My Favourite Everyday Recipes: From cheddar and ale soup to pollack with orange

Cheddar and ale soup

This is a super soup – ideal on its own with some bread for lunch, or as part of a bigger meal. I really like the combination of the rich, hoppy ale and the gentle acidity from the dairy. The chopped apple and malty dressing I use to garnish the soup cuts through the rich flavours and really makes them shine.

Serves 4

75g butter
1 large onion (about 175g), diced
1 large potato (about 175g), peeled and diced
70g plain flour
500ml chicken stock
500ml brown ale (your choice, but the stronger the better)
100ml double cream
350g strong Cheddar cheese, grated
Salt and freshly ground black pepper

For the dressing

4tbsps olive oil
1tbsp malt extract
1tbsp cider vinegar

To garnish

1 large Bramley apple, peeled, cored and finely diced
2tbsps chopped chives

Melt the butter in a large, heavy-based saucepan over a medium heat. Add the onion and potato and cook gently, stirring from time to time, until softened (but don’t let them take on any colour), around 10-15 minutes. Sprinkle the flour evenly over the vegetables in the pan and cook, stirring, for 1-2 minutes, then stir in the chicken stock. Whack up the heat and bring to the boil, then reduce to a simmer and cook gently for about 10 minutes until the soup has thickened. Pour in the ale and heat gently for a further few minutes.

Remove from the heat, let cool slightly and then transfer the mixture to a blender or food processor. Add the cream and whiz until nice and smooth. Pass the soup through a fine sieve into a clean saucepan and season with pepper and a little salt – do not add too much at this stage as the cheese will introduce extra saltiness later.

To make the dressing, whisk together the olive oil, malt extract and cider vinegar in a small bowl until emulsified. Warm the soup gently over a low heat and stir in the grated cheddar, allowing it to melt. Taste and adjust the seasoning if necessary. Ladle the soup into warmed bowls and trickle a little dressing on top of each one. Sprinkle on the diced apple and chives and serve immediately.

Pollack with orange and dill

The lovely, white flesh of pollack goes really well with a citrus dressing and the earthiness of the dill. I use a bit of Douglas fir in this dish, which might seem a bit “cheffy” for everyday, but if you can get your hands on some, it’s a fantastic addition and goes brilliantly with the other ingredients. If you can’t, no worries. Just leave it out. I like to serve this with a simple potato salad.

Serves 4

4 pollack fillets, about 250g each
Vegetable oil, for frying
Flaky sea salt

For the dressing

3 unwaxed oranges
100ml olive oil
150ml cider vinegar
75g caster sugar
Small bunch of dill, chopped, a few sprigs saved for the garnish
2tbsps Douglas fir pine needles, chopped (optional)

For the coating

175g coarse yellow cornmeal
40g plain flour
1tsp salt
1tsp cayenne pepper
1tsp garlic powder


For the garnish

1 orange, peeled, all pith removed and cut into segments

First make the dressing. Pare the zest from 2 oranges with a vegetable peeler, keeping a little of the pith on, and cut into small dice. Place in a small saucepan, cover with the olive oil and heat very gently over a low heat, for 20 minutes or until the skin is just soft. Take off the heat and leave to cool. Squeeze the juice from all the oranges and put into a small pan with the cider vinegar and sugar. Bring to the boil, stirring to dissolve the sugar. Let it bubble to reduce by two-thirds until thickened and syrupy. Pour into a bowl and allow to cool.

Add the orange zest and olive oil mix to the orange juice reduction and whisk to combine. Stir in the chopped dill and pine needles if using, and set aside until ready to serve.

For the fish coating, mix all the ingredients together in a large bowl. Heat about a 2cm depth of oil in a deep-sided frying pan or sauté pan until it reaches 180°C. Use a frying thermometer to check the temperature, if you have one; otherwise drop a cube of dry white bread into the hot oil to test it – if the bread turns golden brown in just under a minute, the oil is ready.

Dust the fish fillets on both sides with the cornmeal coating, shaking any excess. You may need to fry them in batches, depending on the size of your pan. Lay the fish in the pan and fry for 2–3 minutes on each side until the crust is crisp and golden brown. Using a fish slice, carefully transfer to a tray lined with kitchen paper to drain. Season lightly with salt. Serve the pollack fillets on warmed plates, garnished with the orange segments and dill, with the dressing spooned over.

White chocolate and pistachio blondies

These make a tempting, sophisticated alternative to the more familiar dark chocolate brownies. The earthy flavour of the sesame seeds and oil works so beautifully with white chocolate, balancing out its sweetness. Sprinkling on a little flaky sea salt at the end is a lovely finishing touch.

Makes 16

300g plain flour
2tsps baking powder
Pinch of salt
100g shelled pistachio nuts, (bright green ones if you can find them), roughly chopped
200g white chocolate, roughly chopped
50g sesame seeds
150g butter, plus extra for greasing
300g demerara sugar
40ml rapeseed oil
40ml sesame oil
2 eggs, lightly beaten
1 vanilla pod, split in half lengthways
Flaky sea salt, to finish

Preheat the oven to 180°C/Fan 160°C/Gas 4. Lightly grease a 25cm square cake tin with butter and line the base and sides with non-stick baking parchment, letting some overhang the sides of the tin, to make it easier to lift out the cake later. Put the flour, baking powder and salt into a large bowl and mix well, using a balloon whisk, to combine. Stir in the pistachios, 100g of the chocolate and the sesame seeds.

Melt the butter in a large saucepan over a very low heat, then add the demerara sugar, rapeseed and sesame oil, and the eggs. Using the point of a small, sharp knife, scrape out the seeds from the vanilla pod directly into the pan. Heat very gently for 3-4 minutes, whisking constantly, to combine and warm through – don’t overheat or the eggs will curdle.

Pour the warm mixture onto the dry ingredients and whisk until thoroughly combined and the chocolate has melted. Finally, fold in the remaining chopped chocolate.

Pour the cake batter into the prepared cake tin and bake for 25-30 minutes, until cooked through. It should be lightly golden and quite firm to the touch. If a skewer inserted into the centre comes up slightly tacky, that’s fine, as it means the blondie will be nice and moist in the centre.

Remove from the oven and sprinkle on a generous pinch of flaky sea salt. Leave in the tin for 10 minutes, then lift out, peel away the parchment and place on a wire rack to cool. Cut into squares to serve. The blondies will keep for 4-5 days in an airtight tin.

Spuntino: New York Comfort Food From Eggplant Chips To Fennel Pizzetta

Restaurateur Russell Norman had fallen in love with new York before he even visited it. But what he found when he did first visit in 1999, was that most of the so-called American food was in fact Italian, from meatballs, to pizza and macaroni cheese.

Inspired by what he found in New York, across the pond back home, he opened a restaurant named Spuntino – Italian for snack – in London’s Soho area serving up his beloved American dishes in a similarly seedy area to New York’s East Village.

The book is made up of 120 recipes of those snack type dishes made up of luscious meats and the vibrant salads he found and recreated in his small restaurant.

Mozzarella & Cavolo Nero Crostini

When it is in season, cavolo nero is one of my hero ingredients. Its deep, dark green colour and its long crinkled leaves are incredibly glamorous, and it is surprisingly versatile. Florence Knight, one of my favourite chefs, picks the smallest, most delicate raw leaves and tosses them in a delightful anchovy dressing with bread fried in butter. Delicious. This recipe specifies a swift blanch; you really mustn’t overcook the cavolo nero, otherwise it loses much of its flavour and many of its nutrients too.

Makes 4

1 bunch of cavolo nero, about 200g, stems removed
3 garlic cloves
Good handful of grated Parmesan, about 20g
Flaky sea salt and black pepper
Extra virgin olive oil
Juice of 1 lemon
8 slices of ciabatta
2 x 125g balls of buffalo mozzarella, at room temperature

Place a pan of salted water over a high heat. Cut the cavolo nero into 2cm strips. Once the water has come to the boil, add the cavolo nero and, when the water comes back to the boil, blanch for 2 minutes. Drain and, when cool enough to handle, squeeze out the excess liquid. Transfer the cavolo nero to the small bowl of a food processor. Add two of the garlic cloves, the Parmesan and some salt and pepper, and whizz to a purée. With the motor still going slowly add 100ml of the olive oil, then transfer to a mixing bowl and fold in the lemon juice.

Now place a heavy-based griddle pan over a medium heat. Lightly coat the sliced bread with a few brushes of olive oil and grill on both sides until lightly charred. Halve the remaining garlic clove and rub over the hot grilled bread. Top with broken-up pieces of mozzarella and a generous amount of the cavolo nero purée. Serve immediately.

Fennel Salami, Caper & Chilli Pizzetta

Fennel salami (or finocchiona) is one of my favourite sausages and one that is much celebrated in Tuscany, from where it comes. Dry-cured lean pork shoulder and fatty pork cheek, spiced with fennel, then aged for up to a year, are the secrets to this fantastically flavoursome salami. Cooking it makes it even tastier. I find the best capers for this pizzetta are the very dainty Sicilian variety.

For one pizzetta:

1 pizzetta base
1 tablespoon basic tomato sauce or tomato passata
25g grated block mozzarella – the hard, cheap kind
4 slices of fennel salami (finocchiona)
1 tablespoon grated Parmesan
1 teaspoon capers
½ teaspoon chilli flakes

Preheat your oven on its highest setting. If you are using a pizza stone (which I highly recommend), allow 15 minutes for it to get really hot. (An alternative is a good metal baking sheet.) The temperature should be at least 240-250ºC, which is Gas 9 or over, but get it higher if you can.

Onto your pizzetta base, gently spoon a thin layer of tomato sauce (or passata), then sprinkle over the grated mozzarella. Place the slices of finocchiona on top. Scatter over the grated Parmesan, capers and chilli. Cook on the pizza stone in your preheated oven for about 6-10 minutes (depending on how hot your oven can go) or until the edges start to bubble and burn.

Eggplant Chips with Fennel Yoghurt

This has been on the menu at Spuntino since day one and is a much-requested recipe. For me, it’s a dish about contrasts. The hot eggplant chips versus the cool yoghurt. The crunchy sesame coating versus the soft centre. The smoky flavour of the eggplant versus the aniseed tang of the fennel. You can have fun with the presentation of this dish too, by using a shot glass for the fennel yoghurt and then stacking the chips around or to the side.

Makes 6-8

2 teaspoons coriander seeds
2 teaspoons fennel seeds
2 eggplants (aka aubergines)
100g plain flour
1 teaspoon fine salt
½ teaspoon black pepper
3-4 medium eggs
150g panko breadcrumbs
2 teaspoons sesame seeds
1 litre vegetable oil, for deep frying

For the fennel yoghurt

1 teaspoon coriander seeds
1 teaspoon fennel seeds
125g mayonnaise
200g plain Greek-style yoghurt
1 teaspoon lemon juice
Large pinch of flaky sea salt
Pinch of black pepper

First of all, toast the coriander and fennel seeds for both the aubergine and the yoghurt. Put them all – 3 teaspoons of each – in a non-stick frying pan and dry fry over a medium heat for a few minutes, until you can smell their spiciness. Do keep an eye on them, as they can easily burn. Remove from the heat, then grind in a pestle and mortar.

Now make the fennel yoghurt. Take 2 teaspoons of the ground seeds and combine with the rest of the fennel yoghurt ingredients. Put it in the fridge. Cut the eggplant into thick 10cm-long chips.

Now take three bowls. Mix the flour, salt and pepper in the first. In the second bowl, beat the eggs. Mix together the breadcrumbs, the remaining ground coriander and fennel seeds and the sesame seeds in the third bowl. Dip the eggplant chips in the flour, coating well, shake off any excess and then place in the egg wash, shaking off any drips, and then coat well with the breadcrumbs. Set aside at room temperature, not in the fridge, if not cooking straightaway.

Heat the vegetable oil in a medium pan to 190ºC (or until a cube of bread dropped in the oil turns golden brown in less than a minute). Now fry the coated eggplant chips, in batches, for 2–3 minutes or until golden brown. Lift out, drain on kitchen paper and sprinkle with a little salt. Serve hot with the chilled fennel yoghurt.