Grilled asparagus with flaked almonds and Parmesan, an exquisite side dish or starter ready in 10 minutes. It can be cooked in oven grill or on a barbecue.
Grilled chicken burgers, juicy, crispy and tasty thanks to two secret ingredients: Parmesan and a little pork. The healthier answer to your burger craving!
Red mullet brushed with anchovy and coriander butter, grilled whole, is delightful little fish and gorgeously easy to cook. It is also, surprisingly, not as bony as small fish usually is!
Pink guava cake with pink buttercream frosting, made from concentrated guava juice. It looks like a six years old girl’s dream. It tastes like heaven.
Halloumi and vegetable skewers, vegetarian kebabs of cheese, mushrooms, peppers and onion drizzled with tangy marinade, as fantastic cooked on a barbecue as from the oven.
Frozen Greek yoghurt ice cream recipe with raisins and honey, low-calorie and sugar free. The best thing – you don’t need to churn it in the ice cream maker. Just scrape into a tub and enjoy it a few hours later.
Ice cream sandwiches in choux pastry buns, with ice cream flavour of choice, homemade or your favourite brand. I first made choux pastry at the age of about 11, in my technology lesson at school.
Kohlrabi slaw, grated kohlrabi with creamy dressing is versatile and delicious. Try it instead of your regular slaw – this vegetable deserves more acclaim!
Greek style lamb koftas served with a simple harissa dip. Lamb koftas are perfect for a barbecue and just as tasty griddled, with this easy recipe for koftas and harissa sauce.
Leek slaw, a simple salad of raw leeks with cucumber and radish, seasoned with black pepper and honey. Leeks are incredibly healthy when eaten raw, did you know?
Lemon posset, the easiest and the loveliest dessert, served with crunchy biscuits. Posset in medieval times was a spiced, rich milky-wine concoction, served probably more often as a remedy than a dessert. They did mix their drinks in the olden days didn’t they?
Warm salad of poached fish and raw samphire with lemongrass dressing. Samphire, or sea asparagus, is the salty marshland grass and not actually seaweed as some may think.
Smooth mango ice cream without eggs, churned in an ice cream maker. Make sure the fruit is as ripe as it can be; apart from the insufficient sweetness, unripe mango smells a bit off-putting.
Mascarpone blueberry cake, rich and velvety with a tangy flavour from the blueberries. Adding mascarpone to the cake mix makes it rich, moist and tender and no, it doesn't taste like a cheesecake!
Matcha and white chocolate creamy eggless ice cream. More ice cream; this time it’s the creamiest, softest ice cream as claimed by Heston Blumenthal, published a good many years ago in one of the weekend supplements.
Sea trout fillets baked in oven with lots of steam, at low temperature. This is definitely the best way to cook these delicate fillets, often prone to drying out if overcooked.
Pasta with fresh tomatoes, garlic and basil. I love fresh tomatoes with good quality pasta. The question whether you should buy ’fresh’ supermarket pasta is a moot point – buy dry. Good.
Pasta with asparagus and lemon butter, served with lots of Parmesan. Three tricks pasta and I’m pleased to announce that this is truly a pasta template, versatile as anything. I give you the pasta with lemon and any veg, plus Parmesan because pasta can’t be without it.
Baked peach with blue cheese and cinnamon crumble. I like a savoury take on a dessert dish. You expect a roasted peach, honey and pillows of whipped cream or mascarpone and here’s blue cheese with its sharp, salty sting.
Peach jam with a hint of vanilla, easy to make and very flavoursome. Roughly chopped peaches with skins make wonderfully chunky jam.
Peach pound cake is the richest, most buttery and tender crumb made with peach puree, with diced fresh peach embedded in the batter. Jerrelle Guy’s recipe from NY Times Cooking with minor tweaks.
Pheasant meatloaf is juicy, flavoursome and gutsy, and wild game is the best choice of meat both for your health and for the environment.
Pimm's special for the summer, with a secret ingredient. Let’s have a Pimm's this summer, rain or shine (the former more likely). The worst that can happen is we’ll have to run inside sheltering the jugs and the strawberries!
Piperade is the Basque take on ratatouille with the heat of espelette pepper. This recipe is easy and simple, like a lot of best things in life.
This is the best and the easiest plum cake with crumble topping. German plum cake with streusel where plums can be swapped for any other soft fruit, it's brilliant every time.
Potato salad with pancetta and asparagus, delicious warm or cold. I’m really not sure what the deal with the ‘only three ingredients!’ recipes is. Or only four or five for that matter - the authors of those seem to take pride in putting together as few foodstuffs as possible
A summer salad of cucumbers, radish and lots of fresh herbs with feta cheese and a simple dressing. Cucumber, my favourite underrated fruit is usually included in vaguely Greek salads with tomato and feta cheese.
Homemade raspberry jam. I used to think that to make jam you need tonnes and tonnes of fruit and it takes hours and hours of boiling the stuff in huge pans, with lots of splattering and covering the kitchen with sticky gunk – NO.
Raspberry meringue roulade: the perfect dessert recipe by Ottolenghi, with raspberries and whipped mascarpone cream filling, decorated with rose petals and pistachios. It can be made ahead and frozen.
Raspberry muffers are not muffins. There’s no milk, or cream or yoghurt in the ingredients. It’s an ordinary cake mix baked in muffin tins, just for the variety. And no – they aren’t cupcakes either because no icing? No pink colouring? No little roses...
No churn raspberry ripple ice cream, based on Nigella Lawson’s recipe: stupidly easy, and amazingly effective. Two ingredients plus frozen raspberries equals ice cream made in ten minutes.
Raspberry sponge cake recipe, with fresh berries scattered on top of light and airy cake batter. Dust with icing sugar for a perfect summer dessert.
Homemade redcurrant jelly is awesome with roast lamb, turkey pie and venison steaks. And this is a super speedy recipe which still makes crystal clear jelly!
Redcurrant cake, light and buttery sponge topped with fresh tart redcurrants. Redcurrants doth not only jelly maketh, but cake in summer too.
Classic rhubarb fool recipe, ready in minutes. A classic dessert, this rhubarb fool is made with rhubarb puree and whipped cream.
Roasted Mediterranean vegetable mix with a topping of crumbled feta and toasted pine nuts. It’s vegetarian, it’s wholesome and it’s healthy.
The easiest salted caramel ice cream: three ingredients, no churning. Delicious salted caramel ice cream made with Carnation tinned condensed milk caramel.
New potatoes sautéed with spinach. This recipe for sautéed new potatoes has them boiled first and then fried in plenty of butter with spinach and capers.
Scallops and asparagus stir fry. Use frozen queen scallops for this dish, they will come into their own anyway against the background of perfectly cooked aubergines and asparagus.
Fresh mackerel fillets stuffed with samphire, anchovy and breadcrumb mix, grilled and served with parsley butter. Try Tom Kerridge's fantastic recipe for seaside stuffed mackerel.
Skinny ice cream made with single cream and semi-skimmed milk in three flavours: pomegranate, matcha, coffee and lemon. Half as many calories but full taste.
Slow roasted lamb shoulder with anchovies and truffle oil cooked in low oven for four hours. That’s going to be crispy skin and pull-away meat.
A simple and exquisite starter made with fresh melon and smoked salmon, with a drizzle of balsamic and a sprinkling of fresh mint. Gorgeous! Even if salmon is not home cured.
Fiery bacon, spiced but still cool cucumber and mild new potatoes in a warm salad. The bacon and cucumber salad on its own will make a great spicy snack or starter - I’ve thrown new potatoes in to a/ dampen the fire a bit and b/ make it into a main course.
Deep fried sprats can be eaten whole, head, tail and all but it’s very easy to lop the heads off and clean the sprats a bit. An easy, cheap and delicious treat.
Spring cabbage salad is easy and incredibly healthy, with herbs and a touch of garlic. A welcome change from lettuce or mixed greens, it's perfect for BBQ.
Classic Victoria sponge sandwich cake filled with fresh strawberries and whipped cream, also known as strawberry shortcake sandwich.
Strawberry butter cake is a buttery sponge with fresh strawberries scattered over the batter and it's simple and easy to make. Delicious melt-in-your-mouth sponge with seasonal fruit.