1. Lazing in bed on a Sunday morning with a purring cat curled up against my shoulder, knowing I don’t need to get up for work.
2. Swimming in a tropical lagoon surrounded by multi-coloured fishes, or just sitting on the beach watching and listening to the waves.
3. Snuggling up by the log fire on a winter night with a glass of red wine and a new book to read.
4. The fact that we took a risk, sold our house, gave up our jobs, and moved to the south of France to start a business — and it worked! Eleven years on, I still sometimes pinch myself to see if it’s true. I would have spent my life regretting it if we hadn’t done it.
5. The moment when you sit down at the table in a special restaurant, feeling hungry, and open the menu.
6. Singing Bach, Handel, Mozart, or Cyrillus Kreek.

I’ve wimped out on choosing the other six bloggers to pass the award on to; I’m picking six recent commenters on my blog, plucked out at random. Don’t feel obliged to do this if you don’t want to, and thanks to Joanna for thinking of me.

Bellini Valli of More Than Burnt Toast
Sally of Blogging for London
Betty (again!) of La France Profonde, And So Forth, and Cuisine Quotidienne
Ivy (again!) of Little Ivy Cakes
Sarah of Quelques gouttes de nous
Talented artist Steffi of Miss Matzenbatzen

I’ve been hoping for several months that I would be paired with Bellini Valli of More Than Burnt Toast for Taste & Create, and it finally happened! I was delighted, and looked forward to spending some time browsing her site. Unfortunately work and other stuff got in the way; and by last week I had a list of “only” a dozen or so recipes I wanted to try, and no time to try them.

Finally yesterday I had some free time,so I looked for something quick to do (in passing, I discovered that oddly enough Val — or at least her friend Lillian — was the originator of the crater banana bread I cooked for the last round of T&C). I hovered over the apple pancake, the apricot and ginger scones, the lamb sliders and half a dozen others … but finally, the pear upside-down cake looked irresistible for a chilly autumn day.

I used some of our local herb-flavoured garrigue honey, and Louise Bonne pears. Fresh thyme is hard to come by at this time of year, even here, so I sprinkled on some dried. Apart from that and my usual conversions, I followed the recipe exactly. It got the thumbs up from both of us, served still warm with a dollop of crème fraîche. OK, maybe it doesn’t quite reach the gingery, caramelised heights of my Best Dessert Ever, Springfield Pear Cake — the combination of pears and ginger can’t be beat in my opinion — but it is pretty darned close. The caramelised honey gave it a delicious spicy flavour, and the sponge was feather-light. I will definitely be making this again … and again … and again.

Thanks Val for an enjoyable browse and a delicious dessert — I’ve tucked several other recipes away for later!

55 ml intensely flavoured honey, e.g. chestnut, rosemary
4 small or 3 large firm pears, peeled, quartered lengthwise and cored
3 sprigs fresh thyme or a sprinkling of dried thyme(optional)
200 g sugar
finely grated zest of 1 lemon
2 large eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
110 g plain flour
1/4 tsp salt
110 g unsalted butter, melted and cooled
flaked almonds

Preheat oven to 175C. In a 9-inch ovenproof frying pan (the original recipe specified it should not be non-stick, I’m not sure why) simmer honey for 7 or 8 minutes until it begins to reduce and caramelize. Watch carefully and do not let it burn; if it starts to smell burnt, remove from heat.

Arrange pears, close together and cut-side down, in a circular pattern in the pan, stem ends pointing toward the centre. Pack them in tightly; they will shrink as they cook. Cook over medium heat, turning them from one cut side to the other, until they begin to turn golden, about 10 minutes. I used tongs to manipulate the pears throughout.

Flip pears over to their curved side and scatter with thyme if using. Transfer pan to oven and roast, uncovered, until very tender, about 25 minutes.

Meanwhile, in a large bowl or food processor, whisk together sugar and lemon zest. Whisk in eggs and vanilla. Fold in flour and salt; stir in all except about a tablespoon of the melted butter.

When pears are soft, remove pan from oven, discard thyme sprigs and brush edges of pears and pan with remaining melted butter. Pour batter evenly over pears and scatter flaked almonds over batter. Bake until a skewer inserted in the centre comes out clean, about 30 minutes. Don’t be afraid of overcooking it; the more caramelised it gets the better, so if in doubt give it a few more minutes. The original recipe said to cool the cake for 30 minutes before turning out; I did it straight away by gently loosening the edges with a palette knife, placing a plate on top, gripping firmly, and flipping it over. If any bits of pear stick to the pan, you can detach them with a palette knife and replace them. Like Springfield pear cake, this is best served warm rather than hot, with a blob of crème fraîche. But having just eaten the leftovers, I can vouch for the fact that it’s excellent cold too!

For the topping:
1.5 kg waxy potatoes (floury ones won’t do — make mash if that’s all you’ve got)
60g butter, melted
grated Parmesan cheese

Preheat the oven to 220C. Parboil or steam the potatoes for 6-8 minutes depending on size, then drain and set aside to cool. Put the fish in a baking dish. Heat the butter in a saucepan over moderate heat and saute the onion until soft but not brown. Stir in the flour and cook for a couple of minutes. Stir in the white wine, stock, and cream, and bring to the boil, stirring constantly to prevent lumps. Add the herbs, season with salt and pepper to taste, and pour over the fish in the baking dish, stirring gently.

Peel and coarsely grate the cooled potatoes and toss with the melted butter. Spread over the filling and top with the Parmesan. Bake for 25-30 minutes until the fish is cooked and the topping is crisp and golden brown; check to see that the potatoes are cooked and cook a bit longer if not. Serves 4 to 6.

Pork and prunes are a classic combination, but most recipes use relatively expensive tenderloin, while for this one a cheaper cut such as shoulder is fine. I haven’t included a photo because I just couldn’t make it look attractive! But the sauce is a lovely rich caramel colour, and it’s delicious — I would certainly serve it to guests. This recipe would probably work really well in a slow cooker too.

1 kg pork shoulder or similar
2 tbs olive oil
2 onions, sliced
1 large clove garlic, chopped
1 glass (125 ml) dry white wine or cider
2-3 tbs French mustard
2 tbs honey
dried herbes de Provence to taste
1 tsp ginger
salt and pepper
10 prunes (or you could use dried apricots)
1-2 tbs crème fraîche

Heat the olive oil in a heavy casserole. Dice the meat, trimming excess fat, and brown lightly in the oil. Add the onions and garlic and continue to cook till everything turns a nice golden colour. Add everything else except for the prunes and cream. Cover and cook slowly for about half an hour (I put it on top of our woodburner); if it’s the type of casserole with a concave lid, pour some water into the lid so that the steam condenses. After that add the prunes and cook for a further hour, till the meat is tender. Add the cream, stir in, and season to taste.

I haven’t had them for years, and a sudden cold snap after weeks of warm weather made me think of this comfort food. These are nothing like my mother’s, but they are delicious anyway; I just made the recipe up as I went along. If you want something more like hers, replace the stuffing with some home-made ragù bolognese.

4 large sweet onions
250 g good sausage meat
handful fresh breadcrumbs
2 slices Parma ham (or similar), finely chopped
4 tbs Parmesan cheese, grated
1-2 cloves garlic, crushed
1 tbs tomato puree
oregano (fresh or dried)
salt and pepper
1 egg
olive oil
white wine or stock (optional)

Remove loose skin from the onions, wash thoroughly. Bring plenty of water to the boil in a pan big enough to take the onions, and boil them for 25-35 minutes, depending on size. Drain and allow to cool for 15 minutes.

Preheat oven to 200C. When the onions are cool enough to handle, slice off the tops and remove the skins. Remove the centre of each onion with a paring knife or small spoon (a grapefruit spoon or melon baller is good), leaving a shell of 2-3 layers. Patch any holes with spare bits of onion. Put the onions in a small baking dish into which they fit snugly.

Finely chop about half of the extracted onion (save the rest for something else), put in a bowl, and add the meat, breadcrumbs, ham, 3 tbs cheese, garlic, oregano, tomato puree, and egg. Mix well. Season to taste (if the sausage meat was highly seasoned, you won’t need much extra salt and pepper).

Fill the onions with the meat mixture using a teaspoon, and sprinkle with the remaining cheese. Pour a little water, stock, or white wine round the onions, drizzle a liberal amount of olive oil over them, put in the oven and cook for about 45 minutes, until the stuffing is cooked through and the onions are tender. If you have too much stuffing, you can put the remainder in a ramekin and bake alongside the onions.

1. Link to the person who tagged you.
2. Post the rules on your blog.
3. Write six random things about yourself.
4. Tag six people at the end of your post and link to them.
5. Let each person know they’ve been tagged and leave a comment on their blog
6. Let the tagger know when your entry is up.

So here we go; it took me ages to write this post, because I’m not used to writing posts that aren’t recipes.

1. My favourite subject at school was Latin. I was the only person in my year who wanted to take it at A-Level, so for two years I had a teacher all to myself and got an A in the exam, resulting in my being thought an insufferable swot. At that point I was learning four languages simultaneously (French, Latin, German, Russian) but nowadays I speak two fluently (English and French) and one haltingly (Spanish). Time and lack of practice have done away with the rest. But I still think Latin is an invaluable foundation for all sorts of things, including spelling, learning other languages, computer programming, crossword puzzles, and general all-round cleverness

2. Taking a leaf from Fiona’s book, 99.9% of cats like me. Well, maybe not 99.9%, since cats are aloof and discerning creatures, but the vast majority do. When I was a moody teenager, my cat Margo was my best friend, and ever since cats have been very special to me — not just pets but intelligent, interesting, and sometimes baffling companions. I would hate to live without at least one, and I always stop to talk to cats I meet in the street. Dogs on the other hand: some people have a natural authority with dogs, but I’m not one of them.

3. When I was nine, I almost died of peritonitis, and still remember the family doctor telling my mother I was just malingering to get out of school. I was too ill to appreciate the glamour of being wrapped in a red blanket and carried downstairs by an ambulance man before nee-nahing to the hospital in an ambulance for emergency surgery, but my sisters thought it was exciting. And I did get about three months off school, plus an excuse not to join in games lessons.

4. I didn’t learn to ride a bike till I was 25, and I’m still not very good at it. Not to be trusted on public highways. Luckily I took to driving a car better, even if I didn’t pass my test till I was 28, at the third attempt.

5. Music is as essential to life as cats. I love singing, but only with other people, not on my own; I like the feeling of creating harmonies and resonances together, and especially the intertwining threads of baroque music. I’d love to be able to play the piano, but my lessons aged about seven were a miserable failure.

6. I’m addicted to books and have been ever since I learned to read. My mother claims I once walked into a lamp-post on my way home from the library, already absorbed in a book. Fed up of the overflowing bookshelves and piles of books around the house, my husband covered an entire wall from floor to ceiling with shelves, and is surprised I haven’t filled it yet. Another set of shelves is crammed with cookbooks, which I read for pleasure. Since I discovered BookMooch, my habit has found a nice equilibrium: give books away and receive more in the post!

And I’m tagging, in no particular order:

1. Ivy of Little Ivy Cakes
2. Loulou of Chez Loulou
3. Betty of Cuisine Quotidienne, And So Forth, and La France Profonde
4. Nicole of For the Love of Food
5. Stephanie of Fun Foods on a Budget
6. Patricia of Technicolor Kitchen

OK, so they have something obvious in common — their blogs have a lot to do with food But they’re all bloggers that I’ve been reading and enjoying for a while and would like to know more about.

Tatins seem to be everywhere these days; first Bellini Valli of More Than Burnt Toast, then Loulou, then Ivy came up with their own versions. I saw Ivy’s post just as I had got home with a big bag of apples to make one myself. At a stroke, I tried Ivy’s idea of making small individual ones, using some perfectly-sized shallow gratin dishes. A great idea for anyone nervous about flipping the tatin; it’s much easier with small ones! I think I’ll be making these a lot now, although there is something impressive about a single large tarte tatin fresh from the oven, glistening with caramel and just waiting to be shared with friends.

Finally, if you are really, really nervous about making tatins, try this unconventional method from Chefs Gone Wild — the results look stunning, and that’s exactly the colour you should be aiming for — though personally I would not use puff pastry.

Once upon a time, tarte tatin meant apples, but now it’s come to cover a much broader spectrum, from sweet to savoury. Some of them are a travesty of what tatin is about in my opinion; it should be simple, not tricked-up with loads of extra ingredients, and the essential point is that whatever you use should caramelise to a rich golden brown; if it doesn’t, what’s the point? Things that produce too much juice or go soggy/disintegrate will not work. Whatever you choose, you must be brave and caramelise it to within an inch of its life; it must be deep golden-brown before you put the pastry on, otherwise your finished tart will be pale and disappointing. So that said, here are a few ideas:

• To a classic apple tatin, add some thin slices of quince for a wonderful added aroma, or mix pears and apples. I always add some grated lemon zest and a squeeze of juice to mine.
• Try a pineapple tatin; it works really well, and is a good use for a fresh pineapple that isn’t as flavourful as you had hoped. Peaches and apricots are good summer candidates too.
• On the savoury front, tomato tatin is obvious and excellent; either one large one as a main course with salad, or small individual ones served as starters.
• Shallots make a fabulous tatin: caramelise whole peeled shallots slowly in butter or olive oil with a sprinkling of sugar, and add some balsamic vinegar at the end. For the ultimate taste and texture sensation, make individual ones, turn out, and top each with a slice of pan-fried foie gras. This is sinfully good!

This recipe inaugurates a new tag of “frugal food”, which seems appropriate in these credit-crunch times. Made mainly of ripe tomatoes and stale bread, it costs almost nothing, and can make a light vegetarian main course along with a green vegetable or salad. Carnivores can have it as a substantial side dish with a roast — less meat needed! And of course I wouldn’t be posting it if it wasn’t delicious. The bottom layer of crumbs soaks up the juices, while the top is brown and crunchy.

I habitually whiz stale ends of bread to crumbs in the blender and then store them in the freezer in ziploc bags, as they are useful for so many things. So I used some of those for this, and the last of the season’s tomatoes. It’s really best made with the ripest, reddest tomatoes you can find. If they’re a bit pale, up the garlic and herbs to compensate.

For 4:
150-200 g brown breadcrumbs
2 medium onions, very finely chopped
1-2 cloves garlic, very finely chopped
flat-leaf parsley or basil to taste, chopped
1 tbs finely grated lemon zest
6 tbs finely grated Parmesan
4 tbs olive oil
25 g butter
1 kg very ripe tomatoes

Preheat the oven to 200C. Mix together crumbs, onions, garlic, Parmesan, lemon zest, and herbs, and season with salt and pepper. Use about a tbs of the oil to oil a gratin dish. Then sprinkle about a third of the bread mixture into it.

Peel the tomatoes and slice them thickly. Lay half of them on top of the crumbs, season, and drizzle over about half the remaining oil. Repeat layers of crumbs and tomatoes, finishing with crumbs. Drizzle the remaining oil over the crumbs and then dot with butter. Bake for about 35 minutes, until crisp and brown on top.

Domestic crises chez Nicky meant a hiatus for Taste & Create last month, and I’m pleased it’s back this month, thanks to Min, while Nicky takes a much-needed break.

My partner was a new one to me: Allison of Fridgg. First impression when I landed on her blog: “Wow, those photos are amazing!” Second impression: “Spam musubi?? Help! I don’t like spam and I don’t like sushi!” It’s all very well going out of your comfort zone, but this was a step too far

But undaunted, I continued searching, and my persistence was rewarded. Back in August, Allison had made a yummy-looking crater banana bread, and glancing at the fruit bowl I saw a ripe banana just waiting to be used. I’ve actually never made banana bread, so this was a first for me. I still felt at liberty to change it though. I’m not a fan of chocolate chips, in fact I don’t really go for chocolatey desserts unless they are made of large quantities of the best bitter chocolate. Or they are the milk chocolate soufflé at Lapérouse in Paris — I thought I’d died and gone to heaven when I ate that. Bananas say “rum” to me, so I substituted some rum-soaked jumbo sultanas for the chocolate chips.

It smelled fabulous while it was cooking, and I could barely wait for it to cool down before I tried some. I had wondered why it was called “crater” banana bread, but the crackled top did look like solidifying lava when I took it out of the oven. As for the end result, well, now I know what to do with over-ripe bananas. The inside was quite moist and the sultana layer had sunk to the bottom, making a gorgeously gooey, caramelised mess, but the edges and top were crunchy and caramelised, making a lovely contrast with the crumb. It’s so rich, more like cake than bread, that it’s probably most appropriate as a dessert, slightly warm, with ice cream or yoghurt. “I don’t like banana bread,” said Steve, and then had second helpings.

My metric version follows: this time I did stick to the quantity of sugar specified, even though it looked a lot, and double-checked all my conversions. Mine is also for a smaller cake than Allison’s.

As for the photos, well, it just wasn’t a good day, but don’t let them put you off!

150 g soft butter
300 g golden caster sugar
2 small eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 ripe bananas
220 g flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1 1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
150 ml yoghurt or sour cream
1 tsp cinnamon
120 g soft brown sugar
handful of sultanas
2 tbs rum or orange juice

Preheat the oven to 170C. Warm the sultanas and rum or orange juice in a small pan or the microwave and set aside while you prepare the batter.

Cream together butter and sugar, then gradually add the eggs, beating thoroughly. Mash the bananas (I whizzed them in the liquidiser) and add with the vanilla extract, mixing till smooth. Sift the flour, baking powder, and bicarb and beat in, alternating with the yoghurt and finishing with the dry ingredients. Mix together the brown sugar and cinnamon in a bowl.

Lightly grease a 20cm x 15cm baking tin. Pour in half the batter, then sprinkle over half the brown sugar and all the sultanas, adding any remaining soaking liquid. Top with the rest of the batter and sprinkle with the remaining brown sugar (Allison had chocolate chips on top too, but sultanas would burn if you put them on top, so I didn’t). Bake for 45-50 minutes, until springy to the touch.

Preheat the oven to 220C (200C fan). Grease four small ramekins, and put 1 tbs jam in the bottom of each. Tear up the bread, put in a bowl, and pour over the milk; leave to soak for 5-10 miutes, till the bread is really soft.

Break up the cheese and put in a blender or food processor with the butter, egg yolks, and bread mixture. Season with salt, pepper, and nutmeg. Whiz till smooth and set aside. You can do all of this preparation in advance.

20 minutes before you want to serve the soufflés, whisk the egg whites until stiff, and fold into the cheese mixture with a metal spoon. Divide between the ramekins. Run a finger round the edge of each ramekin to make a small gap; the soufflés will rise better. Bake for 15-18 minutes, till risen and brown on top, and make sure all your guests are at the table before removing from the oven and serving instantly.