Featured recipe

Chraime

Fish in spicy garlic paprika sauce

Friday night in Moroccan and Libyan Jewish homes, from Casablanca to Tripoli and now Paris and Tel Aviv, often begins with a plate of chraime before the main course. Thick fish steaks simmer in a brick-red sauce built from a frightening amount of garlic, sweet and hot paprika, chilli, caraway and cumin, loosened with oil and a squeeze of lemon. It is spicy, garlicky and very savoury, and the oily sauce begs to be mopped up with challah or other good bread. It is also eaten cold the next day. Chef's tip: cook the spices in the oil over a low heat until they smell toasty but not dark; burnt paprika tastes acrid and you cannot rescue it.

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Patatas revolconasPaprika mashed potatoes with crisp pork

Shepherds in the Gredos mountains of Ávila once lived on these "tumbled" potatoes, roughly mashed with garlicky paprika oil and topped with crunchy fried pork belly, called torreznos. Bars in Ávila, Salamanca and Béjar now serve them on the house as a tapa, or as a starter before a steak on a chilly evening. This contains pork (pork belly). Chef's tip: save the potato cooking water; a splash makes the mash loose and spoonable without milk or butter.

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These are the potatoes that come out of Peloponnese bakers' ovens alongside Sunday roasts, and that every Greek grandmother has a firm opinion on. Wedges roast in a bath of lemon juice, olive oil, garlic and oregano; the liquid soaks into the potatoes, then evaporates, leaving them sticky, golden and tangy, with fluffy middles. Serve with roast chicken or lamb, or with feta, a salad and bread for a meatless lunch. Common mistake: crowding the tin, so the potatoes steam instead of browning. Chef's tip: add a final squeeze of fresh lemon as they come out of the oven; the cooked juice loses its brightness.

90 min

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Patatesli kol böreğiPotato and onion filo coil

Kol böreği is the long 'arm' börek that Istanbul neighbourhood bakeries coil into round trays and sell by weight in the morning, and the potato version is the one home cooks make for guests at five o'clock tea. Thin sheets of yufka are brushed with a milk and oil wash, rolled around a peppery potato and onion filling, then coiled and baked until shatteringly crisp outside and soft within. Serve it warm with tea or ayran. Chef's tip: let the filling cool completely before rolling; warm potato steams the pastry from inside and makes it soggy.

80 min

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PatayAlgarroba pod cake

Long before sugar reached the dry northwest, the pods of the algarrobo tree were the region's sweetness, and patay is the oldest way of keeping them: the pods are ground, the flour is moistened and pressed into a cake that dries into something dense, fudgy and naturally sweet, with notes of cocoa, coffee and caramel. In Santiago del Estero you still buy it in round slabs at markets and roadside stalls, to eat with mate or to crumble into milk. Harina de algarroba comes from the South American Prosopis tree; look for it in health-food shops or online, and mesquite flour is the same family and works well. Mediterranean carob flour is different and tastes more bitter. Too much water is the way most first attempts go wrong: the cake should be pressed from a damp, crumbly mix, not a batter, or it bakes up gummy. Chef's tip: sieve the flour twice; algarroba flour clumps, and lumps stay as hard grains.

40 min

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Patlıcan musakkaAubergine and mince stew

Turkish musakka has little in common with the Greek bake: there is no béchamel and no potato, just fried aubergine and a mince sauce with peppers and tomato, layered in a pan and simmered until the aubergine melts. It is a summer favourite in home kitchens from İzmir to Ankara, served warm with rice pilaf and a bowl of cacık. Salting and draining the aubergine stops it drinking too much oil. Common mistake: frying the aubergine pale; it needs to be properly golden or it turns slimy in the sauce. Chef's tip: bake the aubergine slices brushed with oil at 220 °C instead of frying if you want a lighter dish.

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Pavê de pêssegoLayered peach biscuit dessert

No Brazilian Christmas or New Year table feels complete without a glass dish of pavê in the fridge, and the old joke at every family supper is 'é pavê ou pra comer?' ('is it pavê or is it for eating?'). Rows of Maria or champagne biscuits are softened in milk or peach syrup, then layered with a thick vanilla custard made from condensed milk and egg yolks, sliced peaches and a cloud of whipped cream. It is cool, creamy and fruity, a relief after a heavy ceia. Chocolate pavê is just as common: replace the peaches with a chocolate layer, as in the tip. Too much soaking liquid is the classic fault, and the dessert collapses into a pool in the base. Chef's tip: dip each biscuit for a single count in the syrup; they keep softening overnight in the custard. For chocolate pavê, stir 100 g melted dark chocolate into half the custard and layer it in place of the peaches.

40 min

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Pé de molequePeanut brittle

Lumpy, glossy slabs of peanut set in dark sugar are sold in every rodoviária snack bar and handed round at festa junina, wrapped in cellophane or set in little paper cups. The name, 'street-kid's foot', probably comes from the cobbled look of the top. Piracicaba in São Paulo state is famous for it, and in the Northeast the same name can mean a cassava cake, so expect confusion. This is the crunchy southeastern style: roasted peanuts cooked into rapadura (unrefined cane sugar) until it caramelises and clings. Rapadura or panela is sold in Latin shops; dark muscovado is a fine substitute. People burn it by walking away; once the peanuts go in, the sugar darkens in seconds. Chef's tip: have the oiled tray ready before you start, because the mixture sets almost as soon as it leaves the heat.

25 min

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Peixada cearenseFish poached in coconut broth

Fortaleza's beach restaurants, the barracas on Praia do Futuro, build a whole Sunday around peixada: thick steaks of firm white fish poached in a coconut broth with potatoes, carrots, chayote, cabbage and peppers, crowned with halved boiled eggs. The fish is mild and juicy, the broth fragrant with coriander, and half of it is ladled off and thickened with cassava flour into pirão, a soft, savoury porridge eaten alongside with white rice and pepper sauce. A common mistake is putting the fish in with the vegetables from the start, so it breaks up before the potatoes are done; the vegetables get a head start. Use snapper, sea bass, hake or another firm white fish in steaks. Chef's tip: stir the farinha into the hot broth off the heat, a little at a time, and whisk hard; it is the only way to get a smooth, lump-free pirão.

65 min

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Peixinhos da hortaBattered green beans

Order a round of petiscos in an old Lisbon tasca and a plate of these often lands first: flat green beans in a thin, crackly batter, eaten with the fingers alongside a cold drink. The name means 'little fish from the garden', because on meatless church days the beans stood in for fried sardines. Portuguese missionaries are often credited with carrying the idea of batter-fried food to Japan in the 1500s, where it may have grown into tempura. Serve them hot, with lemon wedges and a pinch of flaky salt. Chef's tip: dry the blanched beans completely on a towel; any water left on them stops the batter sticking and makes the oil spit.

40 min

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Pestrofa sti skaraGrilled whole trout

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25 min

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Pejelagarto asadoGrilled fish with green salsa

In Tabasco, pejelagarto, a prehistoric-looking freshwater gar from the rivers and lagoons, is skewered and grilled whole over wood in its armoured skin, then eaten with tortillas, lime and fierce chile amashito at roadside stands around Villahermosa. The fish is almost never sold outside the region, so this is a practical version using any firm white fish, such as snapper, sea bass or thick hake fillets, grilled until smoky and served with a bright green tomatillo salsa. Serrano or bird's eye chillies stand in for amashito. Serve with warm corn tortillas for tacos. Chef's tip: oil the fish, not the grill bars, and leave it alone for the first few minutes so the skin releases by itself.

45 min

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Pellkartoffeln mit Quark und LeinölJacket potatoes with herb quark

Ask anyone from the Spreewald, the river-and-forest country south-east of Berlin, for the taste of home and many will name this: small potatoes boiled in their skins, a bowl of cold herb quark and a thread of golden, nutty linseed oil poured over the top. It is a weekday supper in Brandenburg and Berlin, cheap, quick and surprisingly filling, often with a Spreewald gherkin on the side. Fresh linseed oil tastes of hay and walnuts; old oil turns bitter and fishy, so buy a small bottle and keep it in the fridge. A common mistake is peeling the potatoes before boiling; cooking them in their skins keeps them firm and flavourful. Chef's tip: beat a splash of milk or sparkling water into the quark, which makes it light and creamy instead of stodgy.

30 min

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Pepas are the little round cookies with a jewel of quince jam in the middle that Argentine kiosks sell by the bag and grandmothers keep in a tin for the mate round. They are tender and crumbly, not crisp, with just enough sugar that the tart, dark membrillo stands out. Children love pressing the thumbprint and filling it, which makes them a good first baking job, and they keep for a week in an airtight jar. Kiosk versions are often made with margarine; butter tastes far better. Overbaking is the usual problem: take them out while the tops are still pale and only the bottoms are golden, because they firm up as they cool. Chef's tip: use quince paste softened with a spoonful of hot water and pipe it from a small bag; a spoon leaves smears on the dough that burn.

35 min

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Peperoni cruschiCrisp fried dried peppers

In late summer the villages around Senise, in southern Basilicata, hang long garlands of thin red peppers from balconies to dry in the sun. Once dried, a few seconds in hot oil turns them into peperoni cruschi: glassy, brittle and sweet with a faint smoky note, eaten like crisps or crumbled over pasta, beans, fried eggs and mashed potatoes. Lucanians call them their red gold and keep a jar of them on the table all winter. Chef's tip: get the oil hot but not smoking and count to five; the colour should stay bright red.

10 min

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PepitoriaRice with goat offal

Santander's famous plate of cabrito (roast kid goat), sold in Bucaramanga, Barichara and the canyon towns, always comes with pepitoria next to it: rice cooked with the kid's chopped heart, liver and kidneys, a refrito of onion and tomato, and blood, which turns it a deep reddish-brown and gives it a rich, mineral flavour, a little like a soft black pudding. It's a dish that uses the whole animal, and it is worth trying if you like morcilla. Ask a halal, Caribbean or specialist butcher for very fresh goat offal and fresh blood (pig blood works if goat isn't available); keep both cold and cook them the same day. Offal must be cooked right through, and the blood until it has set and darkened with no liquid red left. The usual misstep is adding the blood too early, so that it scorches on the bottom; it goes in when the rice is nearly done. Chef's tip: if blood is impossible to find, double the offal and add 1 tsp extra achiote; you'll get a lighter but still very good rice.

110 min

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Perde pilavıChicken pilaf in pastry dome

At weddings in Siirt, perde pilavı is carried out whole and cut open at the table: a dome of buttery pastry 'curtain' (perde) hiding rice cooked with shredded chicken, toasted almonds, currants and black pepper. Each part carries a wish for the couple: the rice for plenty, the almonds for children, the pastry for a home that holds together. It makes a spectacular centrepiece for any celebration. Common mistake: a wet filling; the base of the pastry turns soggy, so cook the rice until just dry. Chef's tip: scatter almonds over the buttered tin before the pastry goes in; they become a jewelled top when you turn it out.

135 min

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Perdiz al modo de AlcántaraStuffed partridge braised in port

This is the famous dish of the monastery of San Benito at Alcántara, near the Portuguese border. The story goes that French troops looted the library in 1807, and its recipe for partridges stuffed with liver and truffle, marinated for days in port, ended up in French cookbooks, which is why Escoffier listed it. Today it is a dish for autumn hunting-season dinners in Extremadura. Our home version uses chicken livers, mushrooms and an overnight marinade. The dish uses port; for an alcohol-free version, use red grape juice with 1 tbsp of red wine vinegar. Chef's tip: a few slices of black truffle in the stuffing make it truly special, but well-browned mushrooms are a fine everyday substitute.

110 min

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Perdiz de escabechePickled partridge

Partridge shooting season fills the cork-oak plains of the Alentejo with hunters in autumn and winter, and escabeche was how their families kept the birds: browned in olive oil, then cooked slowly in vinegar with onion, garlic, bay and peppercorns, and left in the cool larder for days. Today it is made in the fridge and served cold or at room temperature as a starter, with bread and a green salad. A common mistake is serving it straight away; it needs at least a day for the sour, garlicky flavour to soak in. Chef's tip: use good olive oil, since it sets around the birds and is served as part of the dish.

90 min

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PerrunillasCinnamon and lemon lard cookies

Perrunillas are the cookies of Extremaduran grandmothers, baked in village ovens for Christmas, weddings and the days after the matanza, when fresh lard was plentiful. They are thick, pale and so short they crumble the moment you bite, with a crackly sugar top, and they are eaten with coffee or a glass of milk in the afternoon. This contains pork (pork lard), so they are not vegetarian. Chef's tip: beat the lard and sugar for a good few minutes until very pale and fluffy; that air is what makes them light.

38 min

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Pescaíto fritoMixed fried fish

On the beaches of Pedregalejo and El Palo in Málaga, chiringuito cooks shake small fish in flour and fry them by the basketful: whole fresh anchovies (boquerones), rings of squid, strips of dogfish and little red mullet, served piled on paper with lemon. The secret is a coarse frying flour, partly durum semolina, and very clean, hot oil, so each piece comes out crisp and dry. Eat it at once, at the table, with a cold drink and a salad. Chef's tip: shake off every bit of loose flour in a sieve before frying; excess flour burns and makes the oil dark and bitter.

50 min

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Pesque de quinuaCreamy quinoa with cheese

Up on the Altiplano around Lake Titicaca, where quinoa grows at almost 4,000 metres, pesque is everyday food: quinoa cooked until it collapses, then beaten with milk, a knob of butter and crumbled fresh cheese until it looks like a loose, savoury risotto. Puno families eat it for a warming lunch or supper, often with a glass of milk poured over or a fried egg on top, and in the cold dry air it is exactly what the body wants. It is soft, nutty and mildly salty. The step people skip is rinsing the quinoa, and the natural saponins then leave a soapy, bitter edge; rub it under running water until the foam stops. Serve with a tomato salad or a spoon of uchucuta for some heat. Andean fresh cheese is usually set with animal rennet, so choose a vegetarian fresh cheese if needed. Chef's tip: cook the quinoa in a little more water than usual and leave it a few minutes longer than for a salad, so it turns creamy and the grains burst.

35 min

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PestiñosAnise fritters in honey

When Holy Week and Christmas come round, convent turnstiles and village kitchens from Cádiz to Granada fill trays with pestiños: little folded parcels of dough flavoured with sesame, anise and orange, fried until crisp and blistered and then dipped in honey. The dough traditionally takes a splash of white wine, which makes it bubble and crunch; orange juice works too, and is the alcohol-free option in the list. A common mistake is frying them in oil that is too hot, which browns the outside before the folds of dough cook through and crisp. Chef's tip: roll the dough really thin; thick pestiños stay doughy in the middle and soak up oil.

70 min

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Petits farcis niçoisStuffed vegetables with rice and herbs

From June to September the traiteurs around the cours Saleya market in Nice sell trays of petits farcis: round courgettes, tomatoes and onions hollowed out, refilled and baked until wrinkled and caramelised at the edges. Niçois families often use up leftover daube in the stuffing; this meatless version, common on Fridays and at summer picnics, uses rice, herbs, the vegetables' own flesh and Parmesan. Parmesan is made with animal rennet, so use a vegetarian hard cheese if that matters to you. They are as good at room temperature the next day as hot from the oven. Chef's tip: choose vegetables of a similar size, so they all finish cooking at the same moment.

90 min

French Vegetarian

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Petits pâtés de PézenasSweet spiced lamb pies

Pézenas, the old Languedoc town of Molière, is famous for these little pies shaped like cotton reels, sold warm from its bakeries all winter and especially around Christmas. Local legend links them to the Indian cooks of Lord Clive, who stayed nearby in 1768, which would explain the unexpected sweet-savoury filling of minced lamb, brown sugar and lemon zest. They have a crisp, sturdy hot-water crust and a juicy, gently sweet centre with a hint of spice. Eat them warm as a starter, with a green salad, or as a mid-morning snack the way Piscénois do. Chef's tip: shape the pastry while it is still warm and supple; once it cools it cracks instead of folding.

90 min

French Snacks & Starters

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Peynir helvasıCheese and semolina halva

Around Çanakkale and the Dardanelles, peynir helvası is a soft, oven-browned halva made with fresh unsalted cheese, semolina, butter and sugar, sold warm in clay dishes at the market cafés. The top caramelises in spots, the inside stays creamy and stretchy, and the flavour sits somewhere between cheesecake and halva. Eat it warm on its own or with a glass of tea after a fish lunch. Chef's tip: use a mild, fresh, unsalted cheese and squeeze it well; salty or wet cheese gives a sour, runny halva.

50 min

Turkish Desserts

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PfeffernüsseHoney spice biscuits

Pfeffernüsse are small domed biscuits baked in German homes through Advent, especially in the north and in Saxony, and sold in bags at Christmas markets everywhere. They are made with honey and a warm spice mix, and in old recipes the 'pepper' in the name meant exotic spices in general, though a pinch of real black pepper adds a lovely bite. A thin white glaze sets crisp over a chewy centre. The mistake many people make is eating them straight away; they are hard at first and need a few days in a tin with a slice of apple to soften. Chef's tip: warm the honey only until runny, never boiling, or the biscuits turn tough.

35 min

German Baking

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PfefferpotthastPeppery beef and onion stew

Pfefferpotthast is one of the oldest dishes of Westphalia, written about in Dortmund as far back as the 14th century and still cooked in the Münsterland and the Ruhr for big family meals. Beef is stewed with almost as much onion as meat, plenty of black pepper, cloves and bay, then thickened with breadcrumbs and sharpened with lemon and capers. Pickled gherkins and boiled potatoes go alongside. Chef's tip: grind the pepper coarsely and add half at the start and half at the end, so you get both deep warmth and a fresh bite.

130 min

German Curries

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PfitzaufEgg-batter puffs with apple sauce

Pfitzauf is a Swabian Sunday-afternoon treat: a thin egg and milk batter poured into a heavy clay or tin mould with deep cups, which rises in the oven like a soufflé and 'pfitzt auf', pops up, far above the rim. Grandmothers on the Swabian Alb served it hot with apple sauce or vanilla sauce, sometimes with stewed cherries. A muffin tin or popover tin works too. The classic mistake is opening the oven during baking: the puffs collapse and never come back. Chef's tip: get the buttered tin really hot in the oven before pouring in the batter; the shock of heat is what makes them climb.

45 min

German Desserts

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Pica-pauBeef in garlic mustard sauce

Pica-pau means woodpecker, and that is how you eat it: a crowd round a shared dish in a Lisbon cervejaria, pecking cubes of beef out of the sauce with toothpicks and dunking bread into the rest. The beef is seared quickly, then bathed in garlic, butter, mustard and a splash of white wine, and finished with tangy pickled vegetables. The wine contains alcohol; use stock with a teaspoon of vinegar instead. A common mistake is putting in all the meat at once: it stews grey instead of browning. Chef's tip: cut the beef into small, even 2 cm cubes so every piece browns fast and stays tender.

25 min

Portuguese Meat

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Picadas veracruzanasMasa cakes with salsa

Breakfast in the port of Veracruz and in Xalapa often starts with picadas at a market fonda or a café by the harbour: palm-sized rounds of fresh masa, cooked on the comal, then pinched all around while hot (picar means to pinch) to make little ridges that catch the salsa. Half are spooned with red salsa and half with green, then scattered with onion and crumbled cheese, and eaten with black coffee. Cooks there drizzle them with hot pork lard; this recipe uses a little oil instead. Chef's tip: wet your fingertips in cold water before pinching, so you can work the hot masa without burning yourself.

35 min

Mexican Breakfast & Brunch

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Picadinho cariocaDiced beef stew with rice

Diced small and simmered in a glossy tomato gravy, picadinho is the plate Rio de Janeiro orders at lunch counters and old bars in Centro, and the one cariocas cook at home when they want comfort. The tender cubes of beef come with white rice, a fried egg with a runny yolk, farofa and slices of banana, and every forkful mixes a bit of everything: savoury, sweet, crisp and soft. The everyday mistake is crowding the pan, so the beef boils grey instead of browning; fry it in batches. Cook the eggs until the whites are fully set; if you are serving pregnant women, young children or older people, cook the yolks firm too. Chef's tip: cut the beef into 1.5 cm cubes; any larger and it is a stew, any smaller and it dries out.

65 min

Brazilian Meat

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Picante de polloChicken in red chilli sauce

High up in Jujuy, picante de pollo is the dish cooks make for weddings, patronal feast days and Carnival in the Quebrada de Humahuaca, and the small comedores near the markets of San Salvador serve it every Sunday. Chicken pieces are first poached, then finished in a vivid red sauce of ají colorado (ground dried red chilli), lots of onion, tomato and garlic, thickened with the broth; on the plate it goes with white rice, boiled Andean potatoes and often a scattering of crunchy fried potato sticks (papas fritas en bastón) or chopped tomato and onion. It is warming rather than fiery, with a deep earthy chilli flavour. The chicken must reach 74 °C at the bone. Burning the ground chilli is the usual mistake: add it to the pan off the heat or over a gentle flame, or it turns bitter in seconds. Chef's tip: let the stew sit for 15 minutes before serving; the chicken absorbs the red sauce and the colour deepens.

70 min

Argentinian Chicken

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PickertFried yeasted potato loaf with raisins

Pickert is the bread of Lippe and the Teutoburg Forest in eastern Westphalia, made where wheat was scarce and potatoes plentiful: grated raw potato, flour, eggs and yeast baked into a dense, moist loaf, studded with raisins. Locals slice it the next day and fry the slices in butter until crisp, then eat them for breakfast or supper with plum butter, sugar beet syrup, jam or, for meat eaters, liver sausage. This vegetarian version serves it with jam and syrup. A common mistake is not squeezing the potatoes, which leaves the loaf soggy in the middle. Chef's tip: bake it a day ahead; cold Pickert slices cleanly and fries far better than warm.

90 min

German Breads & Parathas

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Pideli köfteGrilled meatballs on flatbread

Bursa, the city that gave the world İskender, has its own everyday answer for those who don't want doner: pideli köfte, served in workers' lokantas around the Ulu Cami. Small grilled köfte are laid over cubes of soft pide, drenched in a thin tomato sauce, then finished at the table with browned butter poured over so it hisses, with thick yoghurt on the side. It is rich, messy and very satisfying. Chef's tip: warm the pide in the oven before adding the sauce, so it soaks up the juices but keeps some chew.

50 min

Turkish Meat

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Pimenta da terraFermented red pepper paste

On São Miguel, nearly every kitchen has a jar of pimenta da terra, crushed red peppers salted and left to ferment for a few days until they turn tangy and deep red. It goes into stews, octopus, beans and sausages, onto grilled fish and into sandwiches of bolo lêvedo. It can be mild or fiery depending on the peppers. Make it in late summer when red peppers are cheap. Chef's tip: weigh the salt; too little lets the wrong bacteria take over, while the right amount keeps it safe and lets it ferment slowly.

40 min

Portuguese Chutneys & Dips

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Pinhão cozidoBoiled pine nuts

When frost settles on the highlands of Paraná and Santa Catarina, every street fair and roadside stall in Curitiba, Lages and São Joaquim sells paper cones of hot pinhão. These are the seeds of the Araucaria pine, big as a thumb, with a leathery brown shell and a starchy, sweet centre that tastes somewhere between chestnut and boiled potato. Families boil a pot after supper and peel them around the wood stove, and the pinhão is also the star of the Festa do Pinhão in Lages each June. The season runs roughly April to July; outside the south, look for vacuum-packed or frozen pinhão in Brazilian shops, and if you cannot find any, fresh chestnuts cooked the same way are the closest stand-in. The common mistake is pulling them out too early: underdone pinhão is waxy, hard to peel and slightly bitter. Chef's tip: snip the pointed tip off each seed before boiling and the shell slips off in one piece once cooked.

60 min

Brazilian Snacks & Starters

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Pionono de dulce de lecheDulce de leche sponge roll

Pionono is the flat, springy sponge sheet that Argentine supermarkets sell ready-made for party rolls; at home it takes 10 minutes to bake and makes a far lighter roll. The sweet version, filled with dulce de leche and softly whipped cream, is a birthday and Sunday-tea classic in Buenos Aires and Córdoba, cut into spirals that show off the swirl. Savoury piononos rolled around ham, cheese, tomato and mayonnaise are just as common at parties; this one is the sweet, vegetarian kind. The sponge is a fatless, egg-rich batter that relies on air, so whisk the eggs until they hold a trail for several seconds. Most cracked rolls come from letting the sponge cool flat before rolling. Chef's tip: turn the hot sponge out onto a clean tea towel dusted with sugar, peel off the paper and roll it up in the towel while warm, then unroll to fill once cool; it remembers the shape and doesn't split.

40 min

Argentinian Desserts

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Piononos de Santa FeSponge rolls with toasted cream

The pionono was invented in Santa Fe, on the plain outside Granada, in the late nineteenth century by a local pastry maker who named it after Pope Pius IX, Pío Nono in Spanish. The town still sells them by the dozen from its bakeries, and granadinos carry boxes home for Sunday coffee. Each one is a little standing roll of thin sponge soaked in cinnamon syrup, filled with custard and capped with a dome of custard burnt under a hot iron or torch. Chef's tip: roll the sponge while it is still warm and pliable; once cool it cracks instead of curling.

75 min

Spanish Desserts

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Piperies Florinis gemistesFeta-stuffed roasted peppers

Every autumn the long crimson peppers of Florina, near the borders of north-west Macedonia, are roasted over wood in courtyards and either jarred for winter or stuffed and eaten straight away. Here they are charred, peeled and filled with soft feta beaten with herbs and a little chilli, then baked until the cheese just begins to melt. They're a meze for the ouzeri table, with bread for the juices, or a light supper with a salad. Feta is traditionally made with animal rennet, so pick a vegetarian feta-style cheese if that matters. Common mistake: tearing the peppers while peeling — let them steam under a lid first and the skins slip right off. Chef's tip: keep the stalks on; they hold the peppers together and make them easy to lift.

55 min

Greek Snacks & Starters

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PiperradaPeppers and tomato with eggs

Piperrada belongs to late summer on both sides of the Pyrenees, when the market stalls of Bayonne, Gernika and Pamplona are piled with green and red peppers. The vegetables are stewed slowly in olive oil until sweet and jammy, and in many Basque homes beaten eggs are stirred in at the end for a light supper. It is often served with cured ham alongside; this version is vegetarian. A common mistake is rushing the peppers over a high heat: they should collapse slowly, or the dish tastes raw and sharp. Chef's tip: take the pan off the heat while the eggs still look slightly wet, because they keep cooking on the way to the table.

55 min

Spanish Vegetarian

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Pipirrana jaeneraTomato pepper salad with egg yolk

Olive pickers in the province of Jaén used to carry the makings of pipirrana into the groves, and in the city it is still the salad people set out on a hot July evening, with bread for the juices. What sets the Jaén version apart is the dressing: garlic, salt and boiled egg yolk are pounded together, then loosened with the province's own peppery oil until it turns creamy. Some cooks add tinned tuna; this one stays vegetarian. The usual mistake is chopping the vegetables in large chunks; everything should be cut small enough to fit a fork. Chef's tip: peel the tomatoes before dicing, so the dressing clings to soft flesh instead of slipping off tough skin.

30 min

Spanish Salads

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Pipoca doceCaramelised popcorn

Pink, sticky and crunchy, sweet popcorn is the smell of a São João fairground and of the pipoqueiro carts outside schools and squares all year. The popcorn pops directly in a sugar syrup, so every kernel gets a thin, glassy, crackly shell; a few drops of red colouring turn it the classic festival pink. It takes about 10 minutes, so it is a favourite to make with kids watching from a safe distance. Use a plant-based red colouring if you want it vegan, as some red colourings are made from insects. Many cooks add too much colouring or sugar, which makes a sticky clump that never goes crisp. Chef's tip: shake the pan constantly once the popping slows, then tip it out immediately onto a tray and separate the kernels with two forks while still hot.

12 min

Brazilian Snacks & Starters

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Piquillos rellenos de setasPeppers stuffed with mushrooms

Lodosa, on the Ebro in southern Navarre, roasts its little pointed piquillo peppers over wood, peels them by hand and jars them under its own protected name. When the autumn rains bring mushrooms up in the Navarrese hills, the peppers get stuffed with a thick mushroom béchamel, coated and fried, and served as a starter at family lunches or as a pintxo in the old town of Pamplona. A smooth sauce made from a few extra peppers goes underneath. Chef's tip: chill the filling until it is firm enough to scoop, which makes filling the soft peppers far easier.

75 min

Spanish Vegetarian

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Pirarucu de casacaLayered dried fish, farofa and plantain

A party dish from Manaus and the Amazonas interior, pirarucu de casaca (pirarucu in a coat) is built in a big dish for birthdays and Christmas: a bed of buttery-looking farofa, a layer of shredded salt pirarucu cooked with tomato and coconut milk, golden slices of fried plantain, more farofa, and a scattering of raisins, olives, egg and herbs. Each spoonful is salty, sweet and crunchy at once. Pirarucu, the giant Amazon fish, is sold salted and dried like cod; salt cod is the easy substitute. Allow 24 hours to soak the fish in the fridge. A common slip-up is under-soaking, which makes the dish too salty to eat; taste a flake before you cook. Chef's tip: use very ripe, black-skinned plantain, fried slowly, so it caramelises and balances the salt of the fish.

85 min

Brazilian Fish

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Pirpirim çorbasıPurslane, bean and bulgur soup

Purslane grows wild between the tea rows and maize fields of Giresun and Ordu, and in high summer it ends up in pirpirim çorbası, a lemony, slightly tangy soup thickened with cracked wheat and soft white beans. Families make it in big pots on hot days because it is just as good served lukewarm as piping hot. The fleshy leaves turn silky, the bulgur gives a gentle chew and a spoon of yoghurt on top makes it a full lunch. Common mistake: adding the purslane too early so it turns slimy and grey; it needs only 10 minutes. Chef's tip: keep a few raw sprigs back and stir them in at the end for crunch and a fresh green colour.

50 min

Turkish Soups

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PişiFried dough puffs

When a Turkish family has time for a long Sunday breakfast, someone stands at the stove frying pişi while the rest of the table fills with white cheese, olives, tomatoes, honey and endless tea. The yeasted dough is stretched thin with oiled fingers and fried until it balloons, golden and crisp outside and chewy inside. In villages across Anatolia it is also the treat made on bread-baking day from the last of the dough. Common mistake: oil that isn't hot enough; the pişi soaks it up and turns greasy. Chef's tip: poke a hole in the middle of each round before frying so it puffs evenly and cooks through.

35 min

Turkish Breakfast & Brunch

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HindbehDandelion greens with fried onions

Each spring, people in the Lebanese hills go out with a knife and a bag to gather wild chicory and dandelion for hindbeh, a Lenten favourite in Christian homes and a regular on mezze tables all year. The bitter greens are blanched, squeezed and fried with garlic in olive oil, then piled with a tangle of deeply browned, crisp onions and served with lemon wedges. The bitterness, the sweetness of the onions and the sharp lemon balance each other, and it is eaten at room temperature with bread. Cultivated dandelion or curly endive from a greengrocer works well. Common mistake: not squeezing the greens dry; water stops them frying and dilutes the oil. Chef's tip: fry the onions slowly and pull them out a shade lighter than you want — they keep darkening on the paper.

50 min

Lebanese Vegetarian

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