook that is filled with magical recipes from cough syrup to chocolate cake. Preparing the shortbread each year allows me the time to think of my Nanna and reinforces a connection between the generations of women in my family, and that is why it′s so precious.′ - Lisa Norris, Nana′s shortbread.