Only Recipes, by Alessandra Zecchini ©

To do this you need an afternoon, as it is not a quick dinner! On the other hand, you could make it the day before, which is actually better, but I will tell you later about that. To start I cooked a pack of paccheri from  Italian Foodies , then I drained them and cooled them under cold water. In the meantime I made a vegetarian ragù, starting with a  soffritto : finely chop 1 onion, 1carrot, 1 garlic clove, 2 stalks of celery with leaves and some Italian parsley. Sauté the vegetables with some olive oil and a pinch of salt. Then add soy mince, vegetable stock and tomato passata and simmer for at least 30 minutes, or until the sauce is thick. Make a white sauce  ( Besciamella )  with milk, flour, butter, salt, pepper and nutmeg:  melt 100 g of salted butter in a saucepan, then add 100 g of plain flour and stir. Add 1.5 l of milk slowly (this needs more milk than usual as it needs to be a little runny), stirring constantly without ma...

When I was living in London, over 20 years ago now, every eatery I went to (unless it was some sort of hippy/alternative/macrobiotic/ethnic restaurant) would have two hot veggie choices: vegetarian lasagne and cauliflower cheese. I am not joking: that was it! The vegetarian lasagne was usually frozen stuff, and it seems that most pubs and cafes ordered it from the same company (i.e. it always tasted the same!). The cauliflower cheese was either boiled cauliflower with cheddar melted on top, or baked cauliflower with a white sauce... and the consistency of porridge. Meat eaters pitied me and wondered why on earth I would choose to be a vegetarian. Things are different now, and there is more choice, but I am sure that lots of vegetarians still have nightmares about that bland 'cauliflower porridge'. Anyway, here is a version that is not too cheesy (but you can add more cheese on top if you like), and tastes good.  Cavolfiore al forno Ingredients 1 large cauliflower, plus...

I have silver beet (Swiss Chard) in the garden, one of the easiest green leafy vegetable to grow in New Zealand! I usually pick the leaves as I need them, but two of my old winter plants are starting to grow heads so I decided to cut them before is too late. For this recipe first I washed two big bunches of silver beet and cook them. I boiled the white stalks first, and then the green leaves. To do this I put the stalks in a big pot with a little water, and a pinch of salt, then after they have simmered for 5 minutes I add the leaves but no more water: the steam is enough to cook the leaves.  Then I made a thick besciamelle: I melted 100 g salted butter, took the pan off the stove and quickly mixed in 100 g flour, then back on the stove and slowly added 1 l milk. I stirred well until thick, and then I added salt to taste, white pepper and freshly grated nutmeg. In the meantime I cooked 500 g of pasta, I drained it and dressed it with a couple of tbsp of bes...