You don’t have to break the bank at a top restaurant to enjoy a Valentine’s night culinary treat. Shropshire food expert Bruce McMichael has been sharing his top kitchen tips with Star feature writer Andy Richardson.

Dining at the top table in town isn’t always the best way to celebrate a romantic evening. After all, you may find the chef’s having an off night or, worse still, you may be left in the cold when your taxi doesn’t arrive. Shropshire food guru Bruce McMichael says dinner a deux can be more romantic if you eat at home. And with February 14 looming, Bruce booked me in for a session so that he could brush up my culinary skills.

Bruce, who publishes the Shrewsbury-based food magazine Taste, told me to observe a few golden rules. He said: “It really is the chance to show your better side. And it doesn’t matter whether you’re something of a novice cook. As long as you make the effort, your partner will be knocked off their feet.”

I met Bruce before cooking a pre-Valentine’s Day dinner for the woman I lovingly call ‘The Blonde’. Bruce was the perfect coach. He’d told me preparation was the key. I had to ask my partner plenty of questions in advance, about her likes and dislikes.

Bruce said: “Try to prepare a light starter, don’t go over the top and bombard your partner with food or drink. There are plenty of good aphrodisiac foods. Seafood is good as a starter, try prawns or caviar. Then go for small portions when you’re cooking the main course. You don’t want your date to be bloated. When it comes to dessert, again, keep it light. If you’re buying chocolates, just get one or two special ones, from a reputable outlet like Chocolate Gourmet. You don’t need to gorge on a whole box.”

With those tips in mind, I asked The Blonde her likes and dislikes. My attempts at subtlety were greeted with this rebuff: What do you want? But I persevered. Likes were diamonds, horses and holidays. Dislikes were, well, me on a Sunday morning. I went back to Bruce. “Why don’t I cook a savoury diamond ice cream followed by a hay and barley lasagne with an assiette of weekend breaks for afters?” Bruce laughed. His expression read: Don’t be so stupid, young man! I returned to the drawing board, chastened.

I researched cookery books by the nation’s finest chefs. The menu comprised: a butternut squash soup with chanterelles and truffle oil, my now-signature pan-fried turbot on a bed of wilted spinach and goat’s cheese with a chorizo foam followed by a chocolate delice with a salted caramel. Brilliant, I thought. What can go wrong?

I sent my wife a card, inviting her to dinner, in our home, on a quiet Sunday evening. She thought I’d gone mad. “Why didn’t you just ask?” she said. “It’s unlike you to waste 38p on a stamp.” She responded in the affirmative.

I set to work preparing our feast while she visited friends and, when the clock struck seven, I was ready to wow her with the fruits of my labours.

Course one: Brilliant. The soup was likened to that cooked by our favourite chef. Modesty forbids me from naming him, but he’s based in Ludlow and is really, really good.

Course two: Knockout. The inside of the turbot was creamy, translucent perfection while the outside was golden and crisp. The chorizo foam was peppery and rich. The Blonde demured.

Course three: The journey ends. Sadly, I’d put my egg yolks in before my fluffy whites. Or was it my fluffy whites before my eggy yolks? I’m not sure. But the upshot was that the delice was more brick-like than the stuff they sell at Wickes. The floating mousse-like consistency I’d be striving for was a distant memory. My delice had the texture of foundation piles. “Never mind,” I said. “Turn it over and attack it from beneath.”

The Blonde giggled, turned over the delice and using brute force, made her way to the salted caramel inside, which, incidentally, was a treat.

Our dinner had been against a backdrop of soft lights and romantic music. My Dizzee Rascal cds had been confined to the cupboard and the mellifluous strains of Ludovico Einaudi’s Le Onde played. The table had been set with Villeroy and Bosch.

And, to the acid test, did it put The Blonde in the mood for love? I’d devised a cunning test. Bear with me on this one. For some months, I’ve wanted to move my cd collection from an outhouse into our cellar, so that I can play in my den when I get home from work. I seized the moment. “Erm,” I stuttered, vaguely. “My cds would be great in the cellar,” don’t you think. The Blonde knew I was attempting to get one past her but, so impressed had she been by my efforts, that she agreed. “Go on then,” she said, and the deal was done.

The next day, I spoke to Bruce and regaled him with tales of turbot, Einaudi and the errant delice. “And did it go well after dinner?” he asked, coughing into the phone, with a you-know-what-I-mean-mate hhmmm hhhhmmmm. “She let me put my cds in the cellar,” I replied. Bruce sighed a Homer Simpson ‘Doh’-sigh. “You’re supposed to make the most of it in other departments,” he said. And with that, he went to advise better-able lotharios who were less in need of love advice.