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Sayur lodeh

Sayur lodeh is everyday cooking in Central Java, made in big pots in Solo and Semarang kitchens and ladled over rice, with lontong rice cakes at Lebaran, or alongside opor and sambal goreng on festive tables. It's soupy rather than thick: a fragrant broth of coconut milk, galangal, lemongrass and lime leaf that carries chunks of aubergine, long beans, chayote and sweetcorn, plus tempeh and tofu to make it a meal. The flavour is mellow and slightly sweet, so the heat comes from sambal on the side. Chef's tip: keep the pot at a gentle simmer once the coconut milk goes in and stir now and then — a rolling boil splits the coconut milk into oily curds.

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Attiéké with tomato and onion

Attiéké is the light, slightly sour cassava 'couscous' of the Ébrié and Adjoukrou peoples around Abidjan's lagoons, and it is eaten across Côte d'Ivoire every day of the week. In maquis (open-air restaurants) it comes heaped beside grilled fish with a raw salad of tomato, onion and chilli; at home many people eat it simply with that salad, fried plantain and a fried egg, which is how it is served here. Buy it frozen or dried in African shops. Chef's tip: steam attiéké rather than boiling it; water turns it to paste, while steam keeps the grains fluffy and separate.

30 min

Ivorian Rice & Grains

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Banosh

Banosh is the shepherds' dish of the Hutsul highlands in the Ukrainian Carpathians, around Verkhovyna, Kosiv and Yaremche. Coarse cornmeal is stirred into simmering sour cream over a fire until the butterfat beads on the surface, then heaped on plates and crumbled with salty bryndza sheep's cheese and forest mushrooms; tourists queue for it in the mountain kolyba restaurants. Traditionally it is also topped with crisp pork crackling, which this vegetarian version leaves out in favour of extra buttery mushrooms. Bryndza is usually made with animal rennet, so look for a sheep's or feta cheese labelled vegetarian. Chef's tip: stir in one direction only with a wooden spoon, as the Hutsuls insist; it keeps the porridge smooth and helps the fat separate out, which tells you it is ready.

35 min

Ukrainian Rice & Grains

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Pallubasa

Makassar's other great beef soup is darker, richer and more coconutty than coto, and locals argue about which is better over late lunches at pallubasa houses near the port. The secret is kelapa sangrai: grated coconut toasted slowly to a deep brown and pounded, which gives the broth a roasted, almost nutty sweetness and a slightly gritty, full body. It's eaten with a mound of plain rice rather than rice cakes, and for the full version you ask for 'alas', a raw egg yolk dropped in the bowl that you stir into the boiling soup until it turns silky. Offal is traditional but optional; tender beef alone is delicious. Chef's tip: the coconut must reach the colour of milk chocolate, not black, because burnt coconut makes the whole pot bitter.

120 min

Indonesian Soups

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Xawaash

Xawaash (pronounced 'ha-wash') is the spice mix every Somali kitchen keeps in a jar, used in rice, soups, stews, sambuusa fillings and even tea. Families toast and grind their own, often in quantity before Ramadan, and the balance of warm cumin, earthy coriander and sweet cardamom and cinnamon varies from house to house. It is different from Yemeni hawaij and Ethiopian berbere: there is no chilli in it. Chef's tip: toast each spice only until it darkens a shade and smells warm; burnt cumin turns the whole jar bitter.

11 min

Somali Basics

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Koki

Koki is a dense, orange-red bean cake from the Douala and Bakweri country of Cameroon, made from skinned black-eyed beans blended with red palm oil, chilli and greens, then wrapped in banana leaves and steamed for hours. It is weekend food and market food, eaten with boiled plantain, cassava or ripe banana. It is related to Nigerian moi moi but heavier, richer with palm oil and full of cocoyam leaves or spinach. Chef's tip: warm the palm oil just until liquid before beating it in; poured in cold and solid it leaves streaks of fat instead of an even orange colour.

180 min

Cameroonian Vegetarian

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Varenyky with potato

Varenyky with potato are the everyday dumplings of central Ukraine, the ones Gogol's Poltava characters dream about and the ones that fill freezers in Kyiv flats before every holiday. Unlike Polish pierogi ruskie, these have no curd cheese: the filling is simply mashed potato beaten with plenty of onion fried in sunflower oil, so they are vegan and appear on the meatless Holy Supper table on Christmas Eve. They are boiled, then tossed in more golden onion and eaten with dill. Chef's tip: let the filling cool completely before you fill the dough; warm mash steams the dough from inside and the dumplings tear in the pot.

90 min

Ukrainian Pasta & Noodles

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Ukrainian borscht

Borshch is the soup Ukrainians measure every kitchen by: a deep ruby pot of beetroot, cabbage, potato and beans, soured just enough and finished with garlic and dill. Every region argues for its own version, from Poltava's with beans to Kyiv's with apples, and in 2022 the cooking of Ukrainian borshch was added to UNESCO's list of culture in need of urgent safeguarding. Traditionally it is simmered on a pork or beef bone stock; this version uses a well-seasoned vegetable stock and white beans, which is how many families cook it during Lent anyway. Serve it hot with a spoon of sour cream and garlic pampushky, and know that it tastes even better the next day. Chef's tip: fry the grated beetroot with a splash of vinegar before it goes into the pot; the acid fixes the red colour, so the soup stays bright instead of fading to brown.

90 min

Ukrainian Soups

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La zi ji (Chongqing chilli chicken)

Truck drivers stopping on Geleshan, the hill outside Chongqing, made this dish famous at roadside canteens in the 1980s, and it still arrives at tables there as a platter that looks like nothing but dried chillies. Hidden among them are small pieces of chicken fried twice until the outside is dry and crunchy and the inside juicy, then tossed with garlic, ginger and handfuls of Sichuan pepper. Eating it is a game: you hunt through the red pile with chopsticks for the morsels, which are smoky, salty, numbing and surprisingly moreish with a cold beer or a pot of tea. Serve it with rice and a mild soup or stir-fried greens. Chef's tip: fry the chicken in two batches and give it a second, hotter fry; crowding the oil is the most common mistake and leaves the coating soft.

40 min

Chinese Chicken

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Ossobuco alla milanese

Thick cross-cut slices of veal shank, each ringed around a hollow bone full of marrow, are browned and then braised slowly in white wine and stock until the meat is soft enough to cut with a spoon: this is Milan's great winter Sunday dish. The old Milanese way, 'in bianco', keeps tomato out, so the sauce stays golden and savoury. Just before serving it gets a shower of gremolata, a sharp mix of lemon zest, garlic and parsley that wakes up the rich braise. Serve it with risotto alla milanese, the saffron risotto that is its traditional partner (one of the few times a Milanese risotto shares the plate), or with soft polenta. Chef's tip: snip through the thin skin around each shank in three or four places before browning, so the slices stay flat in the pan instead of curling up.

150 min

Italian Meat

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Croque monsieur

Croque monsieur first appeared on Paris café menus in the early 1900s and is still the quick lunch of the city's brasseries, eaten at the zinc bar with a green salad. It contains pork (ham). Good white bread is spread with Dijon mustard and béchamel, filled with ham and Gruyère, then topped with more sauce and cheese and baked until golden. Put a fried egg on top and it becomes a croque madame. Chef's tip: toast the bread lightly first so it stays crisp under the sauce.

30 min

French Fast Food

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Jus de bouye

Bouye is the Wolof name for the powdery white pulp of the baobab fruit, and jus de bouye is the thick, creamy-tart drink sold in reused bottles from coolers all over Dakar and served at every family celebration. It tastes like sherbet with a hint of pear. Most cooks now use baobab powder, which is sold in health shops as well as African grocers. Sweetened condensed milk is optional but common. Chef's tip: whisk the powder into a little water first to make a smooth paste; poured straight into a jug it forms lumps that never dissolve.

10 min

Senegalese Drinks

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Gundel palacsinta

Gundel palacsinta is the festive pancake of Budapest, named after the Gundel restaurant by City Park, where it became the showpiece dessert of the mid-twentieth century. Thin Hungarian pancakes are filled with a rum-scented walnut and raisin paste, folded into triangles and drowned in a dark chocolate sauce, sometimes flamed at the table. Everyday palacsinta at home are simpler, rolled with apricot jam, cocoa sugar or sweet túró; this is the version for name days, Christmas and guests. Chef's tip: rest the batter for 30 minutes; the pancakes become thinner and more elastic and stop tearing when you fold them. Common mistake: overfilling, which makes the triangles burst open.

60 min

Hungarian Desserts

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Ndolé with peanuts and greens

Ndolé comes from the Douala coast and is Cameroon's national dish, cooked for Sunday lunches, weddings and funerals: bitter leaves washed until only a gentle bitterness remains, simmered in a thick sauce of boiled, ground peanuts. Traditionally it is finished with beef, smoked fish and prawns; this version keeps the greens and peanuts at the centre and tops it with crisp fried onions, the way Douala cooks always do. Serve with boiled plantain, miondo or rice. As a variation, add prawns or beef the traditional way. Chef's tip: use raw peanuts, boiled and ground, not peanut butter; ndolé should be nubbly and pale, not like a smooth satay sauce.

110 min

Cameroonian Curries

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Hideg meggyleves

Hideg meggyleves is a chilled sour cherry soup served as a starter in Hungary at the height of summer, from family lunches in the cherry-growing villages around Pest county to the terraces of Balaton restaurants. Sour cherries simmer briefly with sugar, cinnamon and cloves, then the soup is thickened with sour cream and served icy cold, pink and gently tangy. Some cooks add a splash of red wine for grown-ups. It is eaten before the main course, not as dessert, though no one complains if you have it after. Chef's tip: chill it for at least 3 hours; the flavour rounds out and the spices soften as it cools. A common mistake is boiling it after the cream goes in, which curdles it.

25 min

Hungarian Soups

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Pasta con le sarde

Sweet, salty and grassy all at once, Palermo's favourite pasta carries the island's history in one pan: Arab raisins, pine nuts and saffron meet fresh sardines and the wild fennel that grows on every Sicilian hillside in spring. It is cooked at home and in the city's old trattorie from March to the start of summer, and on 19 March for the feast of San Giuseppe. Instead of cheese, it is finished with olive oil toasted breadcrumbs, the crunchy 'muddica' that Sicilians call poor man's parmesan. Wild fennel is hard to find outside Italy; the fronds from two fennel bulbs plus a few fennel seeds come close. Serve it warm, or at room temperature as Palermitans often do. Chef's tip: blanch the fennel greens in the pasta pot first and cook the bucatini in that same green, aniseed-scented water, so the flavour runs right through the pasta.

45 min

Italian Pasta & Noodles

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Somlói galuska

Somlói galuska was first served at the Gundel restaurant in Budapest in the 1950s and named after the Somló wine hill in western Hungary. Today it is the dessert everyone orders at the end of a Sunday lunch: spoonfuls of three sponges (plain, walnut and cocoa) soaked in rum syrup and layered with vanilla custard, then topped with chocolate sauce and whipped cream. It is assembled the day before and spooned out into rough dumplings, which is where 'galuska' comes from. This version thickens the custard with flour and egg yolk rather than gelatine. Chef's tip: soak the sponge only lightly; it should be moist but still hold a spoon-shaped scoop.

80 min

Hungarian Desserts

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Thiakry

Thiakry, called dégué in Mali and Burkina Faso, is the creamy dessert of Senegalese weddings, naming ceremonies and Tabaski: pellets of steamed millet stirred into sweetened yoghurt and soft fromage frais, scented with vanilla and nutmeg and served cold. Ready-made millet granules (arraw or sankhal) are sold in African grocers, which makes it a 15-minute job. Raisins and a little coconut are common in Dakar. Chef's tip: steam or soak the millet fully before it meets the yoghurt; undercooked grains stay hard and gritty in the cold.

25 min

Senegalese Desserts

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Kürtőskalács

Kürtőskalács, or chimney cake, comes from the Székely Hungarian villages of Transylvania and is now sold at every Budapest Christmas market and summer festival, turning on spits over glowing coals. A strip of sweet yeast dough is wound around a wooden roller, rolled in sugar and baked until the sugar caramelises into a thin, crackling shell; you unwind the soft, steaming spiral as you eat it. At home you can bake it in the oven on foil-wrapped rolling pins or tins. Chef's tip: press the dough spiral firmly into the sugar before baking; loose sugar falls off, but pressed sugar melts into the glassy crust. A common mistake is leaving gaps between the strips, which makes the cake tear apart when you slide it off.

75 min

Hungarian Desserts

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Rakott krumpli

Rakott krumpli means 'layered potatoes', and it is a family supper baked all over Hungary, especially in winter in the north-east around Miskolc and Eger, where every household layers it slightly differently. Slices of boiled potato are stacked with hard-boiled eggs and plenty of sour cream, then baked until bubbling and golden. Many versions add smoked sausage; this vegetarian one uses sautéed mushrooms and a dusting of smoked paprika for depth. It is rich, creamy and needs only a sharp cucumber salad or pickles alongside. Chef's tip: boil the potatoes in their skins and peel them while warm; they slice cleanly and don't soak up water.

75 min

Hungarian Vegetarian

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Rice pancakes (mukari)

Mukari are soft, lightly sweet Zanzibari pancakes made from a yeasted rice flour and coconut milk batter scented with cardamom. They're cooked covered over a low heat so they puff up and stay spongy. Serve warm with tea.

155 minAfrican Breakfast & Brunch

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Tandoori tinnies

Baby onions, carrots, potatoes and corn par-boiled, coated in a creamy, fiery marinade of red chilli, garlic, ginger, coriander-cumin and dried fenugreek, then grilled on skewers over charcoal until golden. They're small, colourful and bursting with flavour. Serve hot with lemon wedges.

90 min

Indian Snacks & Starters

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Tagliatelle al ragù

Ask for spaghetti bolognese in Bologna and you will get a polite smile: at home the ragù goes on wide ribbons of fresh egg tagliatelle, or into lasagne, never on thin spaghetti. It is a Sunday-lunch sauce, made with beef and pork mince, a little pancetta, a soffritto of onion, carrot and celery, white wine, milk and only a spoonful or two of tomato, then left to murmur for three hours until it turns deep, savoury and almost creamy. Freshly made tagliatelle are traditional, but good bought fresh or dried egg tagliatelle are absolutely fine. Grated parmigiano goes on at the table, and the ragù keeps for three days in the fridge or three months in the freezer. Chef's tip: make the ragù a day ahead; it thickens and tastes rounder after a night in the fridge, and reheating it gently with a splash of water brings it back to life.

210 min

Italian Pasta & Noodles

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Salade de niébé

Niébé is the Wolof and French name for black-eyed beans, and this bright salad turns up at Senegalese family lunches, baptism feasts and Ramadan break-fast tables next to grilled dishes and rice. The beans are dressed while warm with lime, mustard and onion, then mixed with crunchy raw vegetables and a little hot pepper. It travels well and tastes better after an hour. Chef's tip: dress the beans while they are still warm so they drink in the lime; cold beans stay bland however much dressing you pour over.

60 min

Senegalese Salads

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Vegetable mafé

Mafé is the Sunday-lunch stew of Senegal and Mali: a rust-coloured sauce of roasted peanut paste and tomato, simmered until oil glistens on top and ladled over broken rice. In Dakar it usually carries lamb or beef; this version uses sweet potato, carrot, cabbage and okra, which soak up the sauce just as well. In Côte d'Ivoire the same idea is called sauce d'arachide and is eaten with rice or foutou; make it slightly thinner and add aubergine for the Abidjan style. Chef's tip: use plain, unsweetened peanut paste and cook it long enough that a thin layer of red oil rises to the surface; that is the sign the peanut has lost its raw taste.

80 min

Senegalese Curries

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Baked bananas (ndizi ya kuoka)

Ndizi ya kuoka: small bananas halved and baked with lemon juice, brown sugar and cinnamon until soft and syrupy, then served with lightly sweetened cream and a grating of nutmeg. It's a quick, warm pudding. The book's Handy Hints say bananas are good for the heart.

20 minAfrican Desserts

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Flat white

Sydney and Wellington both claim the flat white, first poured in their cafés in the mid-1980s, and today it's the everyday coffee across Australia and New Zealand, from Melbourne's laneway cafés to a beach kiosk in Raglan. It's smaller and stronger than a latte: a double shot of espresso topped with milk steamed to a smooth, glossy microfoam with only a thin layer of froth on top, so the coffee stays at the front. It's velvety, rich and sweet-tasting without sugar. For a vegan version, use a barista-style oat milk. Chef's tip: stretch the milk only for the first few seconds, then sink the wand and let it spin; you want paint-like milk, not a hat of stiff foam.

5 min

Australian Drinks

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Lángos

Lángos is the deep-fried flatbread of Hungarian beaches and markets: it is eaten in swimsuits on the shore of Lake Balaton, at Budapest's Great Market Hall and at every summer fair. The dough is soft and yeasted, often enriched with mashed potato, and it fries into a puffy disc that is crisp at the edges and chewy in the middle. The classic topping is garlic water brushed on hot, then sour cream and a snowfall of grated cheese. Chef's tip: stretch the dough thinner in the centre than at the rim; the edge puffs into a crisp crust while the middle stays soft enough to hold the toppings. Choose a cheese made with vegetarian rennet (many supermarket Cheddars and Edams are).

60 min

Hungarian Fast Food

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Paprikás krumpli

Paprikás krumpli is a thrifty potato stew that every Hungarian student learns to cook, and it turns up at school dinners, on autumn weekdays and in cauldrons at village harvest festivals. Potatoes simmer in an onion and paprika base with pepper and tomato until they start to break and thicken their own sauce. Most versions add sliced smoked sausage; this vegan one swaps it for a pinch of smoked paprika and caraway, which give the same savoury depth. Serve in bowls with crusty bread and a pickled cucumber or a spoon of pickled peppers on the side. Chef's tip: cut the potatoes unevenly on purpose; the smaller pieces melt and thicken the sauce while the bigger ones stay whole.

45 min

Hungarian Vegetarian

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Neenish tarts

Neenish tarts have sat in the windows of Australian country bakeries for more than a century, and they're also found across the Tasman in New Zealand. Where the name comes from is still argued over, with one story placing it in the small town of Grong Grong in New South Wales. A crisp sweet pastry case holds a thin layer of raspberry jam and a fluffy mock cream, a beaten mixture of butter, sugar and milk, and the top is iced in two halves: one white, one chocolate. Many bakery mock creams use gelatine; this one doesn't. Chef's tip: beat the mock cream for a long time, a full 8–10 minutes, until the sugar has dissolved and it is white and fluffy, not gritty.

80 min

Australian Baking

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Ginger drink (tangawizi)

Tangawizi is a warming Swahili drink of ginger boiled with cinnamon, clove and black pepper and sweetened to taste. It's hot, peppery and soothing on a cool evening or when you have a cold. Serve hot in small kahawa cups.

24 minAfrican Drinks

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Bambalouni

Bambalouni are the big, flat, chewy doughnuts sold hot and wrapped in paper at the top of the blue-and-white village of Sidi Bou Said, outside Tunis, and on beaches all along the coast in summer. The dough is very soft and yeasty; it is stretched by hand into a ring and fried until puffed and blistered, then rolled in sugar. They are best eaten warm with a mint tea. Chef's tip: oil your hands, not the bench, to shape them; floured dough browns too fast and loses its blistered look.

40 min

Tunisian Baking

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Beef bulgogi

In Seoul, bulgogi restaurants still cook it on a domed grill set into the table, with a moat around the edge that catches the sweet juices for spooning over rice. At home it is made in a hot pan, and it is a favourite for family dinners, lunch boxes and birthday tables. Grated Asian pear softens the meat and adds a gentle sweetness to the soy and garlic. Wrap it in lettuce with a little ssamjang, or eat it over rice. Chef's tip: put the beef in the freezer for 30 minutes before slicing; firm meat cuts into wafer-thin slices easily.

40 min

Korean Meat

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Coconut sweet (kashata ya nazi)

Kashata ya nazi is a simple Swahili sweet of desiccated coconut cooked with milk, sugar, evaporated milk and cardamom until thick, then pressed into a dish and cut into diamonds. It's chewy and sweet, and it keeps well. Store in an airtight container.

35 minAfrican Desserts

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Spaghetti alle vongole

Naples cooks this on Christmas Eve, when the feast is meatless, and all summer long in seaside trattorie along the bay. The clams open in a hot pan of garlicky oil and white wine and release their sea-salty juice, which the half-cooked spaghetti then drinks up as it finishes cooking, so every strand tastes of the shore. Neapolitans keep it in bianco, without tomato, with just a little chilli warmth and a heap of parsley. Most clams in shops are sold already purged of sand; if yours are not, soak them in cold salted water in the fridge for 30 minutes first. Serve with a glass of something cold and bread for the juices. Chef's tip: drain the spaghetti 2 minutes early and finish it in the clam liquor, tossing hard with a little extra oil, so the juices turn into a light, clinging sauce rather than a puddle in the bowl.

30 min

Italian Pasta & Noodles

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Bagna càuda

When the grape harvest is over in the Langhe and Monferrato, Piedmontese friends gather round a terracotta pot of bagna càuda, the 'hot bath', kept warm over a little flame in the middle of the table. Everyone dips raw and cooked vegetables into it: peppers, cardoons, fennel, cabbage leaves, Jerusalem artichokes, boiled potatoes and beetroot. The sauce is mellow rather than fierce, because the garlic is poached in milk before it melts with anchovies into olive oil and a little butter, giving a rich, salty, nutty bath. Hunks of bread catch the drips, and a young red wine is the usual partner. Chef's tip: keep it hot but never bubbling, on a fondue burner or tea-light warmer; if it fries, the garlic turns bitter and the anchovies harsh.

35 min

Italian Chutneys & Dips

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Bistecca alla fiorentina

A proper fiorentina is a T-bone cut three fingers thick, traditionally from Tuscany's white Chianina cattle, and Florentine steakhouses sell it by weight and serve it one way only: charred outside, deep red within. It is a sharing steak for three or four, sliced off the bone at the table and finished with nothing more than good olive oil and coarse salt. On one side of the bone sits the tender fillet, on the other the beefier sirloin, and the bone itself gives the meat flavour as it cooks. Cannellini beans with olive oil and sage and a simple green salad are the usual companions. Chef's tip: after searing both flat sides, stand the steak upright on its bone for several minutes; the heat travels up through the bone and cooks the middle evenly without overdoing the outside.

40 min

Italian Meat

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