Cookstrip home as a weekly feature in The Observer. The first cookstrip, "Cooking Beef: Part 1", appeared in The Observer on March 18, 1962 eight months before the release of Deighton's debut novel, The IPCRESS File. The "Len Deighton's Action Cookbook" which expanded these cookstrips into a full-length book was published March 1965, timed to coincide with the release of the film of "The Ipcress File" starring Michael Caine. Deighton chose the menu for the movie's press lunch and everyone was presented with a copy of the book. In the movie, Caine's character, Harry Palmer, is seen cracking eggs with one
The IPCRESS File headings have a "feature". In "The IPCRESS File" these take the form of each chapter being headed with a quote from a horoscope, which relates to the action in the chapter, though vaguely, as in most horoscopes. The front cover, by Deighton's friend Raymond Hawkey, has been described as "the template for the covers of all subsequent airport novels". A film adaptation starring Michael Caine was released in 1965 and produced by the James Bond co-producer Harry Saltzman, assisted by several prominent members of the Bond production family. The film medium made it difficult to maintain the anonymity of Deighton's