In 1993, when founder-owner Christina Ong opened The Halkin in London, it was with a passion for delivering exceptional cuisine inspired by the places she loved most from her travels in the fashion industry. Two years later, The Halkin’s restaurant, led by Stefano Cavallini, earned the first Michelin star for an Italian chef outside Italy, marking the start of the COMO Group’s culinary journey.

Today, with 18 COMO properties spanning destinations from Burgundy to Bhutan, and eight Singapore-based restaurant collaborations with celebrated chefs, the Group’s approach to food is a tapestry of global influences. Culinary icons such as Jean-Georges Vongerichten, Massimo Bottura, tempura master Masaru Seki, and Malcolm Lee — known for his Michelin-starred Peranakan and Straits cuisine — have contributed to the COMO approach to what good food stands for.

This rich heritage of flavours, techniques, and stories now culminates in COMO Simple, a cookbook that distills the COMO ethos into recipes designed for home cooks.

With selections also available on COMO Hotels and Resorts’ menus, the repertoire features salads, soups, meats and fish dishes, sharing platters and kids’ favourites. There are crowd-pleasers ranging from South Indian curries perfected at COMO’s resorts in the Maldives, to freshly made Tuscan pastas, a nasi goreng from Bali, the much-loved COMO burger, and a lobster biryani. There are familiar renditions of Bangkok street food, but also lost dishes from Thailand’s royal palaces. It’s a mix which reflects a traveller’s curiosity in the world, its beautiful diversity, and the abundance of nature.

Of her grandmother, Ong also shares: “She taught me how fresh, hand-picked ingredients mean everything in the search for flavour. She also revealed how technique builds with commitment, experience, and inspiring relationships. She showed me how food brings you into a community of passionate people — an exchange of ideas, discoveries, tastes. And how the joy of cooking takes on another life when the dishes we make are shared with friends and family.”

With an introduction by Ong, it features her favourite recipes simplified for homecooks by COMO’s VP of Culinary Daniel Moran, and Culinary Director Amanda Gale, both of whom trained under Neil Perry at Rockpool in Sydney.

COMO Simple is available to purchase from Amazon.