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Asparagi alla milaneseAsparagus with fried egg

In Milan in April, when the first fat green asparagus come down from the farms of Lombardy, they are served "alla milanese": boiled until just tender, laid on a plate with melted butter and Parmigiano, and topped with a fried egg whose runny yolk becomes the sauce. It is a light lunch or a spring starter in old Milanese trattorie. Parmigiano is made with animal rennet; a vegetarian hard cheese works. For pregnant women, young children and older people, cook the yolk until firm. Chef's tip: tie the asparagus in a bundle and stand it upright in the pan so the thick stems boil while the tender tips steam.

20 min

Italian Sides

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Scarcella puglieseEaster egg biscuit bread

In Bari, Foggia and the Salento, scarcelle are baked in the days before Easter, often by children with their grandmothers: a soft, lemony shortbread-like dough shaped into baskets, doves, hearts or dolls, each holding a whole egg in its shell held down by strips of dough, then iced and covered in sprinkles. They are given as gifts on Easter morning and to children as a sign of new life. Chef's tip: use raw eggs in their shells and wash them first; they cook in the oven while the biscuit bakes. They are decorative, so wash and dry them well.

75 min

Italian Baking

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Polpette di melanzaneAubergine fritters with pecorino

In Calabria, from Reggio up to Cosenza, polpette di melanzane are what grandmothers fry in August when the garden is full of aubergines and nobody wants meat. Boiled aubergine is squeezed dry and mixed with stale bread, egg, pecorino, garlic and mint, then shaped into small balls and fried; they are eaten warm as an antipasto or cold the next day in a sandwich. They should be soft and almost creamy inside with a thin golden crust. Pecorino is usually made with animal rennet; a vegetarian hard cheese works. Chef's tip: squeeze the boiled aubergine in a clean tea towel until no more water drips; wet aubergine makes polpette that fall apart in the oil.

50 min

Italian Snacks & Starters

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Sukju namulSeasoned bean sprouts

Sukju namul is the most delicate of Korea's sprout dishes, set out on every ancestral-rite table at Chuseok and on everyday trays in Seoul homes because it takes five minutes and costs very little. Mung bean sprouts are blanched for barely a minute, then dressed with salt, a little garlic and sesame oil, so they stay juicy and crunchy with a clean, nutty taste. It belongs in bibimbap too. The common mistake is overcooking: mung bean sprouts go limp and stringy within seconds of being done, so pull them while they still squeak. Chef's tip: plunge them straight into iced water after blanching and squeeze gently; they keep their snap for a whole day.

10 min

Korean Sides

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Korokke (Japanese potato croquettes)

On Tokyo's covered shopping streets, from Togoshi Ginza to Sunamachi, butcher and deli counters fry korokke all afternoon and sell them in paper sleeves to children on their way home from school. This vegetarian version keeps the soft, slightly sweet filling of buttery mashed potato with onion and carrot, wrapped in a jagged panko crust that shatters when you bite it. Eat them hot with a drizzle of thick sweet-savoury sauce and a pile of shredded cabbage, or tuck one cold into a bento. The usual mistake is a wet mash: steam-dry the potatoes well and let the filling cool completely, or the croquettes split open in the oil. Chef's tip: chill the shaped, crumbed croquettes for 30 minutes before frying so the coating sets firm.

60 min

Japanese Snacks & Starters

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Sanshoku soboro don (three-colour rice bowl)

Japanese mothers have packed sanshoku soboro bento for school trips and sports days for generations: brown soy-simmered chicken mince, yellow sweet scrambled egg and green beans laid in three neat stripes over rice. It is cheap, colourful and loved by children, and it travels well cold. The chicken is cooked with a splash of sake and mirin that simmers right off; use water and a pinch more sugar for an alcohol-free version. The common mistake is clumpy soboro: stir the mince with four chopsticks held together over a low heat from the start, and it breaks into fine, fluffy crumbs. Chicken must reach 74 °C with no pink. Chef's tip: take the eggs off the heat while still slightly wet; they finish cooking in the hot pan and stay soft.

30 min

Japanese Chicken

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Su-renkonPickled lotus root

Lotus root is full of holes you can see straight through, so in Japan it stands for a clear view of the year ahead, and these crunchy, snow-white slices of sweet-vinegared lotus are a fixture of osechi boxes on New Year's Day. Often cut into flower shapes, they taste bright and lightly sweet with a satisfying crispness. The common mistake is boiling the slices for too long: more than 2 minutes and they turn starchy instead of crunchy. Chef's tip: add a splash of vinegar to the boiling water as well as to the pickle, which keeps the lotus root brilliantly white.

20 min

Japanese Sides

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Fave e pecorinoRaw broad beans with pecorino

On 1 May, Romans head out to the parks and the Castelli Romani hills with a sack of fresh broad beans still in their pods and a hunk of young Pecorino Romano, and spend the afternoon shelling, nibbling and talking. The pairing is simple and very Roman: sweet, grassy raw beans against salty, sharp cheese, often with a glass of something cold and a hunk of bread. Only the youngest, smallest beans work raw, so this is a dish for a few weeks of spring. Traditional pecorino uses animal rennet; choose a vegetarian sheep's cheese if you need to. Chef's tip: taste a bean before you buy; if it is starchy or bitter rather than sweet, braise those beans instead.

10 min

Italian Snacks & Starters

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Torta capreseFlourless chocolate almond cake

Torta caprese was born on the island of Capri in the 1920s, the story goes, when a baker forgot to add flour to a chocolate almond cake and created a classic by accident. It is now the cake of the Amalfi Coast: dense, moist and fudgy in the middle, with a thin crackled crust and a dusting of icing sugar. Restaurants in Capri and Sorrento serve it with a spoonful of cream or lemon sorbet. It is naturally gluten free. Contains nuts. Chef's tip: take it out while the middle is still slightly soft; it firms up as it cools and stays moist for days.

65 min

Italian Baking

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Tataki goboSesame burdock salad

In Kansai homes around Osaka and Kyoto, osechi always includes tataki gobo: burdock root boiled, then beaten with a rolling pin so it splits open, and dressed in a thick ground-sesame vinegar. The long, deep-rooted burdock stands for a family that is settled and lasting. The pounding gives rough, fibrous edges that soak up the nutty, tangy dressing, so each bite is earthy, sweet and sharp. The common mistake is overcooking the burdock until soft; it should still be pleasantly firm before you pound it. Chef's tip: dress the burdock while it is still warm, when the fibres open up and drink in the sesame vinegar.

25 min

Japanese Sides

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Burrata con pomodoriniBurrata with cherry tomatoes

Burrata was born in the dairies around Andria in northern Puglia as a way to use the scraps of mozzarella curd, wrapped in a pouch of stretched curd and filled with cream. In Bari and the towns of the Murge it is eaten the day it is made, often as the first thing on the table at Sunday lunch, torn open over the sweetest summer tomatoes. The outside is soft and springy; the inside, called stracciatella, spills out like thick cream. Mozzarella and burrata are usually made with calf rennet, so look for a vegetarian-rennet burrata if that matters to you. Chef's tip: take the burrata out of the fridge 30 minutes before serving; straight from the cold it tastes of very little.

10 min

Italian Snacks & Starters

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SikhyeSweet rice punch

Every Korean jjimjilbang (bathhouse) sells sikhye in little cans, and every grandmother makes a big pot of it before Seollal and Chuseok to sip after the heavy holiday meal, because it is believed to help digestion. Barley malt water and cooked rice are kept warm for several hours until enzymes turn the rice starch into sugar and the grains float up to the top, then the drink is boiled with ginger and chilled until icy. It is mild, lightly sweet and nutty, with soft rice grains to slurp. The usual mistake is letting it get too hot while it ferments: above about 65 °C the enzymes stop working and the grains never float. Contains barley (gluten). Chef's tip: use the rice cooker's 'keep warm' setting; it holds the perfect temperature on its own.

320 min

Korean Drinks

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Tteok kkochiRice cake skewers

Tteok kkochi is the after-school snack of Korea, sold for a few hundred won from carts outside primary schools, where children cluster round the vendor painting glaze onto the skewers. Cylinders of rice cake are fried until blistered and crisp outside but soft and chewy inside, then brushed with a sticky sauce of gochujang, ketchup and rice syrup. The usual mistake is frying rice cakes that are cold and hard from the fridge: they spit and stay tough in the middle, so soften them in hot water first. Rice cakes are dense and sticky, so cut them small for young children and older people and make sure they eat sitting down: they are a known choking risk. Chef's tip: dry the softened rice cakes very well before frying; water makes the oil spit.

25 min

Korean Snacks & Starters

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Japanese cream stew (chicken white stew)

When the first cold evenings arrive in Hokkaido, where dairy farming is king, and then across the rest of Japan, home cooks make cream stew: chunks of chicken thigh, potato, carrot and onion simmered in stock and finished with a silky milk sauce, eaten with rice or bread. It was a school lunch favourite after the war and is still one of the gentlest, most child-friendly Japanese dinners. This version makes the roux from scratch instead of using a block. A common mistake is adding cold milk to a fast boil, which can make it split; stir it in over a low heat. Chef's tip: add the broccoli only in the last 3 minutes so it stays bright green.

50 min

Japanese Chicken

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Cannoncini alla cremaCustard puff pastry horns

Every pastry shop in Turin and Piedmont has a tray of cannoncini: puff pastry wrapped around metal cones, baked until golden and flaky, then piped full of vanilla custard and dusted with icing sugar. Little ones are part of the "pasticcini mignon" bought on Sunday morning after church to take to lunch at the grandparents' house. You need cannoncino or cream-horn moulds. Chef's tip: fill them just before serving; custard softens the pastry within a few hours.

60 min

Italian Baking

by KrazyBadal 0 views

KuromameSweet black soybeans

No osechi box, the lacquered stack of cold dishes Japanese families share over the first three days of January, is complete without kuromame: plump black soybeans simmered so slowly in syrup that they stay whole, wrinkle-free and shining like jet. The word 'mame' also means hard work and good health, so eating them wishes for a diligent year. They are soft, sweet and gently savoury, with a deep bean flavour. The common mistake is letting the beans touch the air while cooking, which wrinkles their skins; keep them submerged under a drop-lid the whole time and top up with water. Chef's tip: soak the dry beans directly in the hot seasoned syrup overnight rather than in plain water, which seasons them from the inside and keeps the skins smooth.

250 min

Japanese Sides

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SciattBuckwheat cheese fritters

Sciatt means "toads" in the dialect of Valtellina, the Alpine valley near Sondrio, because of their lumpy shape. They are buckwheat batter fritters, each hiding a cube of Valtellina Casera cheese that melts as they fry, served on a bed of chicory salad. Mountain huts and village festivals serve them hot from the pan in autumn and winter. Local cheeses are usually made with animal rennet; choose a vegetarian melting cheese if you need to. Chef's tip: make the batter with very cold sparkling water and a splash of grappa, as locals do; the bubbles and alcohol make a lighter, crispier crust. The alcohol mostly cooks off in the frying; leave it out for an alcohol-free version.

35 min

Italian Snacks & Starters

by KrazyBadal 0 views

Melanzane a funghettoFried aubergine with tomatoes

Neapolitans call this aubergine "a funghetto" because the small fried cubes look and taste a little like sautéed mushrooms. It is a summer side dish from Naples and the Amalfi Coast, made when aubergines are cheap and glossy: cubes fried until golden, then tossed with a quick sauce of cherry tomatoes, garlic and basil. It is served warm or cold next to grilled meat or fish, or piled on bread. Chef's tip: salt the aubergine cubes and leave them in a colander for 30 minutes, then pat dry; they soak up less oil and fry crisp.

35 min

Italian Sides

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Savoiardi

Savoiardi were created in the 1300s at the court of the House of Savoy in Piedmont, for a visit by the King of France. They are long, light finger biscuits of whipped eggs, sugar and flour, with a crisp sugary crust and a dry, spongy inside, made to be soaked: in coffee for tiramisù, in liqueur for zuppa inglese, or in milk for children's breakfast. Chef's tip: dust the piped fingers twice with icing sugar, 5 minutes apart; this forms the pearly crust that keeps them crisp outside.

37 min

Italian Baking

by KrazyBadal 0 views

Torta della nonnaLemon custard pine nut tart

Torta della nonna, "grandmother's tart", is on the dessert menu of almost every trattoria in Florence and across Tuscany: a shortcrust case filled with thick lemon-scented custard, covered with a second layer of pastry and scattered with pine nuts and icing sugar. Despite the name it was probably invented by a Florentine restaurant cook in the 1900s, but it tastes of family Sunday lunches. Contains pine nuts. Chef's tip: let the custard cool completely before filling the tart; warm custard melts the butter in the pastry and makes the base soggy.

90 min

Italian Baking

by KrazyBadal 0 views

Chikuzenni (Fukuoka simmered chicken and root vegetables)

Chikuzen is the old name for the Fukuoka area of northern Kyushu, where this sweet-savoury simmer of chicken and root vegetables is called gameni and turns up at every family gathering; across Japan it is packed into the New Year osechi boxes and eaten cold. The chicken and vegetables are first stir-fried in oil, then simmered in dashi with soy, sugar, sake and mirin until the liquid reduces to a glaze. The sake and mirin simmer for 20 minutes, so the alcohol cooks off; use water and extra sugar for an alcohol-free version. The common mistake is stirring too much, which breaks the taro and lotus root into mush; shake the pan instead. Chef's tip: let it cool in the pot; the vegetables soak up flavour as it cools, so it is even better the next day.

50 min

Japanese Chicken

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SujeonggwaCinnamon persimmon punch

After a big Seollal feast in Seoul, sujeonggwa comes out ice-cold in small bowls, dark red-brown and fragrant with cinnamon and ginger, with a soft dried persimmon and a few pine nuts floating in each one. It is the punch of the New Year season, made a day or two ahead and kept on a cold balcony. The cinnamon and ginger are boiled separately and then combined, which keeps each flavour clean. The common mistake is boiling the cinnamon too long or too hard: it turns bitter and cloudy, so keep it to a gentle simmer. Contains pine nuts. Chef's tip: soak the dried persimmons in the cooled punch only a few hours before serving, so they soften without falling apart.

60 min

Korean Drinks

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Gyeran jjimSteamed egg

At Korean barbecue restaurants in Seoul and Busan, a bubbling stone pot of gyeran jjim arrives puffed high above the rim to soothe mouths burned by grilled meat and kimchi. At home it is a soft, savoury egg custard eaten with rice, especially by children. This vegetarian version uses kelp water instead of the usual salted shrimp or anchovy stock. The common mistake is keeping the heat high once the egg starts to set, which scorches the bottom and makes the top tough and full of holes. Chef's tip: stir constantly for the first minute as it heats, then cover with an upturned bowl over the lowest flame; trapped steam is what makes it rise like a soufflé.

17 min

Korean Sides

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Shokupan (Japanese milk bread)

Shokupan is the everyday sandwich loaf of Japan, sold by the half loaf at bakeries from Sapporo to Fukuoka and toasted in thick slabs for breakfast with butter and jam. Its feathery, pull-apart crumb comes from a cooked flour paste (yudane-style) that lets the dough hold more water, so the bread stays soft for days. You need a 900 g loaf tin and a few hours of mostly waiting. The usual mistake is slicing it while hot, which squashes the delicate crumb into gummy layers; let it cool fully. Chef's tip: roll each piece of dough into a tight spiral before it goes into the tin, which gives the tall, even rise and those stringy, tearable layers.

75 min

Japanese Baking

by KrazyBadal 0 views

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