Steamed globe artichokes served with sriracha mayo. What you do with the chokes couldn’t be simpler: steam or boil them and dish them out with some spicy dips. It’s messy – finger job no doubt, and since the heads stay on the communal plate.
Stir fry cabbage - super quick, super tasty, with herbs, garlic and honey. First off – buy the right stuff. The new season, loosely packed cabbage is the best, in fact the less on the head, the better. What the supermarkets call spring cabbage will do too.
Stir-fried cucumbers Asian style, with ginger, garlic and a pinch of chilli. Spicy but also refreshing which is logical as cukes are 96% water.
Mixed vegetable stir-fry seasoned with ginger, oyster sauce and sesame oil. I like to stir fry veg as a side to not-necessarily-oriental mains like fish or steaks but this recipe works as a good veggie stir-fry too, to be served over plain rice or noodles.
Cabbage rolls stuffed with a pork mince and rice filling, baked in simple tomato sauce – that’s Polish golabki; the ultimate comfort dish. Also, the best use of the outer cabbage leaves.
Roasted summer vegetables with couscous, with dressing made from the juices of vegetables marinated in harissa, honey and spice mix.
Sweet potatoes baked in foil, topped with tahini butter are a fabulous fiesta of flavours. Recipe adapted from NY Times Cooking.
Sweetcorn and nduja salad made with fresh or frozen corn, served on a bed of lettuce and topped with homemade tortilla crisps – an easy and gorgeous lunch dish.
Aubergine and tomato pasta bake with mozzarella. Pasta - fusilli. Tomato sauce - from scratch. Aubergine - lightly fried. A great vegetarian pasta al forno.
Tomato and fig salad with blue cheese and balsamic dressing. This is a particularly well-matched couple: tomatoes and figs. The blue cheese adds a salty touch – otherwise it would be too much of a Mills & Boone book cover.
Tomato crostata with honey and thyme flavour on flaky pastry made from scratch, with a sneaky cheese addition. Crostata or galette is a sweet or savoury open, rustic pie.
Tomato nun, la religieuse de tomate, is an exquisite appetiser of cold, uncooked tomato stuffed with pesto-flavoured burrata cheese.
Very easy, basic tomato sauce made from fresh tomatoes. Heat the oil in a large pan and add the garlic, only to warm it up. Add the chopped tomatoes (or the contents of a tin), season generously...
Savoury tarte Tatin with confit tomatoes. Tomatoes are generally rubbish through three quarters of the year in the non-Mediterranean part of Europe. Tasteless and watery, with thick skins and not much flavour.
Triple cooked chips, exactly by Heston Blumenthal's recipe. And they are the best chips - fluffy on the inside, crispy on the outside chunky English-style wonders. Cooked religiously by the book, ‘In Search of Perfection’ part one.
Twice roasted beetroots with figs and pomegranate seeds. Crimson central – this is a dish of red, red and more red, suitable for the season of flaming gold on tree branches and misty mornings.
Courgette, aubergine, fennel and mushroom parmigiana with chopped tomatoes and Parmesan. This is a mixed vegetable parmigiana, with lots of Parmesan on layers of pre-cooked veg.
White asparagus, simply cooked with butter and lemon. The white ones are quite tasty too and so I decided to give them a go – the only difference in handling them is that they need to be peeled. And let me tell you a secret – the special effect they have on you after eating them is the same as with the green ones…
Whole roasted cauliflower with butter, Parmesan and herbs. Let’s face it: cauliflower does not have a lot going for it.
Vibrant winter rainbow salad with red and green cabbage, red and white onions, herbs and vinaigrette dressing.
Zingy carrot salad with raw grated carrots, chilli, ginger and soured cream. Raw carrots have to be exceptionally good for me to crunch one for a snack.