From Anna:

I am very happy to be handing this week’s newsletter over to Nathalie from Sohaila restaurant. My family and I have eaten a couple of memorable meals at Sohaila. The food was so good but what I remember most is the feeling of being looked after. Nathalie explains that Sohaila means ease and that’s what I felt as it sat at their table. I was there with my sister and her brand new baby and someone offered for her to sit in the manager’s office if she needed some quiet for the baby. True hospitality. Seeing and feeling the needs of the people in your care.

And the food. This is happy food. Small plates with big flavour and colour on top of colour. Food from the heart. If you go get the leeks, the rhubarb ezme and the batara harra. In fact, get one of everything.

Sohaila is also a social enterprise working with Fat Macy’s to help people in temporary housing find work in hospitality and move on to the next stage of their lives. Every meal eaten at Sohalia goes towards supporting more people in doing this.

Natalie and Meg, the female founders of Sohaila, also have a book out soon which you can preorder. So, if getting to London is impossible for you, then you can still eat their food. Nathalie has also shared with us a recipe from the book - halloumi with cherries and candied walnuts which I made and ate for lunch and will be something I make again and again this summer.

Pre-order Nathalie's book

From Nathalie:

Food, for me, has always been about memory. Growing up in a partly Lebanese household, the kitchen was never just a place to cook — it was where the day began and ended, where love was expressed without being said, and where the table was always set for more people than you expected.

Sohaila is my attempt to bring that feeling to London. The name means “ease” — a guiding star — and that is exactly what I want every meal in the restaurant to feel like. Not performance. Not theatre. Just the quiet confidence of food that knows what it is.

The menu draws on the recipes I grew up with: dishes passed through generations, shaped by the landscapes of Lebanon — the mountains, the coast, the cedar-scented air. We have refined them, adjusted them for a London dining room. The best Lebanese cooking asks only to be understood, and the chefs at Sohaila have done just that.

What matters to me is that every ingredient earns its place on the plate. We work with producers who care as deeply about their craft as we do about ours. The spices, the meat, the fish, the grains — they all carry a story, and we want our guests to experience it.

But Sohaila is more than a restaurant. It is the trading arm of Fat Macy’s, the social enterprise founded to create real pathways out of temporary accommodation and into hospitality careers.

Every table you sit at, every dish you eat, is part of that work. The two things — great food and genuine social purpose — are not in tension here. They are the same thing.

This is a restaurant built on generosity. Come hungry. Come often.

Get the book

More about Fat Macy's

Follow along with Nathalie

Things to read:

• My go to read that I keep coming back to is “Food from the Arab World.” My neighbour gave me a copy a few years ago and I find it deeply fascinating and informative. It has a beautiful structure that makes it a fun cookbook to read. It’s a genuine primary source of food knowledge and recipes published in Beirut. Full of real recipes, not an Americanised version. My go-to recipes include hummus bi tahini, baba ganoush, tabbouleh, fattoush, mujaddara, stuffed grape leaves. All very straightforward and delicious.

• I follow and get loads of local London info from LondOntheinside - it’s super helpful to have something out there that truly understands what’s going on in London and my local area for me specifically. Hospitality is really tough right now for so many reasons, especially with no government support. It’s so refreshing to feel like there is a space that understands this and supports you as a small business and social enterprise.

Things to listen to:

• I totally love listening to Off Menu; I am obsessed with what people choose to eat.

Things to watch:

• There are so many beautiful movies centred around food, nostalgia, love and hate. But without shame every time I keep going back to Big Night when I need to relax and feel inspired. Even thinking about it now I feel like someone is hugging me.

Sohaila’s grilled halloumi with cherries and candied walnuts

This recipe emerged from Nathalie’s home and dates back to the earliest days of Sohaila. From Natalie - ‘Cherries are a joy to cook with, whether in sweet or savoury dishes. Roast cherries go really well with strong-tasting softer cheeses – goat and blue varieties particularly. Here, salty halloumi (a favourite with customers), sticky cherries and sweet crunchy walnuts are a winning combination. Use frozen or fresh cherries, the advantage of frozen being that they’re already stoned. This makes an elegant starter or communal dish as part of a mezze selection.’

Serves 4

250g halloumi, sliced into 8 x 1cm thick slices
1 tablespoon olive oil

For the candied walnuts

80g walnut halves or pieces
2 tablespoons caster sugar
1 tablespoon water
Pinch sea salt flakes

For the cherry dressing

200g pitted cherries, halved if fresh (you can use frozen here)
1 tablespoon honey
1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
1 teaspoon olive oil
Salt and ground black pepper

Start by preparing the candied walnuts. Toast the walnuts in a frying pan over a medium heat for about 2-3 minutes until lightly golden. Don’t take your eyes off them. Have the caster sugar and water ready and add them in very quick succession to the pan, stirring immediately until the sugar dissolves and coats the walnuts.

Tip the candied walnuts onto a sheet of baking parchment and leave them to cool and harden. You can sprinkle them with a little salt, but bear in mind the halloumi is salty, and there’s a pinch in the cherry dressing too.

For the cherry dressing, combine the cherries (if they are frozen there’s no need to halve them), honey, balsamic vinegar, olive oil and salt and pepper in a small saucepan. Cook over a medium heat for 15 minutes or more until the cherries soften and release their juice and flavour. Stir occasionally. When it has reduced to a saucy consistency, not too thick and sticky as it will thicken as it cools, turn off the heat and leave.

The last stage is to grill the halloumi. First brush the slices on both sides with a little oil. Heat a ridged griddle or frying pan (or outdoor grill) over a medium-high heat. Fry the halloumi for 2-3 minutes on each side, or until golden grill marks form and the cheese is slightly softened.

Arrange the grilled halloumi slices on individual plates if serving as a starter, or one large dish if it’s for sharing. Drizzle the cherry dressing over it, letting the cherries and their syrupy sauce cover the cheese. Scatter with the candied walnuts.

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Thanks for reading The Anna Jones newsletter, a celebration of cooking, vegetables and life. It’s great to have you here. If you have found yourself here but are not yet subscribed then you can sort that out below….

My cookbooks (there are five) are available here. The latest is Easy Wins - a Sunday Times bestseller. There are hundreds of free recipes on my website which you can find here.

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How is it June? No, really, how? Did I inadvertently walk into a memory-wiping time machine on the 1st of March? Anyway it is actually June the 4th. I checked 3 times.

I’m just back from an absolutely incredible week on Anglesey, John’s homeland and in my opinion, one of the most beautiful / best places in the world. When the sun shines, it’s completely unbeatable. I am putting together a list of places to go if you ever find your way there soon.

Strawberries and sunshine

This is supposed to be the best year ever for British strawberries. I was eating them for a couple of weeks before I found this out, and I had been thinking that they are some of the most full-flavoured and sweet ones I can remember - all of them from the posh veg supplier ones to the supermarket punnets - they have all been good. This is, apparently, due to a colder than normal start to Spring, which let them ripen slowly on the plant. Our beach cool bag last week was packed with fizzy water, beers, strawberries and watermelon. Peak summer in May. Thrilled.

The Food season at the British Library

The Food season of talks and events starts next week and has some of the best conversations around food out there. I am particularly looking forward to one on food photography named from Apsic to Instagram (what a title). Making food for photographs was my job for a very long time, so I have history here and a lot of thoughts. There are talks with Ruthie Rogers and Neneh Cherry. Andi Oliver will be talking about Edna Lewis, and I am particularly keen to go to this one with Fadi and Sammi.

Summer Herbs

I’m a rubbish gardener, but I do seem (with the help of my friends Alice and Elisa who know their shit) to have been able to grow some herbs. My garden is full of herbs and it has become my entire personality. If you come round my house, I will show you them and then make you drink tea made from them, do not refuse. This year’s standouts are chocolate mint, which makes incredible tea, bronze and normal fennel, which I use daily, anywhere that needs dill/fennel/tarragon and lovage, which, in my opinion, is the best herb of all time but is only sold by niche restaurant veg suppliers. Loveage is the best thing to eat with tomatoes, or eggs, or courgettes. Plant some - it grows like a weed and you only need a couple of leaves for it to pack a punch, not like when you buy a bunch of basil, and it makes 20ml of pesto. There is a lot of bang for your buck with lovage.

Below for my paid subscribers is an insight into my colour book collecting habit and, in a departure from what I love, a few things I hate.

Heading out tomorrow, free for all you wonderful subscribers, is a takeover from a family favourite restaurant, Sohaila and thier halloumi and cherry recipe that is all the good things about summer eating.

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This week’s newsletter is part of an occasional series on my favourite ingredients. The first issue on capers is here and the love of tahini here. These are the ingredients I rely heavily on to add a lot of layers of flavour quickly.

Vinegar = acid and acidity is, in my opinion, the most important and most forgotten aspect of cooking. I like to use vinegar as an accent – a highlight, a top note – that brings a plate of food together.

Vinegar is something I find myself craving, and I keep as many vinegars on hand as I do oils. A red wine, a white wine, a sherry, a raw cider one, a rice vinegar, a balsamic and a few fun flavour-infused ones - right now that’s a homemade herb, a mandarin vinegar, a lovage and a blackcurrant. As well as rice wine vinegar, black vinegar and a malt for chips. I realise this is verging on a ridiculous amount of vinegars and unless you find it fun there is no need to have this many in your cupboard.

An essential collection of vinegars to me would be a white wine or cider, a red wine vinegar and a rice wine vinegar. With these vinegars, you can do everything.

The ‘fun’ or flavoured ones are good to cook with too. Each adds its own characteristics and is a chance to add a layer of flavour as well as some acidity. If you are keen on buying interesting vinegars then can I point you in the direction of Andy Harris at the Vinegar Shed? Most of mine come from him.

Of course, in the world of vinegar there are also pickles. They bring acidity and crunch and the flavour of whatever has been pickled so, in flavour terms, I think of them together. I buy a lot of pickles and at the bottom here is a list of my most loved ones.

The pickles I make are mostly very quick or instant ones. Thinly sliced cucumbers with some sugar and coriander seeds to go on a burger (see recipe below), lemon juice pickled onions to top a salad, things that pickle in the time it takes me to cook dinner.

The good thing about pickling is that, on the whole, it actually takes very little hands-on time, you just need to let the ingredients do the work in the jar or bowl when you’ve done all the chopping. Sometimes you need to do a bit of cooking, and some recipes need more time than others - maybe a couple of weeks for flavours to develop, but others, as I say, can pickle in minutes. As a general rule the softer the veg, the quicker it will pickle, and the thinner you cut it the more quickly it will be ready.

This week for my paid subscribers, along with everything I know about vinegar and pickles, I have three of my most made pickle recipes for you. They are three things I always have in my fridge and they make all my meals much, much better. The pink pickled onions and quick cucumber pickle are the work of minutes and vastly improve most things I eat - I eat one of these at least once a day. Sushi rice and some roasted broccoli is much better with a few spoons of a thousand-slice pickle. And if you want to pretend to be Andy from the Vinegar Shed, I’ve included my homemade herb vinegar recipe below too.

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Almost everything I know about vinegar and 3 easy pickles

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This week I am starting a new, occasional series where I talk to the chefs and food writers who I admire most and who make great things with vegetables. If given the choice, these are the cooks I would like to cook for me. The food that gets me really excited.

There is another fun reason why - I am in the middle of working on my next cookbook. So, as I put a lot of energy into that in the coming months, I will be sharing recipes from some of the very best cooks I know.

I am so interested in how and what people eat and the details of the way they cook, so I will be asking these cooks the questions I’ve always wanted to know the answers to alongside their recipes. I hope to give you (and me) an insight into how a cooks mind works, what’s most important to the cooks I love and why their recipes and writing are so good.

I want to particularly shine a light on people doing amazing things with vegetables. That’s what I am all about and I feel like a lot of the enthusiasm we had for eating more veg and in doing so, living more sustainably, has waned over the last few years. I want to reignite that conversation. And I want your thoughts too.

First up is Joe Woodhouse. His food is some of the best I’ve eaten and he’d certainly be high on the list of all-time cooks for me. Joe cooks from the heart, which might seem a cliché thing to say but for Joe it is absolutely the truest thing. Food is in his bones, I imagine that his whole day is choreographed around what his meals will be. He cooks intuitively and beautifully with great respect for ingredients, farmers and our land.

Joe is pretty much a life-long vegetarian. We share a desire not to preach or to label but to make great food that speaks to everyone. I am so inspired by people who cook this way, letting the food do the talking.

I was lucky enough to sit at Joe’s table just a few weeks ago with his wife, Olia and their amazing sons (This video of Joe cooking with his youngest Wilf made my day). Joe made us pizzas with the most perfect crust (a dough recipe lovingly refined over time to include a just right combination of flours). As we waited for the oven to cool enough that it would not burn the crusts, we ate salads on bright plates with herbs from his garden. Joe made us chocolate ice cream for dessert. I know that Joe, without saying or asking anything, remembered the things my kids would eat, and that’s why I say that his cooking is from the heart. Joe cooks to put smiles on people’s faces, and that’s why his food is so so good.

Follow along with Joe

Weeknight Vegetarian

Joe has written some very brilliant books. The third of which, ‘Weeknight Vegetarian’ came out recently. Since it arrived it has not left my kitchen counter. I’ve cooked from it so much. The stir fry fritters and the buffalo chickpea crunch wrap have been favourites so far but the whole book is crammed with things I am excited about. ‘Your Daily Veg’ and More Daily Veg are just as good.

Joe is sharing a recipe from Weeknight Vegetarian and he’s answered a few questions below. He’s shared this crunchy tomato salad with a bright green sauce (I can vouch for how completely delicious it is). Thanks Joe, I have endless love and respect for you.

What did you cook for dinner last night?
Tomatoey black lentils (from Hodmedods) with wholegrain spelt casarecce - I did a big bulk batch of the lentils and used them as a soupy sauce with the pasta. Which also comes from Hodmedods - the kids love it as it has loads of flavour. Plus I’m a massive Hodmedods fanboy!

What’s the most underrated ingredient for cooking with vegetables?
Vinegar - just a splash right at the end helps brighten flavours. A lot of veg can actually be naturally quite sweet so the vinegar can help to balance it out. In soups, stews and sauces as well as salads. It is such an important addition for me.

Your most loved vegetable?
Onions - anything in the allium family - but Onions all day every day. If I don’t have onions in the cupboard I start to feel like something is out of kilter. They form the start of so many dishes. Cooked down gently to become lovely and sweet. Or used raw or pickled to finish dishes. So actually you can have them twice on one plate. That is a massive win in my book!

What is the single ingredient you couldn’t live without?
Really good olive oil. And lemons. Oops, that’s two. But probably the olive oil wins, just.

How long have you been vegetarian? And why are you vegetarian?
30 years. I thought about it while watching a comedy show on TV when I was 10. The jokes about vegetarianism landed in a different way with 10 year old me. And I thought maybe I want to stop eating the way I am until I can answer some of the questions I have. The idea being that I would make my way back. It didn’t work that way. I ended up being a lifer. Essentially it is rooted in whether there is such a thing as a soul, and if it is ok for us to take someone else’s. I feel happy and satiated eating a vegetarian diet. I like the challenge of making complete meals that are vegetarian. Rather than relying on animal protein. Especially in the modern world, it feels like we are eating animals for every meal. The system has also become so mechanised. Full of really low animal welfare. It feels unsustainable and a bit boring. Eat the rainbow!

Is it important for you to get more people eating vegetables?
I think there is so much access to a whole world of new and interesting ingredients these days. As well as the usual ones prepared in new and different ways. It feels exciting and fun to taste outside of your comfort zone and maybe find new things to love. The importance of getting more people eating more veg comes from an inquisitive and feeder point of view for me. Because I don’t want to push anything on anyone. I am genuinely excited to share discoveries or ways of cooking or preparing veg that make it more interesting. And see if that ignites a similar response in others. Sharing the excitement, I guess! I find sharing enthusiasm a better way than lecturing… The short answer though is that I do feel it is extremely important that people eat in a more sustainable and veg centric diet. I love to give inspiration for helping with that. Make recipes your own and put your own stamp on them.

In your opinion, what stands in the way of people eating more veg?
I hear a lot from people that they are a little scared or intimidated by not knowing how to cook a specific ingredient. I mean you have to try it to learn how you like it. So take the plunge or ask someone how they like to cook something. Cooking something in a certain way can completely change your opinion of it. I like to roast a lot of veg in the oven simply with oil and salt. So you get an idea of it. Pair it with a simple sauce you like. A tutorial video will be available online if you really don’t know where to start. Have a look for some inspiration, and set about tackling that veg that has been staring at you from the veg drawer in the fridge!

The lack of excitement factor plays a big part for people, I think. The same old veg in the same old way. Boiled veg is great but it needs some dressing or sauce to bring it to life, a spritz of lemon juice and a drizzle of olive oil. I love making a tangy green sauce in the fridge to toss through veg or dollop on top of dishes, hand chopped or blitzed up together. Think capers, cornichons, a little diced red onion or shallot, all the bits of soft herbs that are around, a little mustard, oil and vinegar. Taste and add more of what you like or it needs. Or take your usually boiled veg and griddle or roast it for a more intense flavour.

Best place to eat as a vegetarian? Best place to eat full stop (if that’s different)?
40 Maltby Street is my all time favourite. I have been going since it opened 15 years ago. The veg dishes are always so inspiring to me. The quality of ingredients and cooking is superb. I often daydream of when I can go next. My son loves it as well, just direct, outright delicious food. I don’t really seek out vegetarian restaurants. I seek out good restaurants, that have great produce and a good energy. The thinking being that if they care about the produce and are excited by cooking, it doesn’t matter if it’s a carrot or a chicken, it gets treated with the same respect! I look at where the good veg suppliers deliver to as a bit of starting point also.

The ice cream flavour you always pick?
Mint Choc Chip - out of nostalgia largely - it is my first memory. With my dad at the beach. Although if it is the luminous green version I hold off until a less vibrant one comes my way… Laura at Towpath does a natural mint soft serve version with chocolate sauce which is pretty ethereal.

What chocolate bar and/or packet of crisps would you get from the corner shop?Green & Blacks 85% - and something vinegary

What’s your 4pm snack?
I always say I don’t snack - but when I think back of course I do! When I do I try and lean into it and have something rather than picking endlessly. So maybe a small piece of wholemeal toast with good butter, set honey and a sprinkle of sea salt. A couple slices of cheese. Or I do like a handful of walnuts and a couple of sticky medjool dates.

Tomato salad with smashed crispy potatoes + mojo verde

SERVES 4

From Joe: ‘When tomatoes are good, I often look for ways to eat them where they remain centre stage. This salad has a lot of elements going on, each ticking its own cravings box: creamy, juicy, crispy, spicy. I love the burst of juicy, sweet, slightly acidic tomatoes against the salty, crispy, fluffy-centred potatoes, all tied together with a deliciously tangy sauce and creamy yielding cheese. If you want to go extra, sub in burrata or, for more tang, a soft goats’ cheese. Making up a big platter of this and dropping it in the centre of the table for everyone to help themselves is very satisfying.’

SERVES 4

600g new potatoes
flavourless oil, for roasting
400–500g ripe tomatoes, ideally a mix of colours, shapes and sizes
2 baby gem lettuce, roots trimmed, broken apart into leaves
300–400g mozzarella cheese, torn into quarters, or bocconcini
salt

For the mojo verde - (all ingredients to taste)

4 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons sherry vinegar
4 garlic cloves
50g coriander
1–2 green chillies
1 teaspoon ground cumin

Cook the potatoes
Preheat the oven to 220°C/200°C fan (425°F), Gas Mark 7. Bring a saucepan of well-salted water to the boil and add the potatoes. Cook until tender when pierced with a knife; 15–20 minutes.

Make the mojo sauce
Meanwhile, put the mojo verde ingredients in a small blender or food processor and blitz until smooth, adding a good pinch of salt. Taste and add more of any ingredient you feel is needed.

Crisp up the potatoes
Drain the potatoes well. Drizzle a couple of tablespoons of oil on to a baking tray. Add the potatoes and crush with a pan or the bottom of a heavy-based glass; they just want to pop and increase the surface area in contact with the tray. Add a further drizzle of oil over the potatoes and put them in the oven. Cook for 30–40 minutes until crisp and golden, flipping them after 25 minutes.

Slice + prep the tomatoes
As the potatoes are finishing, slice any larger tomatoes thickly. Cut smaller ones in half across their equators.

Arrange + serve
When the potatoes are done, arrange the lettuce on a platter. Top with the warm crispy potatoes sprinkled with salt, followed by the tomatoes and the cheese. Dot over the mojo verde and serve.

My cookbooks (there are five) are available here. The latest is Easy Wins, a Sunday Times bestseller. There are also hundreds of free recipes on my website which you can find here.

Can I please ask that if you like this week’s newsletter and words, that you add a like or comment below and perhaps share it with someone who might also like it. Thank you.

All five of my cookbooks are available here. The latest is Easy Wins, a Sunday Times No. 1 bestseller. My website, on which you can find hundreds of free recipes is here.

Our family, I am sure like all families, is a multi-functioning organism. Maybe nicer to describe us as a constellation. We exist in holding pattern of joy, tenderness, laughter, meltdowns, responsibility, dishwashers, paint splatters, school runs and so much toast. All relying on each other in some way for it to work, we exist as a four in a beautiful, sometimes chaotic and extremely us way.

When something in that dynamic changes, it feels weird and we have to rebalance. John has been away for a couple of weeks and so our status quo has (temporarily) shifted. It’s a small shift but it’s had me thinking about how families change over time, how our family will change as kids grow and life changes - a feeling that’s felt by all families, however they look - children or not.

For a few weeks we have moved into a new way of doing things. As the only parent in the house it has given me endless respect for parents and people who do this day in, day out. I bow down to you all single parents and carers.

I have had to be more organised with everything, including our meals. I am an instinct cook, I cook based on mood, on want, on the feeling of the day, so I find it hard to forward plan and think about what I might feel like eating any other moment but right now.

In an attempt to help my future self, at the start of last week I cooked up a massive pot of Jersey royals, enough of a blank canvas to be taken so many different ways. I turned them into simple dinners with the addition of spring vegetables, cheese, eggs, herbs and dressings through the week. It meant I had the base of a meal in the fridge at all times. I have been running through my new potato back catalogue.

Today’s twelve favourite ways with new potato and how I make life easier with them, are for my treasured paid subscribers this week. If you would like to become a paid subscriber, you can do that below. If not, thank you for just being here, there are hundreds of recipes on my website - all for free.

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My cookbooks (there are five) are available here. The latest is Easy Wins - a Sunday Times bestseller. There are hundreds of free recipes on my website which you can find here.

Subscribe now

From Anna:

Adriann! How full of joy I am to welcome you this week.

I have been eating Adriann’s pastries (which are also ART) from my local Finks bakery for the last few years. They have seen me through good and bad times, bringing me inspiration, fun, comfort and vibes in equal measure. I had always wondered who made them as they seemed more fun, more colourful and just more delicious than almost any I have had. When I discovered Adriann was the person behind the pastry, it all made sense. Some people's food is so unmistakably theirs who else would make a rhubarb princess cake or a HUGE rosette apple galette. Adrainn that's who.

Anyone who can get as excited about a tayberry or a pink fleshed apple as Adrainn is my kind of person. I am just made up that Adriann is sharing his world with us this week, from the things he listens to and loves to a recipe for strawberry jam doughnuts that I am clearing a few hours to make this weekend.

Thank you for it all Adriann.

Anna xx

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From Adriann:

Hi angels, my name is Adriann Ramirez and I’m a pastry chef based in London! I also go under the moniker @gay.nigella on Instagram. A more nuanced description of myself would include writer, recipe developer, poet, sometimes performance artist and all the time diva. I’ve been the head of pastry for 9 years, largely self taught, at Fink’s in North London. Working closely with my partners (and Fink’s founders), Mat Appleton and Jess Blackstone, we have shaped the identity of Fink’s together by designing spaces, curating menus and cooking really good food. They were most kind to let me get on with the sweet side of things, allowing me to do a lot of trial, and make a lot of errors before finding the sweet spot we find ourselves in today.

Before that, I spent time front of house at Tartine bakery and Violet Cakes, soaking up the energy and influence like a sponge.

Over the years, I have made seasonality at the forefront of my menu and ethos as a pastry chef. Working with amazing suppliers like Shrub, Natoora, Albion and Wildfarmed, I’ve been able to play around a lot making hyper-seasonal desserts like the classic hot pink Princess Cake using forced rhubarb from the iconic Tomlinson’s Rhubarb farm in Pudsey, Leeds, Nectavigne Slab pie using beautifully wine stained and tart blood nectarines from France, and Gariguette Strawberry Shortcakes made using Estate Dairy double cream and early season strawberries from France.

When you move with the seasons, you are able to keep things exciting for customers, my bakers and myself executing recipes from a blend of Americana and European influences that I’ve come to learn, recreate and love. I want to create a world in which the interplay of drama, seasonality, fun and provenance can all exist in pastry form. I want to enjoy what I’m baking and I want you to enjoy what you’re eating. I don’t cook to challenge, I cook to comfort. If it looks beautiful as a result, how fabulous that is.

At the end of May, I’ll be taking this obsession with fruit and turning my attention to full early summer, halcyon vibes with a true blue icon of ice cream, Kitty Travers of La Grotta Ices. WHITE HOT FOREVER, an evening of dreamy ice cream desserts and wine, will take place on May 24th, 2026 at Fink’s Salt and Sweet. Think seasonal fruit pies a la mode, banana splits, choc ices, ice cream sandwiches and sexy wines. Hope to see you there. xx

White Hot Forever

Things to buy:

• TEKLA bedsheets - this is a totally unnecessary luxury that I now refuse to live without. I have pink sheets called Petal Pink and cream coloured ones in the shade of Winter White.

• Sage green paring knife - I like to live in the delusion that I cook in a Dickensian, cottagecore fantasy. These knives are so chic, I have 4 pink ones, just in case I have company round for dinner. When sharp, they cut small stone fruit wonderfully.

• Rose harissa - But for me, it has to be the Belazu brand. I just think it’s so beautifully balanced, a nice heat and a mellowness from the added rose petals. If added to scrambled eggs, it gives a similar flavour profile to Mexican chorizo.

• Cherry lime Le Croix - I LIVE FOR LA CROIX. Sparkling water is a vice I cannot live without. But La Croix, which Fink’s imports from America, is particularly special. No sugar, no calories, full of impeccable vibes.

Things to read:

• All Consuming by Ruby Tandoh - This book reinvigorated my love and curiosity for food culture. Ruby is a funny, thoughtful and well researched writer. She writes because she knows or is curious to know and I am always ready to hear what she says next. One of my favourite reads of the year.

• The Goal is to Eat by Panayiota Soutis - Pani is whip smart and is the truest example of what it means to have your finger on the pulse. Her substack is a great study on what is happening in the London food scene. Taste, while subjective, is irrefutable. Pani’s got taste. I was also recently a guest on her new talk show, watch here!

• La Grotta Ices by Kitty Travers - A beautiful study on seasonality and flavour pairings by way of ice cream. The photography is simple, imbued with the essence of 1950’s Italian ice cream adverts. The recipes, easy to follow and delicious.

• The White Album by Joan Didion - Joan is one of my favourite writers of all time, writing about American and California culture with such delicacy and truthfulness that is both romantic and sobering. The essay The White Album, on the witnessing of the Manson Murders Trial of 1969 is electrifying. I reread it every year.

• HOT TEARS THROUGH VELVET RAGE by Adriann Ramirez - Shameless self plug. I wrote this collection of poetry in 2020/2021 and it was published in November 2021 and if you like poems about romance, sex, queerness and fruit, this is for you!

Things to listen to:

• Anything by Lana Del Rey - Norman Fucking Rockwell! When the summer draws in, Ultraviolence when the weather hits 30C and Ride when you’re feeling like you need to hit the open road and kiss a biker named Buck.

• Addison by Addison Rae - No misses. No skips. Just pure pop brilliance by a pop star who understands the beauty of high/low.

• Joi3 et Triste - I made this playlist in February when I took a last minute trip to Paris by myself and I listened to it on a loop. It healed me and I hope it will you.

• Violent Bent Backwards Over the Grass - Ok, so this is also by Lana Del Rey, but it’s her poetry book which is read by her and produced by Jack Antonoff. It’s weird and beautiful and utterly inspired. I always listen to it when I get writer’s block. Listen to The Land of 1000 Fires.

Adriann’s Strawberry + brown butter custard doughnuts

For the brioche

500g strong bread flour
50g caster sugar
225g eggs
160g whole milk
8g active dry yeast
7g table salt
250g unsalted butter, cold

For the custard

250g whole milk
62g caster sugar
20g cornflour
60g egg yolk
1 vanilla pod, or 1 tsp vanilla extract
100g butter
Heavy pinch of sea salt

1 jar of your favourite strawberry jam, homemade even better!

Melt the butter for your custard over a medium heat consistently stirring until your butter begins to brown. Take it off the heat and continue stirring to mix the melted butter ensuring not to burn the butter. Leave to cool.

In a standing mixer, whisk together sieved flour and sugar. Add milk and eggs. Move to using the dough hook and mix on a medium speed. Mix for 10 minutes and then add the salt.

In 50g portions, add the cold butter until it is fairly incorporated. When all of the butter is added, mix at a medium speed for 13-15 minutes until the dough is glossy and passes the window pane test. Proof in greased container at room temp for at least 45 min or until doubled in size. Refrigerate overnight before using.

While the dough is chilling, make the custard. Stir the milk, half of the sugar (31g), the vanilla until just steaming. In a separate bowl, mix the egg yolk, half of the other sugar, and the cornflour together until light in colour. When the milk is steaming, slowly pour into your egg mixture whilst stirring so not to curdle your egg mix. Add the fully combined mixture back into your pan and put back on a low heat. Stir until the custard is bubbling. Cook for a further minute, to cook the cornflour out. Take off the heat and add in your brown butter.

Place in a container with clingfilm over it to prevent a skin from forming. Chill for a few hours, or overnight.

When the dough is fully chilled, portion the dough into 100g portions, and roll into balls. Place onto a greased tray and cover with clingfilm and proof for another 1 hour at room temp, or until doubled in size.

Fill a deep pan, cast iron or stainless steel, with a neutral oil and bring to 160C-180C, using a thermometer. Fry your doughnuts for 5 minutes on each side using a timer. Place the finished doughnuts on paper towel to collect the excess oil. After a few minutes, dredge your doughnuts in icing sugar or caster sugar.

While they’re cooling, beat your custard with a spatula to make it easier to fill your doughnuts with. Create a hole in your doughnuts with a small paring knife or scissors. And fill your doughnuts with a half jam and half brown butter custard.

Eat fresh and enjoy divas x

Follow along with Adriann

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Winter tomatoes

I’m acutely aware that this newsletter has featured winter tomatoes numerous times already this season. It could become a winter tomato fanzine at this stage. But, I won’t stop and I’ll tell you why, winter tomatoes are at their peak right now. I know that’s counterintuitive, as it’s technically Spring, but right now the winter tomatoes, Camone, Marinda and Iberico, are tasting the best I can remember in a long time.

I’ve been eating them most days with an egg, some toast and loads of lovage from the garden. You can also buy them from Natoora or here and here. Notable mention also to Alfonso mangoes which are in the middle of their very short season right now. They do come from a long way away, but if you love them, now is your time.

Jikoni and the V&A East

My dear friends Ravinder and Nadeem have just opened up an East outpost of Jikoni in the the newly opened V&A East. Luckily for me, it’s in my neighbourhood and part of town I spend a lot of time in. I’ve been there twice already. The menu is full of Jikoni favourites. The cocktails are incredibly good, and the room is high-ceilinged, bright and spacious. It’s a calm and lovely place to be. The V&A East itself has an incredible exhibition on at the moment The Music is Black: A British Story. It’s rare that an exhibition charts such a big chunk of my living memory (aka my lifetime). The exhibition felt so alive, hats off to Gus Casley-Hayford and the V&A East team.

Life inside a cottage

I’ve been completely captivated by this book by my friends Rachel and Nell. It’s a book that looks inside cottages, mostly in the UK, but also some in Japan and beyond. I wasn’t sure that it was going to be a book that I was going to spend a huge amount of time with as I’m not really into interiors books but I have been diving into it every day. It is such an escape of a book. I found inspiration for my own home but also just felt transported to other places. If you are in the mood for some escapism then this could be your route.

Below for my paid subscribers is my most craved, current favourite restaurant in London, that I kind of want to keep a secret but can’t, the exhibition I've enjoyed the most so far this year and an incredible Circus about to go on tour that you need to know about.

Heading out tomorrow, free for all you wonderful subscribers, is a very exciting newsletter takeover from the brilliant Adriann Ramirez aka Gay Nigella, free for everyone.

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It’s that moment. A distinct and marked point in my year. It’s the start of salad for dinner season, the moment at which it feels ok to have salad as a meal. There are 6 months of the year when salads are an add on, a side. But, as we tip into May, we move into the 6 months of the year when I am happy to eat salad as my dinner. This also coincides with me (mostly) not turning on the oven and leaning on the hob more. The proper end of winter and the start of salads.

And as luck / nature / our ancestors would have it, it’s timed perfectly with a Bank Holiday weekend. May Day. Beltane. Morris Dancing. May poles. May cakes. And SALADS. This first May Bank Holiday always feels like the start of the good times.

So, this week as a celebration of this feeling I have for you my favourite salads to make in Spring. These salads I hope will see you in you through - outdoor lunches, indoor dinners, picnics and just everyday eating. These salads are all more than leaves, they are salads that are (sometimes with the addition of a flatbread or some toast) a full meal. They’re interesting enough from a flavour and a texture point of view to be the main event. And that’s what I want from a spring salad. One recipe and a full dinner - no messing about with multiple recipes.

As well as a list of my favourites, I’m giving you one new-ish recipe this week and it’s this pea, salted lemon and date salad. It’s a salad that I love deeply. It pairs peas with dates and it works so well. There’s a freshness coming from the peas and the herbs and the lemon and that’s grounded by sticky dates that are warmed in the pan until they’re just a little bit more sticky chewy. The perfect level of chewy, I would say.

The below list is all the things I make from now until Summer hits in late June or July. It’s the food I eat while we are waiting for the good tomatoes (though there are some very good winter tomatoes about) and the watermelons. Inside / outside food.

10 Spring salads that will carry you into to July:

• My All Spring / Summer salad

• Yasmin’s broccoli + lentil salad

• Spring onions + little gems with miso dressing

• Salted lemon, ricotta + sticky dates (recipe below)

• Grilled Caesar salad with crispy chickpeas

• The best lunch salad

• Spring panzanella

• Hetty’s ginger-peanut kale salad

• Asparagus, pea + parmesan chopped salad (paywalled)

• All-time favourite chopped salad

Salted lemon, ricotta + sticky dates

I tend to make this with fresh peas as I love to eat them raw and this salad suits that perfectly but it’s also good with frozen peas if thats what you have.

I eat this on its own with some olive oil rubbed toast. I used really crumbly ricotta from a deli which crumbles into the salad a bit like feta might (feta would also work here). Supermarket ricotta is much more soft and spreadable, a bit like soft goats cheese or cream cheese. If you are using supermarket ricotta then you might want to season it and then spoon it onto your plates first as a base and top with the dressed salad on top.

SERVES 4

1 unwaxed lemon, finely sliced
300g freshly podded peas (about 750g in their pods), or frozen petits pois, defrosted
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil, plus more for finishing
1 tablespoon white wine vinegar
Salt and black pepper
250g good-quality ricotta (see note above)
A small bunch of mint and basil - leaves picked
8 dates - roughly chopped
80g pea shoots, or other delicate salad leaves like lambs lettuce or rocket
2 slices of toast

Make the quick salted lemon
Cut the whole lemon in half. Take one half and cut it in half again, picking out any big pips. Rest the flat side of each quarter on the chopping board and slice the lemon, peel and all, as thinly as you can, then put it into a bowl with a good pinch of salt and mix well to make your own, quick preserved lemon. Leave aside whilst you make the rest of the salad.

Season the ricotta
Put 250g ricotta in a small bowl and season with a pinch of salt and pepper, then grate over the zest from the other half of the lemon and drizzle with a little olive oil.

Caramelise the dates
Remove the stones from 8 dates and roughly chop. Heat a frying pan over a medium heat, add a splash of olive oil, then cook the dates for a couple of minutes until they are warm, chewy and are beginning to caramelise. Just before taking them off the heat, pour in 1 tablespoon white wine vinegar into the pan to deglaze. Once the vinegar has slightly reduced, pour everything into a bowl large enough to mix the rest of the salad with.

Pod the peas & dress the salad
Pod 750g peas into the large bowl with the dates in and then put in 80g of pea shoots, half of the picked herbs and pour in the quick preserved lemon. Dress with oil, and a good pinch of salt, then squeeze in the juice from the zested half lemon.

Assemble everything
When you are ready to eat, scatter the salad over each plate and then dot the ricotta around the salad. Finish with a scattering of the rest of the picked herbs and a drizzle of oil. Serve with toast.

Things to click on:

• This is a gardening show

• In the clutter, looking at the stars

• Support smartphone free childhoods

• The alphabet, in twigs

• Is your home making you happy?

• Rethinking breakfast

• How to colour code your google cal with your own colour palate. Yes.

• Where chefs eat

• Life inside a cottage

• Once you’ve watched this, sign this

• Foraged wild garlic fritters

• Government funded restaurants?

• The beginning comes after the end

My cookbooks (there are five) are available here. The latest is Easy Wins, a Sunday Times bestseller. There are also hundreds of free recipes on my website which you can find here.

Can I please ask that if you like this week’s newsletter that you add a like or comment below and perhaps share it with someone who might also like it. It’s free for everyone this week and a lot of time, love and excellent shirt sleeves have gone into it. Thank you.

All five of my cookbooks are available here. The latest is Easy Wins, a Sunday Times No. 1 bestseller. My website, on which you can find hundreds of free recipes is here.

Asparagus season is supposed to be something that has me in raptures, jumping out of bed with thoughts of different things to do with it. And for years, its arrival has had that effect. But this year feels a bit different. It doesn’t feel ok to be romanticising £7 bunches of asparagus in the way I have in the past.

I have a constant conversation with myself on how to tread the line between the joy and connection food brings and being honest about the fact that the world feels a lot, and food is really expensive.

But, rather than go the other way, these thoughts make me double down on the importance of food, of shared meals, of community, of local food, of supporting farmers, of small moments of joy and of doing things to make us feel good.

So in the quagmire of these thoughts, today, as planned, we are celebrating sharing a meal together. And we are celebrating asparagus.

This week’s recipe, asparagus lemon and sesame sauté, is an approximation of something I ate at a cafe in Los Angeles about 20 years ago that I still come back to in my head every few months. It was so fresh and full of lemon brightness and green-ness. They served it with spaghetti, but I prefer egg noodles. It’s the work of minutes as all asparagus recipes really should be.

Back to asparagus. I love how it looks, like a lovely green medieval spear. I love the perpetuity of it, the fact that it comes around every year without fail (got to feel for this farmer though). But most of all, I love that asparagus means the end of something; it means the end of winter. It means the sun is out and we can sit on the grass once again. We all celebrate the beginning of spring, but I prefer to think of it as the end of winter.

I have checked of my local shops and greengrocer and the online supermarkets, and you can get a decent bunch of asparagus for £4 to £5, and the price may still drop a bit as the season goes on. But when I buy it, I remind myself that an asparagus crown (plant) takes three years before you get a proper harvest, thats three years of watering, tending and caring. So we must not waste even a bit of it.

Today’s recipe for a quick asparagus sauté, which stretches your asparagus further, some asparagus myths and legends and all the asparagus recipes I love the most are for my treasured paid subscribers this week. If you would like to become a paid subscriber, you can do that below. If not thank you for being here, there are hundreds of recipes on my website - all for free.

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My cookbooks (there are five) are available here. The latest is Easy Wins - a Sunday Times bestseller. There are hundreds of free recipes on my website which you can find here.

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From Anna:

I am so pleased to put you in the hands of Helen Graham this week. Helen is a chef and cook I admire and whose food I love to eat.

Helen made her name at the helm of Bubala (though she no longer works there), one of the very few new all-vegetarian restaurants that have opened in recent years. When I first read the menu of Helen’s food it felt special. Yes, I could eat everything on the menu (which is a rare thing) but I was really just excited to eat every plate. The flavours felt new and fresh but at the same time all of my favourite things. In his introduction to Helen’s new book, Centrepiece, Jay Rayner talks about the importance of the ‘good taste’ of a chef, that without good taste, skill and technique are nothing. Helen has good taste to spare. She seems drawn to many of the flavours that I also love the most, her food speaks to me and I am so happy to have her here this week.

Below (free for everyone) Helen shares her recommendations on everything from favourite knives to FKA Twiggs as well as a mushroom chilli crisp recipe that she spoons onto toast with lime spiked ricotta. I told you she had good taste.

Centrepiece

From Helen:

So, I’m Helen Graham, and I’ve just arrived at my debut cookbook Centrepiece, after journeying through some of London’s most exciting restaurant kitchens – most recently as the executive chef of Bubala. Before this, I worked at The Palomar and The Barbary, as well as a stint at the Ottolenghi Test Kitchen, where I learnt to hone big flavours inspired by the Middle East and beyond.

I’m Jewish, and take influence from across the diaspora, from Yemeni buttery breads to Iraq and its vibrant amba sauce, through to Tunisia and its tangy preserved lemons and spicy harissa. My approach is: if you treat the vegetable like the star, cook it in the right way to coax out the maximum amount of flavour and pair it with vibrant and playful flavours, you’ll land on something really special.

This approach gained Bubala much critical acclaim, and I’m so proud of the cult dishes I created there, including the halloumi with blackseed honey and baba ganoush with curry leaf oil. We agreed from the very start that the restaurant would not be marketed as ‘vegetarian’ – a term that I feel sometimes undermines the integrity of the cooking – it was more about the attitude towards veg, and really celebrating them rather than highlighting what the menu was lacking. This worked, and we attracted many a meat eater. Sometimes people didn’t even notice there was no meat or fish until after the meal – and that, to us, was a massive win.

I’m not vegetarian – I just don’t eat meat or fish at home (besides the odd anchovy or can of tuna). I wanted to create a book that would help people create absolutely knock-out dinner parties using only vegetables, as I do at home – and Centrepiece is the result. I hope you love it!

Order Centrepiece

Follow along with Helen

Things to buy:

• A decent chef's knife is essential, and please, please, please don't buy anything but one made of Japanese steel. It's worth the money – it will hold its blade for a long time providing you take good care of it. I love Katto Knives for both their quality and affordability.

• Centrepiece-deserving food needs centrepiece-deserving plates. I like Falcon and, if I’m really treating myself, John Julian.

• I discovered Honest Toil when I was trying to source oil for Bubala and have since been 100% devoted. It’s sustainable, unfiltered and comes from small farms in Greece. It’s fruity rather than peppery, and I use it for both cooking and garnishing as it always elevates my cooking. Also, the packaging is amazing (it’s by a very cool tattoo artist called Dóra Berczi, if you’re in the market for a tattoo too!)

• Pratt Schneiders – my mate Jake started this online deli, inspired by all the gems he was picking up in European grocery stores on holiday. Everything I’ve tried from there has been supremely delicious but the tuna belly and salted almonds made me emotional.

Things to read:

• Kitchen Confidential is a must-read. No one does it like Anthony Bourdian, and reading this helped me make so much sense of why I was so addicted to working in restaurants and what it meant to me.

• A Modern Way to Eat by Anna Jones (not just saying this because I’m here on Anna’s newsletter!) – this is the first book I remember picking up and realising how inspiring cooking with vegetables could be. I owe so much of my career to this book.

• Nothing Fancy by Alison Roman – a big inspiration for my own book, which I wanted to be the vegetarian equivalent. Also, her YouTube videos are a) so funny and b) have taught me so much, not just about cooking but also about cookery writing. The way she explains things is so useful and literal.

• The Book of Jewish Food by Claudia Roden – I was gifted this book about 3 times for my Bat Mitzvah and understandably so! It’s a totally unrivalled classic which perfectly captures the breadth and depth of Jewish food.

• Centrepiece by Helen Graham – shameless! But hopefully, your new go-to for celebrating vegetables with friends and family over the dinner table

Things to listen to:

• I love the podcast Table Manners, and also Dish with Nick Grimshaw and Angela Hartnett – their friendship gives me such joy.

• Quite obsessed with everything FKA Twiggs both sings and wears.

• Nick Cave, Mk.gee, Cameron Winter – all on repeat.

Helen’s Wild mushroom + wakame chilli crisp with lime ricotta

From Helen: ‘The love child of chilli crisp and sautéed mushrooms! I like to use more robust mushrooms here, so I’ve opted for a wild mushroom mix. You can use whatever you can lay your hands on, but I’d make sure you have shiitake or oyster mushrooms in there, as they are excellent at soaking up flavour.’

Serves 6–8 as a small plate

250g wild mushrooms (see recipe introduction), broken up into bite-sized pieces

For the lime ricotta
250g ricotta, or vegan alternative
zest of 2 limes, finely grated
1∕8 teaspoon fine sea salt

For the wakame chilli crisp
100ml vegetable oil
100g shallots, halved lengthways, then sliced into thin strips lengthways
1/2 teaspoon fine sea salt
1 red chilli, stalk removed, finely sliced
1 teaspoon grated root ginger
3 garlic cloves, finely sliced
leaves from 3 rosemary sprigs
1 teaspoon hot smoked paprika
1 tablespoon black sesame seeds
1 teaspoon chilli flakes
1 tablespoon wakame, soaked and drained
2 tablespoons soy sauce
2 tablespoons agave syrup

To make the lime ricotta, stir everything together in a small bowl and set aside.

For the chilli crisp, heat the oil in a small saucepan over a low heat, add the shallots and salt and sauté for 10 minutes, until looking soft and very slightly starting to colour. Add the chilli, ginger, garlic and rosemary and cook for a further 3–4 minutes, until the garlic is starting to colour on the edges.

Place the smoked paprika, black sesame, chilli flakes and wakame into a heatproof bowl and place a sieve over the top. Pour the shallot mix over. Stir thoroughly, before seasoning with the soy and agave syrup. Transfer the shallot mix to a kitchen paper-lined plate to cool and crisp up for 15 minutes, then stir it back into the spiced oil.

Place a nonstick frying pan over a medium-high heat and add your mushrooms; it may seem weird to cook them without any oil, but you’re about to rehydrate them with the chilli crisp, so have faith. Cook for 7–10 minutes, stirring regularly, until the mushrooms are softened and cooked through, with a little colour. Pour in the chilli crisp and fry for 1–2 minutes, stirring constantly now, to let the mushrooms hydrate in the oil and all the flavours to come together. Transfer to a bowl to cool slightly.

I like to serve the lime ricotta and mushrooms in separate bowls, with a pile of toasted sourdough or little crostini of toasted baguette. Spread the lime ricotta on the toasts and spoon the chilli crisp mushrooms on top.

Watch Helen make them

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All my (5) cookbooks are available here. The latest is Easy Wins, a Sunday Times bestseller. There are also hundreds of free recipes on my website which you can find here.

I work at home almost every day and most days I make a quick 5-10 minute lunch for me and John. These lunches include but are not limited to an omelette with tomatoes, a loose interpretation of egg mayo on a bagel/slice of sourdough, these fritters or, in the depths of winter, soup and a toasted sandwich.

Until now a toastie* (if we must) for me has been the preserve of winter. What a fool. A toastie is as flexible and adaptable as a pizza or a bowl of pasta. A toastie is essentially a vehicle for melted cheese and a filling. Traditionally, toasted sandwiches have been just a lot of cheese and not much else, but there is no reason why a toasted sandwich should not be filled with as much veg as cheese.

This toastie is spring. It’s got cheese (mozzarella and a decent grating of parmesan) but it also has veg - peas. Peas may not feel like the most obvious addition to a toastie but along with some lemon and herbs they make a perfect layer of green between the crispy bread and melty cheese.

After all a toastie is a bit like a pizza in reverse. The bread crisps while the cheese stays melted and soft. This toastie feels like a crispier spring version of a pizza bianca without having to mess about with any dough, and everything I need to make it is almost always in the fridge and freezer.

It is the start of fresh pea season, the first peas in their pods have come from Italy into my kitchen already, but I mostly make this with frozen peas. This feels like the perfect bridge lunch, a lunch that bridges just from the end of winter (carbs, melted cheese and crisp edges) to spring (green, freshness, herbs and fun).

* I’ve have a passionate dislike for abbreviations that end in an ‘ie’. There is something cutesy about them that does not chime with me. Foodie is top of the list, but toastie comes close. But toasted sandwich feels a bit formal, so against my better judgement, I have included the word toastie in this newsletter, please don’t hate me.

Todays recipe and flavour map of my favourite toastie ideas is for my much-loved and appreciated paid subscribers. If you would like to become a paid subscriber, you can do that below. If not, then still thank you so much for being here - there are hundreds of recipes on my website - all for free.

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My website

Crispy pea + mozzarella toasted sandwich / toastie

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My sister Laura who really, really loves chocolate and also really loves cake said this was the perfect chocolate cake. Laura is hard to please when it comes to food and cake, so this really is the very very highest praise. I agree with her.

The recipe is sadly not mine but from my friend Edd, who knows a lot about chocolate. It is essentially a flourless chocolate cake that is cooked in two parts. Half the batter is cooked first to form a more fudgy but still light and airy base, then the other half of the batter is poured on top and cooked for a little less time, this second layer turns into a light as a feather almost-mousse-like top. Two textures from one batter, a genius move. I’ve made cakes which follow this the double-bake method before but I must say Edd’s is the very best I’ve ever had. He really knows his stuff.

I met Edd 14 (!!) years ago when I was working as a food stylist on his second book. Edd, if you don’t already know, was the first ever winner of the Great British Bake Off. What a claim. Since then, Edd has shared his encyclopaedic knowledge of baking with the world through his books and newsletter. I am a particular fan of his One Tin Baking books.

Edd has just written a book on baking with chocolate, and this was the recipe that immediately drew me in. I will be making it on Easter Sunday. We don’t buy Easter eggs for the adults in our family any more, so this will be our chocolate fix.

Small caveat - I could not find my 20cm cake tin so I made it in a bigger 23cm tin, which worked well and actually cooked in the same amount of time, just like Edd suggests in his notes.

Find Edd’s recipe below along with some chocolate-y things to click on. It’s free for everyone this week. Thanks for sharing with us Edd.

Edd's Substack

Get Chocolate Baking

Dinner party cake aka Double baked flourless chocolate cake

SERVES 8–10

From Edd ‘This is my go-to dinner party dessert. It’s simple, can be made ahead, and is an absolute showstopper, guaranteed to go down a storm. The cake batter is a pretty classic flourless one; the difference lies in the method used to bake it. Half is baked as usual, then the remaining batter is added on top. The cake then gets a brief second bake, just until the crust is set. The top layer remains as light and airy as a chocolate mousse whilst the bottom layer is closer to a fudge brownie. Because this is a flourless cake it also happens to be gluten free. Take the dessert to the next level and serve in a puddle of nutmeg-infused crème anglaise.’

For the flourless chocolate cake
250 g (9 oz) dark chocolate (70–80% cocoa solids)
250 g (9 oz) unsalted butter, diced
6 large eggs, separated
120 g (½ cup + 1 tablespoon, packed) light brown sugar
120 g (½ cup + 2 tablespoons) caster (superfine) sugar
¼ teaspoon cream of tartar
¼ teaspoon fine sea salt

Nutmeg crème anglaise
300 ml (1¼ cups) whipping (heavy) cream
300 ml (1¼ cups) whole milk
1 whole nutmeg
6 large egg yolks
1 teaspoon vanilla bean paste
100 g (½ cup) caster (superfine) sugar

To Serve
cocoa powder

Note: You can also use a 23 cm (9 in) springform tin (pan) if that is what you have, but you’ll end up with less-defined layers.

As the recipe does use a lot of eggs, you could skip making the custard, simply infuse the same amount of nutmeg into 600 ml (20 fl oz/2½ cups) whipping (heavy) cream and refrigerate until needed, using as a sauce or whipping to soft peaks.

Prepare your tin
Preheat the oven to 180°C/160°C Fan (350˚F). Lightly grease a 20 cm (8 in) round springform cake tin (pan) and line the base and sides with baking parchment.

Melt the chocolate + whisk the egg yolks
Melt the chocolate and butter in a bain-marie (see page 24). Remove from the heat and set aside to cool slightly. Put the egg yolks and brown sugar in a large bowl set over a pan of simmering water and, using an electric hand mixer, whisk for 2–3 minutes or until the mixture is pale and thick. Remove the bowl from the heat, pour in the chocolate mixture and fold together to combine.

Make the meringue + fold into the chocolate mixture
Working quickly, wash the beaters of the mixer. Put the egg whites, caster sugar, cream of tartar and salt in another large bowl and whisk until the meringue holds soft peaks. Fold a third of the meringue into the chocolate batter, then the remainder in two additions, folding gently until the mixture is streak free.

Add to tin + bake
Pour half the batter into the prepared tin, spreading gently into an even layer. Bake for 25–30 minutes or until risen and domed on top. Remove and allow to cool for 10 minutes. During this time the centre of the cake should cave in on itself a little. If it stays level, use a spoon to lightly compress the cake, creating a slight well. Scrape the remaining batter over the cake and gently spread into an even layer. Bake for 15 minutes. The top layer will remain very soft but it will have formed a thin crust.

Leave to cool
Leave to cool to room temperature before transferring to the refrigerator and leaving for at least 6 hours, but preferably overnight.

Make the crème anglaise
To make the crème anglaise, pour the cream and milk into a saucepan. Grate about a third of a single nutmeg into the pan, stir to combine, then bring the mixture to a simmer over a medium heat. Meanwhile, put the egg yolks, vanilla and sugar in a mixing bowl and whisk until pale. Pour over the cream mixture, whisking as you do so, to prevent the eggs from scrambling. Pour the custard back into the saucepan, place over a low heat and cook, stirring constantly, until the custard thickens enough

Edd’s guide to bain-marie

With a bain-marie you place a heatproof bowl over a pan of barely simmering water, add the chocolate and heat it until melted. The benefit of this method is that the heat is gentle and the risk of scorching or burning the chocolate is minimal. The potential issue is that water can accidentally get into the chocolate, causing it to seize.

Edd’s tips

Finely chop the chocolate to ensure even melting. Stir often to ensure even melting. Keep both the water level and the heat low. The water should never be allowed to touch the bowl and the heat should similarly be kept low, so the chocolate doesn’t become too hot. Wipe the bottom of the bowl with a towel once the chocolate is melted, to remove the risk of water contaminating the melted chocolate sauce or glaze.

Chocolate-y things to click on:

• Edd’s go-to chocolate for baking. ‘Buy it by the kilo and it’ll likely be much better in quality and most of the time it’s also cheaper’.

• The easter egg Edd is hoping for this weekend, or these

• My go-to chocolate shop

• Edd’s one tin bakes

• My favourite chocolate bar at the moment

• Chocolate + lemon?

• ‘We’re very lucky in the UK to have a great number of excellent bean to bar chocolate makers’ Some of Edd’s favourites include Table Chocolate, Bare Bones Chocolate and Land.

• Easy, homemade chocolate drops and some words on my favourite sweet treats

• For serious chocolate bakers

• A magic bowl of chocolate mousse

• Edd’s favourite ever chocolate bar

My cookbooks (there are five) are available here. The latest is Easy Wins, a Sunday Times bestseller. There are also hundreds of free recipes on my website which you can find here.

Can I please ask that if you like this week’s newsletter and words, that you add a like or comment below and perhaps share it with someone who might also like it. Thank you.

Joe Woodhouse’s Weeknight Vegetarian

I’ve been cooking a lot from this book. It's written by my friend Joe Woodhouse who is one of best cooks I know. His food sits at the centre-point between achievable, comforting and really delicious. This books is full of things I just know I am going to make. They are unfussy and homely but because they are Joe’s recipes I know they are going to be really good to eat. Already cooked is the mushroom lasagne as well as these genius fritters above. All Joe’s recipes are vegetarian and make great lunches and dinners. I cook from a handful of favourite books, I know I will still be cooking from this one in 10 years. Hats off Joe. Here is Joe talking us through it.

Easter tree 1990

Is this twee? I think it is. But I don’t care. When I was little, I used to get a few blossomy branches from the garden and hang pastel-coloured eggs on them and call it an Easter tree. It made me really happy in the way my Christmas tree does. So I’m going to make an Easter tree again this year with blossoms and some eggs. If I have the time to paint some I will, if not I’ll just position some little foil-wrapped chocolate ones around it. Incidentally, while writing this, I found this story of an old Hollywood legend who kept his Christmas tree up all year round. Into it. Feel like this is the energy we all need right now.

Below, for my much loved paid subscribers, are the other things that I’m excited about this month: all things magnolia, a life changing pair of trousers and a TV show I can face watching right now. Heading out tomorrow, to all my wonderful subscribers, is a chocolate baking recipe from brilliant Edd Kimber as well our favourite chocolate recommendations, free for everyone.

Read more

All my (5) cookbooks are available here. The latest is Easy Wins, a Sunday Times bestseller. There are also hundreds of free recipes on my website which you can find here.

The only recipe of mine that my Mum cooks is my one pan pasta recipe, the one with lemon, kale and tomatoes which is, by far, my most popular recipe. It might even be the reason you are here?

I did not in any way come up with the idea of cooking pasta and its sauce in one pan. There are so many recipes for one pan pasta. Its origins, like most pasta, are in Italy, where it is frowned upon by some but to me, pasta and sauce made in one pan is really useful. My kale and lemon one pan pasta will always remain my perfect one pan pasta for when tomatoes are good and cheap and sweet.

I take the principle of this pasta into each season, it’s so useful (one pan, very little washing up, pasta and sauce ready in under 15 mins). This is the one I make in spring, it’s green, it’s fresh, it’s lemony.

The idea of a one pan pasta is that you cook the pasta in just enough water to simmer down to a sauce which perfectly coats the pasta. By the time the pasta is perfectly al dente, you have a creamy (no cream needed) sauce. The creaminess comes from the starch in the pasta water. As you will I am sure, know, the starch which comes out of pasta into the water is imperative in cooking pasta in the traditional way and here in the one pan method it becomes even more critical. As you are not cooking the sauce separately, this starch is what will thicken the cooking liquid as the pasta cooks and create the perfect instant sauce.

One thing that I’d say about this recipe is that you must use standard linguine or spaghetti. I tried it with an upmarket linguine, and it was too starchy, and it did not work as well as it usually does. A decent, but standard brand is what’s needed, Rummo, De Cecco or the like.

Todays recipe for my updated spring one pot pasta is for my treasured paid subscribers who support my work and allow me to write, test and shoot brand new recipes. If you would like to become a paid subscriber you can do that below. If not thank you for being here, there are hundreds of recipes on my website - all for free.

Subscribe now

One pot asparagus, pea + lemon pasta

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To me, there is nothing more annoying in a recipe than one that requires effort I am not expecting. Be it hours of chopping, having to turn to page 27 to make another recipe before you can start the one you want to cook, or an ingredient that is hard or annoying to come by. All of my recipes are, I hope, written with these things in mind, especially this one, which is made in one pan with no need to chop a single thing and with alternatives to suit any eater or shopper.

Wild garlic is around now. You can absolutely pick it in woods and hedgerows. Or you can also buy it at the greengrocers. And if wild garlic is not something you have seen at a local shop or have the inclination to go and pick, you can absolutely use some extra greens and normal garlic for this recipe.

Foraging might be your thing but I would wager that, for most of you, it’s not. While I will always fly the flag for having a relationship to how the food we eat grows, I absolutely realise that getting out to forage wild garlic is not an option or a preference for a lot of people.

If you do want to pick your own then a carpet of wild garlic on the floor of a woodland is a very lovely thing, especially when it’s in flower, and the starry white flowers dangle over the carpet of green. There is wild garlic in the very inner city park at the end of my road. It is everywhere now so if you do fancy looking for it its one of the easiest things to recognise and pick. If not I have an included a way to cook this without which is just as good.

This is a springy green one-pan egg lunch (or weekend breakfast). The greens and the eggs are something I crave and the sesame and crispy sage topping take it up a level from quick lunch to something layered and interesting.

Find the recipe below along with some good things to click on, from a tulip in a bottle show and two important raffles to soothing still lifes. It’s free for everyone this week.

Wild garlic + yoghurt baked eggs

In early spring wild garlic lines our hedgerows, paths and parks.

You can smell it a mile off, so it’s pretty easy to be sure you have the right stuff. It’s a great place to start gathering your own food – there is a satisfaction from picking something from the wild which would have otherwise gone unloved. While the leaves will smell very garlicky in the hedgerows as you pick them, they will mellow as they cook so don’t worry. Make sure to give it a good wash.

SERVES 2

Olive oil
12 sage leaves
30g sesame seeds
50g wild garlic
150g rocket
olive oil
1 unwaxed lemon
4 organic eggs
100g Greek yoghurt
12 sage leaves
30g sesame seeds
Pul biber or a pinch of dried chilli flakes
flatbreads or sourdough, to serve

Crisp up the sage + seeds
Heat about 3 tablespoons of oil in a medium ovenproof frying pan until it’s good and hot but not smoking, line a plate with kitchen paper, then add the sage leaves to the pan. Cook for a few seconds until they are crisp, then scoop out with a slotted spoon and drain on the paper. Using the same pan, add the sesame seeds to the sage oil for 30–45 seconds, until they turn a deep golden colour. Scoop them out on to a separate sheet of kitchen paper. Wipe out the pan.

Cook the garlic + rocket
Preheat the oven to 170ºC/150ºC fan/gas 3. Wash the wild garlic and the rocket and place them into the frying pan with a drizzle of oil. Add some salt and cook over a medium heat for about 5 minutes, or until the rocket has wilted and most of the liquid has evaporated. Strain the liquid from the leaves in a sieve set over the sink, pushing down to remove as much of the water as possible, then put them back into the pan. Grate over half of the lemon zest.

Crack in the eggs + cook
Make four deep indentations in the wild garlic mix, and crack an egg into each little hole. Place in the oven for 7–10 minutes, or until the egg whites set.

Prepare the yoghurt
Meanwhile, mix the yoghurt with the other half of the lemon zest and some salt and pepper.

Serve
Once the eggs are done, take them out of the oven and spoon over half the yoghurt mixture (leaving the rest for the table). Top with the fried sage, the toasted sesame seeds and a sprinkling of chilli flakes. Serve with flatbreads or good sourdough.

Things to click on:

• An incredible collection prizes for a good cause

• The kind of food I want to cook every day

• Dirty business and Rave on the Avon

• Soothing still lifes

• My fav local, Finks, recommends

• Tulip in a bottle

• A serpentine plate for the Spring equinox this weekend and more Spring ceramics

• You and I are Earth and Water, in Bath and Landslides, in London

• The dice was loaded from the start

• How to zest a lime

• House Rules

• One of a kind textile retreat

• Soft and Swirly are back

• For bean enthusiasts from the OG

• A pair of horse cups

My cookbooks (there are five) are available here. The latest is Easy Wins, a Sunday Times bestseller. There are also hundreds of free recipes on my website which you can find here.

Can I please ask that if you like this week’s newsletter, wild garlic baked eggs and words, that you add a like or comment below and perhaps share it with someone who might also like it. It’s free for everyone this week but a lot of time and love has gone into it. Thank you.

All my (5) cookbooks are available here. The latest is Easy Wins, a Sunday Times bestseller. There are also hundreds of free recipes on my website which you can find here.

Sometimes I forget about something really good. A book, a film, a chocolate bar, a restaurant or a recipe and remembering that it exists and that I love it, is almost as good as finding out about it in the first place.

A short list of such things includes but is not limited to;

• Turkish delight

• Roast sweet potatoes

• Blue Peter (for my kids)

• Jilly Golden’s wine reviews

• Ritter Sport Mint

• Nigella Express (my comfort watch)

• This book

• Baggy jeans

• Cottage cheese

• Chia bowls

I find it reassuring when something I have known and loved comes around again, or I remember that I liked it. There is that thrill of newness, and at the same time the comfort of knowing something well.

Fritters have been my latest new-but-old rediscovery. Fritters are such a useful thing to know how to make. You can use them in a lot of ways - as I do here in the classic way with yoghurt dip and some leaves. They are great in wraps as you might use falafel. They are very good in packed lunches. They are, along with an omelette, one of my favourite quick working at home lunches, and the batter will last in the fridge for a few days so you can make a batch and cook them hot and fresh for each lunch.

They are also an elite way of using up leftovers and the ends of things. A courgette that’s seen better days, the last ¼ wedge of squash, the end of a few bunches of herbs, a little clank of feta, the bottom 3rd of a tin of beans, it goes on and on and on.

So this week, I give you my favourite fritter recipe. As Spring is not yet with us I have used squash here but courgette, peas, carrot would all work well. I use halloumi as I love the texture it gives the fritters but most other cheeses would work just as well. And the real trick is the flour I use which gives the fritters a really good crispness.

As well as the recipe as proof of the supreme flex of a fritter I’m also sharing my fritter choose-your-own-adventure recipe map, which is a failsafe format for making fritters out of almost anything. Make them for yourself, make them for your Mum, make them for dinner or breakfast.

Todays recipe and my formula to make a fritter from anything is for my treasured paid subscribers who support my work and allow me to write new, test and shoot brand new recipes. If you would like to becoome a paid subscriber you can do that below. If not thank you for being here, there are hundreds of recipes on my website - all for free.

Subscribe now

Halloumi + squash fritters with a chilli yoghurt dip

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My cookbooks (there are five) are available here. The latest is Easy Wins - a Sunday Times bestseller. There are hundreds of free recipes on my website which you can find here.

Subscribe now

From Anna:

This week it gives me great pleasure to hand my newsletter over to Mallika Basu. She is a food writer, cookbook author, spice brand co-founder and most recently the author of ‘In Good Taste’, a book that looks at all the issues surrounding food, climate, and how we eat today.

It’s a really important book. Anyone who is a regular reader here or who reads my books will know that the relationship between food, climate, soil and biodiversity is close to my heart and is a daily consideration when writing my recipes and feeding my family. Climate books written by cooks feel genuinely useful to me. The really practical changes we can make, I think, come in the kitchen so it always excites me when I see someone who really knows cooking tackling the subject.

Mallika’s book is a triumph. It’s written in chapters on everything from the decolonisation of food to positive, practical changes we can make in our own kitchens. Each chapter ends with a neat and useful little summary, to its easy to dip into. Anyway, enough about the book, Mallika’s food is also really delicious. She’s written two brilliant cookbooks, and she’s sharing a couple of recipes with us too. Her recommendations are genuinely useful, from a nine-in-one cooker to the best spices. Mallika, thank you for this book, for your work and for sharing it all with us.

Anna x

In Good Taste

From Mallika:

It’s a horrible word, I know, but what does it mean to be a true foodie today?

My life revolves around food and drink – cooking, eating out, talking about and advising on it. It’s hard to believe I spent my childhood in India as a desperately underweight, picky eater, much to my parents’ horror. As I built a new life in the UK, food became more than just sustenance, it became pleasure and joy, memory, identity and belonging.

I went on to write two Indian cookbooks and co-founded a spice company (now divested). Punchy flavour has always been my starting point. But over time, my curiosity widened beyond the plate.

I started asking broader questions about what shapes our plates and palates. Who decides what we eat? Which food cultures are treated with more respect than others? How does unripe produce land in my local supermarket and at what cost? If there are more than 1,000 varieties of banana, why do we get only one? If a jar of turmeric costs £1, what did the farmer earn? Why are products that are better for us often more expensive than those that make us sick?

Somehow, I held on to my sense of humour while unpacking the largest onion I’d come across.

My latest book, In Good Taste: What Shapes What We Eat and Drink – And Why It Matters, explores these questions. It has no recipes and isn’t preachy. With expert voices and practical takeaways, it helps readers navigate shopping choices, labels, menus and headlines with confidence, and understand their wider impact.

The aim is to empower food lovers like me become more powerful tastemakers and changemakers. Because we’re not short of food content, but we’re often missing food context. If we all did a bit, it would already be a lot.

Order In Good Taste

Follow Mallika

Mallika's cookbook Masala

Things to read:

• I think they call this an “own goal” in football, but of course I have to say In Good Taste here. I’ve had some lovely feedback saying it’s accessible and digestible (not always palatable), so it would be great to spread the word.

• If you care about food and climate, I recommend Thin Ink on Substack. She’s one of the 50 expert contributors in my book and always has her finger on the pulse.

• The best books I have read about food and the British Empire are Empireland by Sathnam Sanghera and The Hungry Empire by Lizzie Collingham. If you want something shorter and sharper, the Food Matters Sankofa report is a must

• Pam Brunton’s Between Two Waters was a sparkling recent read. She’s an incredible speaker with the most infectious cackling laugh.

• I use cookbooks A LOT. The best ones I’ve used recently are Alissa Timoshkina’s Kapusta and Noor Murad’s Lugma.

• I’m excited about two upcoming books – Melissa Thomspon’s cookbook Fired Up and Aaron Vallance’s memoir Friday Night Chicken. Worth keeping an eye out for them.

Things to buy:

• Better spices please (I am increasingly predictable). This is the quickest way we can make a difference from our kitchens! Organic, fairly priced spices mean fewer chemicals in us, and a better outcome for farmers around the world. Clear out your spice cupboard and the next time one needs replacing – upgrade. I like Steenbergs and Food of Gods.

• Tableware by Maham Anjum. Everything she makes is so exquisite and she just won a Designer of the Year award. My current selection is from my local North Street Potters, but I will be slowly buying her entire collection as soon as possible

• Quality rice. To get the fluffiest, defined and delicate grains you need to start with the best quality Basmati. I like Daawat (the blue one for everyday use and the green long grain for pulao and biryani). I also buy Tilda and Nice Rice in smaller quantities.

• A nine-in-one cooker. I don’t have a lot of worktop space for gadgets, but this has been life changing. I’ve taught my teens how to use it too, so they can be self-sufficient if I’m out and about. We undertake long weekend projects with it like dehydrating and broth making, which disconnects my son from his digital devices

• Flourish Foodhall is a people and planet-focused place to eat and shop with two sites based in Saltford, Bristol and Norton St Philip, Bath. Founder Paul Hargreaves is a UK B Corp Ambassador who does a lot to champion purpose in food and people who want to do better

• If you don’t already do this, please sign up to a local veg box. It takes the thinking out of eating more seasonally and supports locals who want to do more for better food. Mine comes from Sutton Community Farm and you might want to check out Sitopia in Greenwich too, which is run by four women.

Things to watch/listen to:

• I make time to listen to Dr Rupy Aujla’s The Doctor’s Kitchen, which deep dives into food as medicine. He’s an old friend. I went on as a guest with an overview of my book, and we managed to have a few laughs. I also like Paul Newnham’s Future Fork podcast.

• I really enjoyed the Fuel to Fork podcast by Table and IPES-Food. Although it’s about fossil fuels in our food, it covers a lot of ground.

• Six Inches of Soil is a great British documentary on farmers working more closely with nature. It’s insightful and engaging.

• I only watched this recently, but Ramen Shop was a life affirmingly slow and gentle film I enjoyed tremendously. My son said it was the most boring movie in the world but he’s 15, so we’ll let that pass

• My podcast, also called In Good Taste and available on YouTube, Spotify and Apple (sorry, sorry). It covers some of the topics in my book, food matters for food lovers, in short and sharp 30-minute episodes.

Smoky chipotle carlin pea dip

Carlin peas are a heritage pulse grown in Britain. Creamy and nutty, they are great bedfellows with sock-you-in-the-eye flavour. This was one of the three dips I made for my book launch event, and I was worried I would set tongues on fire. Instead, it was by far the most popular. Smoked salt and smoked garlic work brilliantly alongside the chipotle chilli here, which you may want to add bit by bit to reach a level of heat you can tolerate.

570g queen carlin peas (I used Bold Bean Co)
50g chipotle chilli paste
2 fat cloves smoked garlic, peeled
Smoked salt to taste
Couple of glugs of Extra Virgin Olive Oil

Blitz the peas
Place the peas with their stock in a high-speed blender along with the chilli paste and garlic.

Add oil + serve
Add salt and olive oil bit by bit to blend the lot into a creamy dip. Serve with quality olive oil drizzled on top. It will last for a week in an airtight container in the fridge.

Other recipes to try

This root vegetable rogan josh is a winter favourite at ours, especially when all creativity has collapsed towards the end of relentlessly long, cold and grey days. You can mix and match the vegetables.

I know Anna and her fans love a dal, so if you have smoked garlic lying around this no waste broccoli, smoked garlic + lime dal might come handy. It’s always particularly satisfying to get a whole broccoli down my teens’ throats too.

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Ingredients as gifts

Every year on my Mum’s birthday in late Feb I give her a box of winter tomatoes, the marinda ones. If you are wondering what winter tomatoes are they are tomatoes, grown outside in southern Europe (mostly Spain and Italy) that are ready in the first few months of the year when the summer varieties of tomatoes are still a long way away. They are grown outside and not in tunnels through the winter months, so they have a completely different character to summer tomatoes. More savoury, firmer and saltier. I love them so much and so does my Mum. In fact, I think giving a single ingredient as a gift is about the best and chicest present you can give anyone. A box of tomatoes, a bunch of pink rhubarb tied with a ribbon, a couple of bunches of chard, a bag of oranges or leafy lemons.

Chocolate + being an Easter person

I’m an Easter person. It’s the time of year I love the most. Also, it’s almost always my birthday v close to Easter. The shops filled with eggs and £1 daffodils give me a thrill. I realise that almost everyone in the UK feels the same. It’s been a long winter. I have a special interest in Easter eggs. I just love it all and enjoy picking out the perfect egg for each of my family. My favourite places for chocolate and Easter eggs are Pump Street Chocolate and Cocoa Runners. These are the ones which have caught my eye this year. Some are bars, some are eggs, some are chocolate plaques with hares on, all make me very happy.

• Pump Street’s hot cross bun chocolate bar

• Chocolate caramel eggs

• A favourite chocolate bar in egg form

• Tiny chocolate bunnies

• A hopping hare

• Pistachio chocolate eggs

• Pump Street’s sourdough + sea salt Easter eggs and their Chocolate cookie egg

• Make your own easter eggs

Before I go any further with todays newsletter I want to acknowledge that the things going on in the world right now are wild. It almost feels too big to begin to know how to talk about them here. Today’s newsletter is intentionally fun and frivolous escapism. Below, for my paid subscribers, are the other things that I’m excited about this month: ice cream all year round, a tiny little lamp and my one of my favourite and most brilliant writers on SubStack, Julia Turshen.

Read more

All my (5) cookbooks are available here. The latest is Easy Wins, a Sunday Times bestseller. There are also hundreds of free recipes on my website which you can find here.

As I’m writing this a diamond-shaped slice of light has settled on my bed covers. Bright winter sunshine, the likes of which we’ve not seen in London for a very long time. I’m hoping it’s a sign of a shift towards brighter days and Spring. I am so ready for it. I’m really done with winter now.

I’m writing from my bed after a few weeks of a horrible cold that just won’t shift. It has really got me, this one. I’ve decided the only option is to spend the day under the covers in the hope some rest will shift it, even just a bit.

I’ve been doing everything to feel my best again, more vitamins than it’s reasonable to consume, gallons of fire honey and hot water. And citrus, so much citrus for real-life vitamin C.

I’ve been ordering oranges with unstoppable zeal. Cara Cara oranges and blood oranges, which are peak right now and just so delicious.

I’ve been putting orange on and in almost everything, from juices to breakfast granola, and most satisfyingly this butterbean and greens one pan dinner. It’s the kind of comforting food we will need as we drag ourselves to the finish line of winter, but with a hit of bright orange and herb that cheers us on and reminds us we are nearly there, nearly at the end of a long, rainy winter and that the sun will shine again very very soon.

Oranges to me are just that, the product of the sun that has shone all summer. They only taste as they do thanks to all the sun they have soaked up and right now I’m hoping by eating them I can soak some of it up too. Oranges are the hype man/woman of winter.

Back to the stew. The base is a quick and flavourful one pan butterbean stew with greens and lemon which I topped with a very good date, orange and herb salad which livens it all up and cuts through the richness of the stew.

As with all good plates of food this stew is full of contrasts, sweet and sharp, hot and cold, soft and crunchy, mellow and bright.

Butter bean stew with kale + sticky blood oranges

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I’ve been in Switzerland for a few days, up in the mountains. There was a lot of snow. The world felt like it had been iced. A thick dusted layer of royal icing over everything. Breathtaking.

Whenever I spend time the mountains of Europe (especially as a vegetarian) I seem to eat a diet of cheese (fondue), pommes frites and baguettes with the odd salade verte. This food feels right for long days in the snow but coming home I crave bowls of brothy veg and salad.

This is the soup I will be making as soon as our bags are through the front door. It’s a more than a sum of its parts recipe. It uses two favourite veg which both bring totally opposite energies to the soup. Sweet potato brings a comforting soft, orange sweetness and greens (I used cavolo nero) bring a minerally brightness. But what really makes this soup is a lot of ginger, lemon and a lot of fresh coriander - both stalks and leaves. Everything exciting in perfect balance making this soup one of my most-made and most-craved.

If you are making more portions than you will eat immediately a tip is to make the soup base but only add the greens, coriander and lemon once the soup is reheated. If they’re not fresh they will lose some of the essential brightness which makes this soup so good.

Find the recipe and some good things to click on, from a book to pre-order right now to the origins of laksa, below. It’s free for everyone this week.

Coriander, lemon and sweet potato soup

An easy-to-make, easy-to-eat soup that is filling and refreshing all at once.

If you don’t have cayenne pepper, I used paprika and it worked just as well.

1 tablespoon olive oil
1 onion, peeled and finely chopped
1 teaspoon fennel seeds
1 large thumb ginger, peeled and grated
3 garlic cloves, peeled and finely chopped
4 medium sweet potatoes (about 800g), peeled and roughly chopped into chunks
½ teaspoon cayenne pepper or paprika
Juice of 1 lemon
200g cavolo nero or winter greens, leaves stripped and broken into large chunks
1 large bunch coriander, stalks finely chopped and leaves roughly chopped

Fry the onion, garlic & ginger
Put 1 tablespoon of olive oil in a large pot over a medium heat. Add the onion and a tiny pinch of salt and cook for 10 minutes, until soft and sweet. Add 1 teaspoon fennel seeds, large thumb of ginger and 3 cloves of garlic, and cook for a further three minutes.

Add the sweet potatoes
Peel and roughly chop 4 sweet potatoes and add these to the pan with a litre of boiling water. Bring to a boil and simmer for 10-12 minutes or until the sweet potatoes are soft but still holding their shape.

Wilt the cavolo nero
Once the sweet potatoes are soft but still holding their shape, add the 200g cavolo nero to the soup to cook for 3 minutes.

Take the soup off the heat
Once the soup is off the heat, add ½ teaspoon cayenne, juice of 1 lemon, the chopped coriander stalks and leaves and stir before serving. Once cooked, the soup will keep in the fridge for up to five days.

Things to click on:

• Oat milk?

• A book to pre-order right now, it’s worth the wait

• Save Moth Club

• Anna Sulan Masing on the origins of laksa

• A garden in Chile

• Welsh rarebit but crumpet… a crarebit?

• Hot sauce in Gaza and Palestinian fermented hot sauce

• Ottolenghi on my favourite subject

• My new Katto knife, seen chopping coriander stalks below

• Two favourites, one favourite chocolate bar

• Fold in the cheese

• Are Omaze ads a sign of the times?

My cookbooks (there are five) are available here. The latest is Easy Wins, a Sunday Times bestseller. There are also hundreds of free recipes on my website which you can find here.

Can I please ask that if you like this week’s newsletter, wintery ginger broth and words, that you add a like or comment below and perhaps share it with someone who might also like it. It’s free for everyone this week but a lot of time and love has gone into it. Thank you.