Reading back through some old diaries recently, I was mortified to discover what a flaky teenage diarist I used to be. I would write every day for a month – usually expounding the virtues of the object of my latest crush, who was more often than not some spotty colleague on the fag counter at [...]
Broad bean, edamame, pea and radish salad
My relationship with beans hasn’t always been as extensive or as loving as it is today. It began just over a decade ago in a student house, the morning after a particularly heavy night of drinking. I awoke with the kind of almighty hangover that only painkillers and copious amounts of food could shift. After [...]
Smoked mackerel and pea frittata
It struck me recently that there are remarkable similarities between particular processes in cooking and learning a language. You can slog away for months and years trying before, all of a sudden, something clicks and you have a breakthrough. This used to be how I felt about making pastry. I scoured cookbooks and the internet, [...]
Apple cakes
The danger of work colleagues knowing that you possess a degree of skill in the kitchen is that it tends to lead to an expectation of regular treats for the office. In honesty, I try to avoid baking. One, because I’m not terribly good at it (though I blame an erratic oven on my failures) [...]
Lettuce, borlotti bean and bacon gratin
For anyone experiencing déjà vu reading the title of this post, I must confess right away. Fish-defender Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall focused his weekly Guardian column on lettuce a fortnight ago and included a recipe for a lettuce gratin. This is not a coincidence. What follows is Hugh’s gratin, though admittedly with a few tweaks. But I [...]
