Recipe collections

Cote de boeuf is a rib-eye steak on the bone, also known as tomahawk steak. This is a simple recipe for a sparingly seasoned, seared and roasted cote de boeuf, ideal for sharing.

Courgette and spinach tian with garlic, pine nuts and cheese. Make a note of the courgette treatment – that’s how this boring vegetable needs to be handled. Squeeze the living daylights out of it and it might just be vaguely tasty.

Zucchini parmigiana becomes here zucchini alla pecorino – let’s stick to courgette gratin, shall we? I like courgette but do agree it needs some oomph to make it less bland and it must borrow flavour from elsewhere – tomato sauce for instance.

Savoury courgette wheat and rye bread with Parmesan, it is perfectly good for slicing, buttering, and turning into ham sandwiches.

Courgette fritters in tomato and paprika cornmeal crust. Why is it such a thing about courgettes every summer? Magazines, blogs and weekend supplements fall over themselves to supply novel ways of utilising courgettes:

Courgette loaf cake or what to do with courgette glut. Let’s be honest here: this is no Great Bake Off contest entry. It’s fairly bland, similarly to the vegetable; will benefit from vanilla, cinnamon, nutmeg, almond essence, lemon zest and whatever other flavourings you can think of.

Raw courgette ribbons marinated with lemon and tossed with raisins, almonds, pistachios and nori flakes – a gorgeous courgette salad made without spiralizer but just a vegetable peeler.

Courgette sandwich loaf - tasty, sliceable and excellent when toasted. This is a twist on my onions-and-mash deli bread, a lovely loaf in itself albeit really quite oniony.

Couscous salad with chicken and red peppers - lovely salad. As with most salads, the ingredients may vary – depending on your fancy and the contents of the fridge. I like to add some kind of cooked, warm vegetables.

Couscous with asparagus chunks, toasted pistachio nuts and fresh herbs, it’s a warm salad of perfectly matching ingredients.

Crab salad with spring onions and radishes, served with acocado slices - the classic. The alpha male approach to crab is to grab a live crustacean and plunge it into boiling water, claws waving.

Thick and flavoursome cranberry butter is like cranberry sauce on steroids and it can be used as jam, jelly or confiture too. There's no dairy in fruit butters!

Cranberry ketchup is a sweet, sour and salty condiment with a festive tang, excellent with roast meats instead of the usual cranberry sauce. Tomato ketchup is what springs to mind these days but it wasn’t always so - fish as above, mushroom in 18th century and even walnuts here and there.

Simple and easy cranberry sauce to serve with your turkey. It can be made well ahead of time as it stores well in the fridge. If you prefer it a little tarter, reduce the amount of sugar.

Jerusalem artichokes cooked in cream with garlic and tarragon, then baked au gratin style. This dish is supposed to be made with potatoes: sliced thinly, accompanied with herbs and garlic, a bit of onion, a bit of leek and – wait for this – cooked in cream. Literally. Boiled in copious quantity of double cream. Decadent or what?

Creamed corn with blue cheese and fresh ripe tomatoes. Creamed corn in fact is now my number one method of cooking corn and that’s how I’ll continue until the end of the summer and beyond – it’s gorgeous.

Creamed Swiss chard cooked over low heat has incredible depth of flavour and velvety texture. And it’s still marvellously nutritious!

Creamy chicken with mushrooms and leeks; one pan dish great with pasta. Tender chicken pieces cooked in creamy sauce, with caramelised leeks and mushrooms.

Creamy mushrooms, lovely on toast, on pasta or as a side dish, paired with steak. An easy recipe for velvety creamy and garlicky shiitake mushrooms.

Oven baked creamy orzo pasta with wild chanterelle mushroom topping is a wonderful vegetarian main course or a luxurious side for Italian chicken or veal.

Homemade Easter creme eggs with filling made from buttery icing. Just like Cadbury's mini creme eggs, with white and yellow filling, made from milk chocolate melted into egg moulds.

Another way to cook cabbage: crispy and caramelised. Brown cabbage Swedish style is simply fried down and baked. This method turns the vegetable into the perfect side dish.

Crispy fried chicken with a spicy rub, extra crunchy in coating of cornmeal and panko breadcrumbs. It’s interesting how words can change the taste of food. An astonishingly awful lot of people react negatively not as much to the taste of a dish but to its name.

Crispy ginger beef noodle stir fry with pickled radish is Tom Kerridge’s take on a takeaway-style ginger beef and it’s amazing. Skip noodles for a low carb version.

Crispy pork mince, kidney beans and Romaine lettuce salad with mixed toasted seeds. Caramelised pork crumbs are the best thing since crispy bacon!

Crispy fried minced pork with noodles or called 'ants climbing a tree' in Sichuan cuisine. Traditionally glass vermicelli, my recipe is for egg noodles, so the poor ants have more traction!

Crispy rice with chorizo and mushrooms blasted under the grill for super-crunchy breadcrumb and Parmesan topping. A dish based on the paella theme but ten times easier.

Crispy and spicy roasted chickpeas with grilled peppers, a wholesome vegetarian lunch or dinner as chickpeas are an excellent source of protein and fibre.

Crispy popping chickpeas and roasted red peppers, spiced with chilli flakes and fennel seeds, with butter or olive oil in the vegan version. It’s your new favourite dish!

Crispy tobacco onions, very easy, very tasty, they beat onion rings anytime. Why are they called tobacco onions? It's because of their colour and curly appearance.

Tomato rice with crispy cheese topping can be made with leftover rice. Spiced up with tomato and chilli, flashed under the grill, ready in 40 minutes even boiled from scratch.

Recipe for croquants aux amandes, French almond cookies. ‘Croquant’ means ‘crunchy’ and these biscuits are wonderfully brittle, softening a little though as they keep. Hazelnut croquants are just as lovely.

Crunchy cabbage salad with chopped gherkins and vinaigrette dressing. Raw shredded cabbage is better than the best lettuce, and this salad recipe is the absolute go-to garnish for tacos, gyros, summer rolls and all dishes that want for a bit of crunchy flavoursome greenery.

Crushed broad beans with garlic, mint and dill are a perfect summery side dish, and the best use of the larger, mature, late season beans.

How to cook and serve new potatoes? Lightly crushed, dressed with garlic, mint and dill with some chopped olives. The best new potatoes are Jersey Royal of course, but pick your own local ones if Jerseys are not available.

Fresh cucumbers with cumin tahini dressing, sprinkled with extra sesame seeds are crunchy, juicy and wonderfully refreshing.

Fresh cucumbers with feta cheese and honey are a minimalist version of Greek salad and all the better for skipping tomatoes – mainly for your digestion.

Cured duck breast meat, tonnes of umami flavour produced over three days with just salt and sugar. Homemade prosciutto, and it’s lean and healthy if you discard the skin.

Cured salmon, homemade gravlax, flavoured with fennel, caraway and lemon zest. Three minutes work, four days wait and you have an astonishing party starter or a sandwich filling. Good value too, obviously.

Curried mussels with saffron and ginger, steamed in light creamy sauce. No, I still don’t like curries. One of the very few dishes that revolt me, out there with mushy peas, kale, barley and any veiny, tendony, gelatinous meat.

Date and nut squares, with chunks of Medjool dates and a mix of almonds, pecans and pistachio in rich, chewy batter. There’s a reason why these are called ‘food for gods’.

Date and walnut nougat meringues, the most exquisite sweets for all meringue, nougat, marshmallow and turrón lovers. Meringue never tasted better!

Date porridge is naturally sweet, prepared the night before and cooked within minutes into chunky, nutritious and kick-ass breakfast.

Easy dirty rice with minced pork and homemade Creole seasoning, a bomb of flavours and a healthy main course ready in about 40 minutes.

Easy cherry sponge cake with fresh cherries lightly roasted; the base is gently prebaked and the end result is pure, gorgeous summer dessert.

Duck pastilla, a Moroccan pie made with filo pastry layers encasing leftover roast duck mixture filling, with onions and peppers.

Easy chocolate brownie, intense and fudgy but unbelievably quick to make. My best to date recipe for brownie is quite intricate, with beating eggs to a fluff and then folding and folding.

Ebi fry, Japanese style breaded and deep fried shrimp with tonkatsu sauce. Ebi-furai can fortuitously be pronounced ‘ebi fry’ and that’s what it is: shrimp fry. It’s not katsu - I’ve spent some time around various websites featuring katsu, tonkatsu and such, only to find that there is no ebi katsu.