Nott had been the chief cook for a string of aristocrats, named on the title page of his book as the Dukes of Somerset, Ormond, and Bolton, and the Lords Lansdowne and Ashburnham.

The book describes how to make savoury dishes including "Bisks, Farces, forc'd Meats, Marinades, Olio's, Puptons, Ragoos, Sauces, Soops, Pottages".

The bibliographer William Carew Hazlitt, in his 1902 Old Cookery Books, considered Nott well-read and intelligent as he drew his recipes from many sources at home and abroad, including "to dress mutton the Turkish way".

[6][7] Nott's "Queen's Pottage" is recreated at The Gilbert Scott restaurant, though The Telegraph notes that the chef, Marcus Wareing, omits the original cockscombs.

[9] The Oxford Companion to Sugar and Sweets notes that the "ubiquitous" crème brûlée appeared in the Dictionary, but that Elizabeth David had traced Nott's version to François Massialot's recipe in his 1691 Cuisinier royal et bourgeois, rendered as "Burnt Cream" in the English translation of his book, The Court and Country Cook of 1702.