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Chainaki
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Chainaki

Teapot lamb with split peas

In the teahouses of northern and central Afghanistan, from Mazar to the Salang road, every traveller who orders chainaki gets his own small metal teapot packed with lamb, onion, split peas and water, set in the embers beside the samovar from morning until lunch. When it is ready, the broth is poured off over torn naan in a bowl and the soft meat eaten after, with raw onion and green chilli. The taste is simple and pure: clean lamb, sweet onion, a little turmeric and pepper. Rushing it on a high flame toughens the meat and boils the broth cloudy, so the heat should be so low that the liquid only trembles. Chef's tip: a small heavy lidded casserole in a low oven gives exactly the same result as the teapot, with no risk of it boiling dry.

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Com hen (Hue baby clam rice)

Cơm hến began as a cheap meal of the boat people around Cồn Hến, an islet in the Perfume River in Huế, and it is still sold for breakfast and as an afternoon snack from tiny stalls across the city. Room-temperature rice is topped with stir-fried baby clams, crunchy pork crackling, roasted peanuts, toasted rice cracker and a heap of raw herbs and greens, then splashed with hot clam broth and plenty of chilli. Huế cooks use tiny river clams; at home, choose the smallest clams you can find, such as baby or Manila clams. The mix of cool and hot, crisp and soft, is the whole point. Chef's tip: keep the rice cool and the broth boiling hot right up to the moment you pour it.

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Paella valenciana

In the villages around Valencia, paella is a Sunday lunch dish, never a dinner one, cooked in the open air by whoever in the family has the steadiest hand and eaten straight from the pan with spoons. The Valencian original has no seafood, no chorizo and no peas: just chicken, rabbit, wide flat green beans (ferraura), big white garrofó beans, tomato, sweet pimentón, saffron and short round rice. If you can't get rabbit, use all chicken; it is still very good. This version is sized for a 38–40 cm paella pan on a large hob ring or a barbecue. Chef's tip: once the rice goes in, smooth it flat and then leave it alone; stirring releases starch and turns paella into risotto.

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Nem ran (Hanoi fried spring rolls)

At Tết, the lunar new year, a plate of nem rán sits on almost every family feast tray in Hanoi and the north, and the same rolls turn up at weddings, death anniversaries and Sunday lunches all year. Northern cooks wrap a filling of minced pork, crab or prawn, glass noodles and wood ear mushroom in thin rice paper, which fries into a pale golden, bubbly shell quite different from wheat-wrapped spring rolls. Southerners call the same idea chả giò. Serve them cut in pieces with rice vermicelli, lettuce, herbs and a warm sweet-sour fish sauce. Chef's tip: fry them twice, first gently to cook the filling through, then briefly in hotter oil to crisp; they stay crunchy far longer.

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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.

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Classic tiramisu

Tiramisù ('pick me up') was created in Treviso, in the Veneto, around the 1960s and 70s; the restaurant Le Beccherie is the best-known claimant. The original is simple: savoiardi biscuits dipped in espresso, layered with a cream of egg yolks, sugar and mascarpone, and dusted with cocoa. No alcohol and no cream in the Treviso version, which is different from this site's Baileys tiramisu. It is best made the morning of, or the day before. Because the eggs are raw, use the freshest you can find, or pasteurised eggs. Chef's tip: beat the yolks and sugar for a full 5 minutes until pale and thick as custard; that is what makes the cream light without whipped cream.

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Vegetarian banh tet

In the Mekong Delta, families gather in the days before Tết (Lunar New Year) to wrap bánh tét: long, round logs of coconut-scented sticky rice around a core of mung bean, tied in banana leaves and boiled overnight over a wood fire. The everyday version hides a strip of pork belly in the middle; the chay version here, with peppery shallot-seasoned mung bean, is the one made in Buddhist pagodas and vegetarian households, and some cooks make a sweet bánh tét chuối with ripe banana instead. Slices are cut with a loop of string, eaten with pickled vegetables, or fried until crisp in the days after Tết. Chef's tip: roll and tie the log tightly; a firm parcel is what keeps the water out and gives clean, dense slices.

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Soup joumouPumpkin soup

Every 1 January, Haitian families from Port-au-Prince to Brooklyn wake up to soup joumou. It marks independence from France on 1 January 1804: under French rule, enslaved Haitians cooked this pumpkin soup but were forbidden to eat it, so the free people of the new nation made it their own as a dish of freedom. In 2021 it was added to UNESCO's list of the intangible cultural heritage of humanity. The base is a velvety purée of joumou (Caribbean pumpkin) with epis, and in it simmer chunks of carrot, potato, cabbage, celery and turnip, with pasta and a squeeze of lime. It's usually made with beef; this vegetable version is full and golden, rich enough for the day. Chef's tip: roast half the pumpkin before puréeing it; the caramelised edges give the soup the depth that slow-cooked meat usually provides.

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AloudaChilled milk drink with basil seeds

Alouda is the cold, sweet milk drink sold from stalls in the Port Louis central market and at beaches all over Mauritius, especially on hot afternoons. Vanilla- or rose-scented milk is poured over soaked tookmaria (sweet basil) seeds and cubes of agar jelly, and often topped with a scoop of ice cream. It is a cousin of the Indian falooda. Because the jelly is set with agar agar, it is vegetarian. Chef's tip: soak the basil seeds for a full 20 minutes until each one has a thick, clear coat; dry seeds stick in the throat.

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Banh mi

On Saigon pavements at breakfast time, bánh mì carts with glass cases are stacked with light, crackly rolls, tubs of pickles and trays of pâté and pork. The bread came with the French, but the filling is entirely Vietnamese: a smear of liver pâté and mayonnaise, cold cuts or lemongrass-grilled pork, sweet-sour carrot and daikon, cucumber, coriander and fresh chilli, with a splash of savoury seasoning sauce. It's eaten on the move, often on the back of a motorbike. This is the meat version; there is also a lemongrass tofu bánh mì on the site. Chef's tip: choose the lightest, airiest baguettes you can find, as a dense French loaf squeezes the filling out the sides.

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ÄlplermagronenAlpine macaroni with potatoes and cheese

Älplermagronen is what dairymen cooked in the summer huts of central Switzerland, from Uri to the Bernese Oberland, using what they carried up and what the cows gave: pasta, potatoes, cream and their own cheese. Today it is a fixture of mountain restaurants and a quick weeknight supper across German-speaking Switzerland, always eaten with a bowl of warm apple sauce (Apfelmus) on the side, the sweet-sour fruit cutting the rich cheese. Many versions scatter bacon over the top; this one leaves it out and leans on a heap of slow-browned onions for depth. Use cheese made with vegetarian rennet. Chef's tip: cook the potatoes and pasta in the same pot, adding the macaroni once the potatoes are half done, so they finish together and the starchy water helps the sauce cling.

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Bun chaGrilled pork with rice noodles

Around 11 in the morning, the side streets of Hanoi's Old Quarter fill with smoke as cooks fan little charcoal braziers loaded with pork. Bun cha is the city's lunch: grilled patties and caramelised strips of pork belly served floating in a warm bowl of thin, sweet-sour fish sauce, with cold rice vermicelli and a basket of lettuce and herbs to dip in alongside. Each mouthful is a bit of noodle, a bit of meat and a leaf or two, all dunked together. A barbecue gives the real smoky edge, but a ridged grill pan works well indoors. Chef's tip: let the grilled meat sit in the warm sauce for a few minutes before eating, so the smoky fat seasons the sauce and the sauce soaks into the meat.

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Lotus seed and longan sweet soup

Hue, the old imperial capital on the Perfume River, is famous for its chè: sweet soups and puddings sold from tiny shops where the menu runs to dozens of kinds. The most elegant is chè hạt sen long nhãn, once a palace dessert. Lotus seeds from the city's lakes are simmered until soft and creamy, then tucked inside juicy longan fruit and served in a light, clear syrup. It is eaten warm on cool rainy afternoons or over crushed ice in the hot months. Chef's tip: split each dried lotus seed and pick out any green germ inside before cooking; one missed germ makes the whole bowl bitter.

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Ackee and saltfish

On a Jamaican Sunday morning, from Kingston yards to country kitchens in St Mary, the smell of salt cod frying with onion, thyme and scotch bonnet means breakfast is nearly ready. The ackee itself is a red tree fruit whose cream-coloured flesh cooks up soft and mild, a lot like scrambled egg, and it soaks up the salty fish and peppery oil around it. It is eaten with fried dumplings, boiled green banana, roast breadfruit or hard dough bread, and is just as welcome at lunch. A note on safety: ackee is only safe when the pod has ripened on the tree and opened by itself, and the black seeds and pink membrane are removed. Outside Jamaica, tinned ackee is the safe, easy choice and is what this recipe uses. Chef's tip: soak the saltfish overnight and then boil it once; taste a flake before it goes in the pan, because you can always add salt but you can't take it out.

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Jamaican curry goat

No Jamaican wedding, nine-night or big Sunday family lunch is complete without a pot of curry goat, often cooked outdoors in a huge pot by whoever has the steadiest hand with the seasoning. It came to the island with Indian indentured workers in the 1800s and became fully Jamaican with scotch bonnet, pimento and thyme. The bone-in pieces are seasoned overnight, browned with the curry powder until it darkens, then simmered for a couple of hours into a rich, brick-yellow gravy with soft potatoes that thicken it. Serve with white rice or rice and peas and a little fried plantain. If you can't find goat, bone-in mutton or lamb shoulder works the same way. Chef's tip: 'burn' the curry first; fry the curry powder in hot oil for a minute until it darkens and smells toasty before the meat goes in, and the gravy will never taste raw or chalky.

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Brown stew chicken

Ask a Jamaican what was on the table for weekday dinner growing up and brown stew chicken will be near the top of the list, served at home and at every cookshop from Montego Bay to Spanish Town. The deep colour comes from 'browning': sugar caramelised in hot oil until it is dark, then the seasoned chicken is turned in it so every piece takes on a mahogany coat. Peppers, onion, tomato and thyme simmer down into a sticky, savoury gravy that begs for a pile of white rice, rice and peas or boiled dumplings. Chef's tip: season the chicken the night before and dry each piece well before it goes into the caramel; wet chicken spits violently and won't take on that deep brown colour.

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Tawa mushrooms

Halved mushrooms cooked on the tawa in a rich masala of browned onions, ginger, garlic and puréed tomato, finished with a little cream and dried fenugreek. It's quick, creamy and full of flavour. Serve hot with naan, paratha or bread straight off the barbecue.

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Oxtail with butter beans

Oxtail started out as a cheap cut in Jamaica and is now the Sunday-best dish that cookshops in Kingston sell out of first, and that people across the diaspora queue for on Saturdays. The bony pieces are seasoned overnight, browned hard, then braised slowly for hours with pimento, thyme and whole scotch bonnet until the meat slides off the bone and the gravy turns glossy with gelatine. Butter beans go in near the end to soak up the gravy. Serve with rice and peas, steamed cabbage and fried plantain. Chef's tip: cook it a day ahead, chill, and lift off the hard layer of fat before reheating; the gravy is cleaner and the flavour deeper.

235 minJamaicanMeat
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Yangnyeom chicken (Korean fried chicken)

Fried chicken shops are on almost every street corner in Korea, and late-night delivery boxes are shared over sport on TV or by the river in summer. The pairing with beer even has its own word, chimaek, but an ice-cold alcohol-free beer, barley tea or a fizzy drink works just as well. Yangnyeom chicken is the glazed kind, tossed in a sweet, garlicky gochujang sauce, and it always comes with cubes of white pickled radish to cut the richness. Chef's tip: let the chicken rest for 5 minutes between the two fries; the moisture that rises to the surface is what the second fry turns into a shatteringly crisp shell.

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Tobago curry crab and dumpling

On Tobago, curry crab and dumpling is the dish people travel for, eaten with fingers on Sunday afternoons and sold at the Store Bay food huts near Crown Point, where a plate is half the reason to visit. Blue crabs are cleaned, rubbed with green seasoning, 'burnt' in curry and simmered in coconut milk until the shells turn red and the sauce goes rich, spicy and sweet with crab. Long, flat flour dumplings cook right in the gravy and soak it all up. It's messy, so have bowls for shells and plenty of napkins. Chef's tip: crack the claws lightly before they go in the pot, so the curry can get inside and the meat is easy to pull out at the table.

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Rogan josh

In the Kashmir Valley this deep-red lamb braise turns up at every wazwan, the multi-course wedding feast cooked by hereditary chefs, and on Sunday tables in Srinagar through the cold months. The Kashmiri Pandit version cooked here uses no onion, garlic or tomato: the colour comes from mild Kashmiri chillies, the warmth from ground fennel and dry ginger, and the body from yogurt cooked down until the fat rises red to the top (that red oil is the 'rogan'). Eat it with plain steamed rice, the Kashmiri way. Chef's tip: use bone-in shoulder or leg and give it time; the bones and slow simmer make the thick, glossy gravy, and boneless meat turns stringy before the sauce is ready.

120 minIndianMeatGluten freeSpicy
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BraaibroodjieGrilled cheese and tomato sandwiches

No South African braai is finished without braaibroodjies, the sandwiches that go onto the grid once the coals have died down, from Cape Town to the Highveld. White bread is buttered on the outside and filled with cheddar, tomato, onion and a thin smear of apricot jam, a sweet-and-savoury combination every South African swears by. They come off the fire smoky, crisp and oozing. A frying pan or griddle works when there's no braai. Chef's tip: toast them over gentle, ashen coals and turn often; fierce heat burns the bread before the cheese inside has melted.

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Kullu trout

Rainbow trout were introduced to the cold, fast Beas river over a century ago, and today the farms and roadside dhabas between Kullu and Manali serve it simply: rubbed with lemon and a light masala, then fried whole in a hot pan. It is what travellers stop for on the drive up to the snow, eaten with rice, a green salad and a squeeze of lemon. The spicing is gentle so the clean, sweet flavour of the fish stays in front. Chef's tip: dry the fish very well and leave it alone in the pan for the first few minutes; moving it too early tears the skin, which should come out crisp.

25 minIndianFishGluten free
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MansafLamb in yogurt sauce with rice

Mansaf is Jordan's national dish and the centrepiece of its weddings, Eid gatherings and big family days, set down on a huge round tray for everyone to eat from together. Bone-in lamb is simmered until tender in a sauce of jameed, the dried, salted goat's-milk yogurt of the Bedouin, then served on thin shrak bread and turmeric-tinted rice, scattered with almonds and pine nuts and drenched in more of the hot sauce. If you can't find jameed, a mix of thick yogurt and labneh gives a fair stand-in. Chef's tip: stir the yogurt sauce in one direction constantly as it heats, and never let it boil hard before the lamb goes in; that is what keeps it smooth.

180 minLebaneseMeat
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Butter chicken

Butter chicken was born in the Punjabi restaurants of Old Delhi after Partition, when cooks found a way to use up tandoori chicken by simmering it in tomatoes, butter and cream. It is not the same as chicken tikka masala: tikka masala builds its sauce on fried onions and is chunkier and spicier, while makhani gravy has no onion at all, is strained silky-smooth, and gets its gentle sweetness and smoky-savoury note from butter, cashews and dried fenugreek leaves. It is the dish families order for celebrations across Delhi and Punjab, mopped up with butter naan or eaten with jeera rice, and it's mild enough for children. Chef's tip: crush the kasuri methi between your palms right over the pot; that one step is what makes it taste like the restaurant version.

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Tandoori chicken

Tandoori chicken comes from Punjab, where clay tandoor ovens fired with wood or charcoal reach well over 400 °C and roast marinated chicken in minutes. In Punjabi dhabas and wedding buffets it arrives on a sizzling plate with raw onion rings, lemon and mint chutney, and it's the starting point for butter chicken. A home oven can't match a tandoor, but a very hot oven plus a final blast under the grill gets you charred edges and juicy meat. The two-step marinade (lemon and salt first, then spiced yogurt) is the key. Chef's tip: cut deep slashes right down to the bone; the marinade gets inside and the thick legs cook through at the same time as the thinner parts.

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Mughlai chicken korma

In the lanes around the Jama Masjid in Old Delhi, korma is cooked in huge copper degs for Eid and wedding feasts and sold from dawn with khamiri roti and sheermal. It descends from the Mughal court kitchens, where 'korma' meant meat braised slowly in yogurt and its own juices rather than in water. This one is not the mild, pale, coconut-sweet korma of British curry houses: it is golden-brown, fragrant with cardamom and mace, enriched with almond paste and fried onions, and medium-hot. Chef's tip: fry the onions slowly to an even golden-brown and grind them with the yogurt; the browned onion paste is both the colour and the backbone of the sauce.

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Mushroom stroganoff

Beef stroganoff was named after the aristocratic Stroganov family of St Petersburg in the nineteenth century, and the original is strips of beef in a sauce of smetana and mustard. In Russian homes today the meatless version, made with forest mushrooms in autumn and button mushrooms the rest of the year, is just as common, especially during Orthodox fasts and on weeknights. It differs from Hungarian paprikás: no paprika, a gentle mustard edge, and a sauce that should stay pale and creamy. Serve it on fluffy buckwheat or mashed potatoes. Chef's tip: stir the smetana in off the boil; bubbling it hard makes it split into grainy curds.

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Nakuru-style sizzlerVegetable and corn ball sizzler

A complete barbecue meal on one big tawa: a tangy wheat and vegetable mix with three chutneys, crisp cheesy corn balls, baked stuffed capsicums and creamy cheesy pasta, all sizzling under hot barbecue sauce. Every part can be made ahead and finished on the jiko. It's a healthy and filling meal by itself.

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Bhopali gosht korma

Bhopal was ruled for over a century by the Begums, and its Muslim kitchens developed their own style: earthier and more robust than the delicate cooking of Lucknow, with a liking for red chilli, roasted coriander and a thickening paste of dried coconut and poppy seeds. This mutton korma is the centrepiece of Eid lunches and nikah dinners in the old city around Chowk Bazaar, eaten with sheermal or khamiri roti. Compared with an Old Delhi chicken korma, it is darker, hotter and nuttier, and it's made with goat on the bone. Chef's tip: crush the fried onions roughly with your hands instead of blending them smooth; the little flecks of onion are part of the Bhopali texture.

140 minIndianMeatGluten freeSpicy
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Chambo with nsimaFried fish with maize porridge

Chambo is a tilapia from Lake Malawi, and fried chambo with nsima (stiff maize porridge) is what visitors to Mangochi, Cape Maclear and Nkhata Bay are served at lakeside lunches. The fish is fried or grilled whole, then topped with a fresh tomato and onion relish; the nsima is pinched off and used to scoop up the fish and juice. The mistake is skipping the relish, which keeps the meal fresh; make it while the fish fries. Chef's tip: any whole tilapia or sea bream works if you can't find chambo.

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Olivier salad (vegetarian)

Salat Olivier was born in a fashionable Moscow restaurant in the 1860s, but today it belongs to every Russian kitchen on 31 December, when a bowl the size of a washing-up basin is made in the afternoon and eaten until 1 January is well over. Soviet cooks swapped the original's game for boiled sausage; this vegetarian version leaves it out and lets the sweet carrots, peas, sharp pickled cucumbers and creamy egg carry the salad. Chef's tip: cut everything to the size of a pea, the same size as the peas themselves; that is what makes Olivier feel like Olivier rather than potato salad.

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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.

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Goan fish curry (xitt codi)

Ask anyone from Salcete or Bardez what they eat for lunch and the answer is xitt codi: rice (xitt) and curry (codi), almost always fish curry. The gravy is ground from fresh coconut and Kashmiri chillies, soured with kokum and tamarind, and cooked with whatever the boats brought in, from kingfish and pomfret to mackerel. It is a weekday dish, ladled over red Goan rice with a fried fish or a pickle on the side. Chef's tip: grind the coconut masala for a full 2–3 minutes until it is completely smooth; a grainy paste gives a thin, separated curry.

50 minIndianFishGluten freeSpicy
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Pork vindaloo (vindalho)

Vindalho grew out of the Portuguese vinha d'alhos, meat kept in wine and garlic, which Goan Catholic cooks remade with palm vinegar, Kashmiri chillies and spices. In Goa it is a feast dish for Christmas, weddings and the big family lunch after a church feast, made a day or two ahead because it improves as it sits. Despite its fame, the real thing is more sour and garlicky than blisteringly hot, and it has no potatoes. This recipe contains no alcohol. Chef's tip: let the pork marinate overnight in the fridge so the vinegar and chilli go right through the meat.

125 minIndianMeatGluten freeSpicy
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Chimichurri

No Argentine asado (barbecue), from a Buenos Aires rooftop to an estancia in the Pampas, is complete without a jar of chimichurri on the table. It is a loose, oily sauce of finely chopped parsley, garlic, dried oregano and chilli flakes in red wine vinegar and oil, sharp and herby rather than smooth like pesto. Spoon it over grilled vegetables, provoleta, halloumi, potatoes and bread. Chef's tip: chop everything by hand and let it sit for a few hours; a food processor bruises the parsley into a green purée and the flavours never settle.

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Sauerkraut

Sauerkraut is how German households have kept cabbage through the winter for centuries, and autumn is still when families in Baden, Franconia and Alsace shred the new white cabbage into stoneware crocks. It's nothing but cabbage and salt: the salt pulls out the juice and natural lactic acid bacteria do the rest, turning it sour, crunchy and full of flavour in a few weeks. Raw homemade sauerkraut tastes far fresher than the jar and is a lovely side for Kartoffelpuffer or potato mash; for a warm side, simmer it with onion and a grated apple. Chef's tip: weigh the cabbage and use exactly 2% of its weight in salt; too little and it goes soft and mouldy, too much and it won't ferment.

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Thalassery chicken biryani

On the Malabar coast of northern Kerala, the port town of Thalassery makes its biryani with kaima (jeerakasala), a tiny fragrant rice that stays separate and buttery instead of long and dry. Mappila Muslim families serve it at weddings, at Eid and at Friday lunches, the chicken cooked first in a green-chilli and tomato masala, then buried under ghee rice and sealed for dum. There is no red chilli powder in it; the heat comes from fresh green chillies, and the sweetness from cashews, raisins and deeply fried onions. Serve it with a sharp date-and-onion pickle or a simple raita. Chef's tip: toast the washed, drained rice in ghee until it smells nutty before the water goes in; it keeps every grain whole.

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Hiroshima oyster nabe (kaki nabe)

Hiroshima Bay is lined with oyster rafts, and from late autumn to early spring the city's restaurants put kaki nabe on the menu. In the version called dote nabe, a thick band of sweetened miso is smeared around the inside of the pot like a riverbank, then melts into the broth bit by bit as you eat. Cabbage, tofu, leek and mushrooms go in first; the oysters only need a few minutes at the end. It is cooked at the table on a portable burner, so everyone eats it as it is ready. Chef's tip: rinse the shucked oysters in a bowl with potato starch and a little salt, then in clean water; the grey starch pulls out grit and slime and leaves them clean-tasting.

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Onomichi ramen

Onomichi is a hilly port town in Hiroshima prefecture on the Seto Inland Sea, and the start of the Shimanami Kaido cycle route across the islands to Shikoku. Its ramen shops serve a dark soy-seasoned broth made from chicken and small dried fish, with flat, slightly wavy noodles. The signature is a scattering of soft pork back-fat pieces that float on top and melt into each mouthful. Many visitors eat a bowl before or after the bike ride. Chef's tip: pull the heads and dark bellies off the dried sardines before using them; that is where the bitterness lives, and the cleaned fish give a sweet, clean sea flavour.

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Chettinad chicken

The Nattukottai Chettiar merchants of Karaikudi and the villages around it in southern Tamil Nadu built grand mansions on the spice trade, and their kitchens show it. Their chicken curry is built on a masala roasted and ground at home: dried red chillies, black pepper, fennel, star anise, coconut and the earthy lichen called kalpasi. It is hot, aromatic and deep brown, and in Chettinad it is eaten at Sunday lunch and festivals with rice, idiyappam or flaky parotta. Chef's tip: grind the roasted masala while it is still warm with a splash of water; the oils release and the paste comes out smooth.

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Wagyu steak, Kobe style

Kobe's steakhouses cook beef on a hot iron plate in front of the diners, cut it into bite-size pieces and serve it with little more than salt, wasabi and golden garlic chips. Genuine Kobe beef is a protected name: it can only come from certified Tajima cattle born and raised in Hyogo prefecture that meet strict grading rules, and it is rare and costly outside Japan. This recipe is cooked in the same style, with any good wagyu, or a well-marbled sirloin or ribeye if you cannot get wagyu. Because the fat is so rich, a modest portion goes a long way. Chef's tip: cut a small piece of fat from the edge of the steak and melt it in the pan instead of oil; it greases the pan and adds a lovely beefy aroma.

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Akashiyaki (Akashi egg and octopus dumplings)

Ask for tamagoyaki in Akashi, a fishing town on the coast of Hyogo, and you will be served these dumplings rather than a rolled omelette: that is what locals call them. Small shops near the Uonotana fish market sell them on tilted wooden boards, with a bowl of warm dashi for dipping. Compared with Osaka takoyaki, the batter is mostly egg and stock, so the balls are soft and trembling inside, and they come without sauce or mayonnaise. Akashi is famous for its octopus, and a piece sits in every ball. Chef's tip: oil the pan generously and fill each hollow right to the brim; the soft batter needs the extra to make a round, puffy ball.

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Tebasaki (Nagoya fried chicken wings)

In Nagoya's izakaya, chicken wings come whole, with the mid-joint and tip still joined in a V, and they arrive in piles beside cold drinks. Tebasaki are fried without batter until the skin turns crisp and thin, then brushed with a sweet soy glaze and dusted heavily with pepper and sesame. The spice is the point: they should taste peppery, salty and sticky at once. Eat them with your hands, twisting the two bones apart to pull the meat off. Chef's tip: brush on the glaze the moment the wings leave the oil; hot, crisp skin soaks it up and stays crunchy, while cooled wings just turn sticky.

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Andhra kodi kuraSpicy chicken curry

Guntur district grows more red chilli than almost anywhere on earth, and Andhra home cooking wears that proudly. Kodi kura is the Sunday chicken curry of Andhra homes, from Vijayawada to the Rayalaseema villages: thick, red and properly hot, with a little ground poppy seed and coconut to round out the sauce. It is eaten with heaps of plain rice, a spoon of ghee and a bowl of rasam on the side, or with jowar rotis. Chef's tip: fry the masala until oil pools at the sides before adding any water; that is where the colour and flavour come from.

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