Chicory is something I never ate in the UK, and thought I probably didn’t like. But over the last year I have discovered its virtues, when treated correctly (i.e. water should not come anywhere near it, if you want a result that is not limp, soggy, and unpleasantly bitter). Endives au gratin, where the chicory is pre-cooked, wrapped in ham, and covered with a nice cheesy sauce before being popped in the oven, is easy and obvious, but here’s a wonderful Simon Hopkinson recipe that sets it off at its best. Serves 2.
Category: Favourite
La soupe de Myriam
Here is a quick-to-make soup which sounds implausible but is actually very nice. It can be eaten hot, warm or cold. As a variation, you could use Boursin or similar instead of vache-qui-rit.
Gazpacho Express
A summer recipe par excellence, and very quick to prepare. You might need to adjust quantities, according to taste and the size of the tomatoes.
Yorkshire Pudding
As recorded in a Yorkshire kitchen. Photos taken in haste, they are too good to leave hanging around!
Warm broad bean and potato salad with cheese and prosciutto
This is loosely based on a recipe in an old Sainsbury’s magazine. It’s an unusual idea — a kind of cross between salad and gratin, pretty and refreshing — a good light summer lunch or starter. You may vary the ingredients depending on what you have.
Tomates à la crème
From Edouard de Pomiane via Elizabeth David, who says it ‘makes tomatoes taste startlingly unlike any other dish of cooked tomatoes’.
We had it as a starter but we reckoned it would be fab with some nice fillet steak – or with roast/grilled lamb.
Salade aux lentilles du Puy
This is an absolutely classic French bistro dish. I still remember eating it in a little café in Violès after an arduous morning’s grape-picking.
Moules farcies au four
Serves 4 as a starter or 2 as a main course. Best with the large Spanish mussels — small moules de bouchot should not be wasted on this!
Mouclade
Devised by Steve from several different recipes, this is the best sauce for mussels I have ever tasted. It deserves small, fresh moules de bouchot (grown on posts in Brittany). Make sure you have lots of French bread for mopping up the sauce. This will serve six as a starter, or 3-4 as a main course.
Escalivade
A simple and very delicious Catalan recipe, with almost the same ingredients as ratatouille, but a very different result.