Some critics, used to more prescriptive cookery writers, thought her approach assumed too much knowledge on the part of the reader. In her view, "The ideal cookery writer is one who makes his readers want to cook as well as telling them how it is done; he should leave something, not too much perhaps, but a little, unsaid: people must make their own discoveries, use their own intelligence, otherwise they will be deprived of part of the fun." In "The New York Times" Craig Claiborne wrote admiringly of David, but remarked that because she assumed her readers already knew the basics of cooking she would be "valued more by those with a serious regard for food than by those with a casual interest". The writer Julian Barnes commented that as an amateur cook he found David's terse instructions intimidating: of a recipe in "Italian Food" he wrote, "E.D.'s first sentence reads like this: 'Melt 1½ lbs (675 g) chopped and skinned tomatoes in olive oil' ... "Melt? Melt a tomato?" ... Could it be that Elizabeth David was too good a writer to be a food writer?". A later cook, Tom Parker Bowles, observes, "You don't turn to Elizabeth David for nannying, step-by-step instruction, or precise amounts and timing. She assumes you know the basics, and is a writer who offers inspiration, and wonderful, opinionated prose. Her recipes are timeless, and all her books wonderful works of reference (and tirelessly researched) as well as beautiful reads."