Curried cauliflower cheese filo pie

Nothing is as exciting as a new Ottolenghi cookbook but I particularly love the approach of Shelf Love on which he’s collaborated with Noor Murad and the Ottolenghi Test Kitchen team. It's the first in a series of OTK books which are designed to be easy and versatile (they recommend alternative ingredients if you don't have the ones in the recipe)

I’ve already had the chance to taste a couple of recipes friends have made but this cauliflower cheese filo pie has my name all over it. Yours too, hopefully!

Curried cauliflower cheese filo pie

Cauliflower cheese, but make it pie. This dish was once described as ‘molten-hot-cheese-lava’ and we think that’s pretty fitting for the ultimate comfort of comfort foods.

Prep time: 20 minutes

Cook time: 1 hour 45 minutes

Serves 4, generously

1 large cauliflower, trimmed and cut into bite-size florets (700g)

2 tsp mild curry powder

3 tbsp olive oil

100g unsalted butter, 50g cut into roughly 3cm cubes and 50g melted

75g plain flour

675ml whole milk

2 garlic cloves, crushed

11/2 tbsp English mustard

150g mature cheddar, roughly grated

6 sheets of good-quality filo pastry (we use feuilles de filo)

salt and black pepper

1 tbsp roughly chopped parsley, to serve

11/2 tsp lemon zest, to serve

1. Preheat the oven to 180°C fan. Line the bottom and sides of a 23cm springform cake tin with baking parchment.

2. Put the cauliflower on a large, parchment-lined baking tray and toss with the curry powder, half the oil, 1/2 teaspoon of salt and a good grind of pepper. Roast for about 20 minutes, until cooked through and lightly coloured. Set aside, and turn the oven temperature down to 170°C fan.

3. Meanwhile, make the béchamel. Put the cubed butter into a medium saucepan on a medium-high heat and, once melted, whisk in the flour and cook for 1–2 minutes – it should start to smell nutty (like popcorn). Turn the heat down to medium and slowly add the milk a little at a time, whisking continuously to prevent any lumps, until incorporated and the sauce is smooth. Cook, whisking often, for about 7 minutes, until thickened slightly. Off the heat, stir in the garlic, mustard, cheese and 1/4 teaspoon of salt until the cheese has melted.

4. Keep your filo sheets under a damp tea towel to prevent them from drying out. In a bowl, combine the melted butter and the remaining 11/2 tablespoons of oil and keep to one side.

5. Working one sheet at a time, brush the exposed side of the filo with the butter mixture and drape it into your prepared tin (buttered side up), pushing it down gently to fit. Continue in this way with the next filo sheet, brushing it with butter and then laying it over the bottom sheet, rotating it slightly so the overhang drapes over the sides at a different angle. Do this with all six sheets. (There's a really good step by step series of pictures illustrating this in the book)

6. Spoon half the béchamel into the base and top with the roasted cauliflower florets. Spoon over the remaining béchamel, then crimp up the overhang so that it creates a messy ‘scrunched-up’ border around the edges, leaving the centre of the pie exposed.

7. Brush the top of the filo border with the remaining butter mixture, then transfer the tin to a baking tray and bake for 30 minutes.

8. Using a tea towel to help you, carefully release the outer circle of the springform tin and return the pie to the oven for another 20–25 minutes, or until the sides are nicely coloured and everything is golden and bubbling. Leave to settle for 15 minutes.

9. Top the pie with the parsley and lemon zest and serve warm.

What to drink: I’d go for a crisp Italian white wine like a Falanghina with this though a not-too-fruity dry Alsace, Austrian or German riesling would work well too.

Extracted from Ottolenghi Test Kitchen: Shelf Love by Noor Murad and Yotam Ottolenghi (Ebury Press, £25) All photography by Elena Heatherwick

Poppycooks' Bacon-y Garlic-y Potato-y

Given TikTok megastar Poppy O'Toole (aka @poppycooks) passion for potatoes I really had to pick a potato recipe from her fab new cookbook Poppy Cooks so here is the recipe she calls Bacon-y Garlic-y Potato-y - which really does what it says on the tin.

Bacon-y Garlic-y Potato-y

Okay. This is my official statement on achieving the perfect potato dish: bacon, garlic and potato are the ménage à trois that is out here changing lives. It’s the modern-day throuple that’s right every time. Unless you’re veggie, that is – in which case, this dish is still a stand-out with just the garlic.

Serves 4

The core

1 recipe quantity of Cheese Sauce (see below)

For the gratin

4 large potatoes, peeled, and sliced into 5mm-thick (2 inch) rounds

1 tsp salt, plus extra to season

200g/7oz smoked bacon lardons

3 garlic cloves, peeled and chopped

2 rosemary sprigs, leaves picked and roughly chopped

100g/3.oz cheddar, grated

black pepper

1. Preheat the oven to 200°C/180°C fan/400°F/Gas 6.

2. Tip the spuds into a large saucepan and just cover with water. Add the salt and place over a high heat. Bring to the boil, then cook for about 7 minutes, until tender.

3. Drain the potatoes in a colander, then suspend the colander in the potato pan and cover with a clean tea towel for about 5 minutes, until the potatoes have steamed off and dried out a bit.

4. While the spuds are boiling, add the lardons to a cold frying pan and place over a medium heat. Fry for about 6 minutes, until cooked through and golden. Remove the lardons from the pan and set aside on a plate lined with kitchen paper.

5. Tip one third of the spuds into a medium ovenproof dish, spreading them out in an even layer. Season with salt and pepper and sprinkle over one third each of the garlic, rosemary, lardons and cheese. Top with a good ladleful of cheese sauce (if it’s been chilling in the fridge, you may need to spread it out a bit) and repeat twice more (potato, garlic etc, cheese, sauce), until the dish is full and you’ve finished with a final sprinkling of cheese. Bake for 30 minutes, until golden and a bit crispy on top. Dig in!

Cheese Sauce

It ends here. No more packet cheese sauces. It is literally so easy to make your own (it’s just the béchamel with cheese in it) and I promise you’ll be able to tell the difference. Forget the powdery texture and the 10,000 unknown ingredients that you just ignore on the packet. You know everything going into this baby, and it’s all good stuff. Good stuff = good sauce.

Serves 4-6 (depending on how you use it)

500ml/2 cups whole milk

50g/2oz butter

70g/2.oz plain flour

1 tsp salt

1/4 tsp ground nutmeg

200g/7oz your choice of cheese, grated (I’d go for cheddar and double Gloucester, but a traditional mornay sauce usually just has gruyère in there)

1. Pour the milk into a medium saucepan and place it over a medium heat for 7 minutes, until warmed through. Set aside.

2. Place a second, smallish saucepan over a low–medium heat. Add the butter and allow it to melt. Then, using a spatula or wooden spoon, gradually beat in the flour, about a tablespoon at a time, until you have a thick paste. You don’t want the paste to start browning – if you’re worried just take the pan off the heat to slow things down a little as you add.

3. Once all the flour is in, cook, stirring, until you have a dough-like consistency and the paste is coming away from the sides of the pan.

4. Little by little, add the warmed milk, making sure you allow the first addition to fully incorporate into the paste before adding more. Keep mixing to avoid lumps – switch to a whisk if you need to.

5. Once all the milk is in and you have a smooth, thick sauce, season with the salt and nutmeg.

6. Now, simply add your cheese and stir to melt in and combine for the perfect cheesy sauce! If you’re not using the sauce straight away, transfer it to an airtight container (leave it to cool before you put the lid on). You can store it for 3 days in the fridge and 3 months in the freezer.

What to drink: I'm not sure how much of a wine dish this is but a Chablis or lightly oaked chardonnay would work pretty well. Or a Belgian-style blonde ale like Leffe.

From Poppy Cooks by Poppy O'Toole published by Bloomsbury at £20.

Two great prawn recipes to grill on the BBQ

Talking to food writers Helen Graves and Genevieve Taylor about recipes that might get beginners - particularly women - into barbecuing they both came up with one based on prawns, aka shrimp. Both are super-easy.

Genevieve's prawn, chorizo and ciabatta skewers

The spicy oil from the chorizo soaks into the bread so it grills up to be deliciously crisp and tasty. Keep the bread cubes fairly generous so they will be less likely to fall off the skewers.

Makes 6

6 thick slices ciabatta

2 tbsp olive oil

200g (7oz) raw peeled prawns (shrimp)

125g (4 1/2oz) dried chorizo, cut into 5mm (1/4in) discs

sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

To serve

a handful of flat-leaf parsley, chopped

1 lemon, quartered

You will also need 6 metal skewers.

When you are ready to cook, fire up your barbecue ready for direct cooking.

Cut the bread into cubes a similar size to the diameter of the chorizo and put in a bowl. Drizzle in the olive oil. Add the prawns (shrimp) and the chorizo and a good grind of salt and pepper then toss to mix. Thread onto skewers, alternating between bread, prawns and chorizo.

Lay the skewers directly over the fire and cook them for 3–5 minutes, turning regularly, until the prawns are pink and cooked through and the bread is crisp. If the bread is catching too quickly, move the skewers slightly further away from the fire to cook more gently.

To serve, scatter over the parsley and squeeze over the lemon. Eat while hot.

Credit: Foolproof BBQ by Genevieve Taylor (Quadrille, £12.99) Photography ©Jason Ingram

Helen's prawns with smoky chilli salt

For 2 people

12 large king prawns, shell on

1 smoky dried chilli, such as a jalapeno or ancho

A couple of pinches of flaky sea salt

1 lemon, cut in half

Light the barbecue for direct cooking.

Toast the chilli in a dry frying pan until fragrant - a few minutes. Remove the stalk and blitz in a spice grinder or smash it up in a pestle and mortar. Combine with the sea salt and set aside.

When the BBQ is ready, toss your prawns in a little oil but don’t season them.

Cook them over direct heat for a couple of minutes each side, or until totally pink and cooked through.

Cook the lemon cut side down over the hottest part of the BBQ until it’s lightly charred.

Serve the cooked prawns with the caramelised lemon and the chilli salt, for dipping.

Recipe and photography ©Helen Graves. You can find more of her recipes on her blog Food Stories

What to drink: Although these recipes have different seasoning they'd both go with a crisp citrussy white. I'd probably pick an unoaked white rioja or Rueda with Genevieve's recipe and an albarino or an assyrtiko with Helen's.

Pizza 'claminara'

Shellfish topped pizzas or pizzette have been right on trend recently and here's a great version from Mitch Tonks fab new cookbook Rockfish (which has a whole load of other recipes I want to cook).

Mitch writes: "There is nothing not to like about this dish and it can be easily made at home. Garlic, crisp bread and a creamy topping of sweet clams.

The method was inspired by Pizza Pilgrims, the best pizza guys in London. During the lockdown of 2020 they launched an at-home pizza kit that fascinated me, and I watched their video on how to make a delicious pizza in a frying pan. It was genius and it works!

Take the time to make this dish. It’s super. If you like folded pizza, just fold it over before cooking and enjoy a ‘clamzoni’.

MAKES 4

For the dough

a 7g sachet of fast-action dried yeast

500g strong white flour

325ml tepid water

1 tablespoon olive oil

5g salt

5g caster sugar

For the sauce

1kg live clams

100ml white wine

1 bay leaf

1 peperoncini – hot red chilli

20g butter

20g plain flour

200ml milk

2 garlic cloves, grated

a handful of chopped curly parsley

To finish

1 tablespoon grated Parmesan

1 mozzarella ball (about 125g), roughly torn

Make the dough by mixing together the yeast, flour, water, olive oil, salt and sugar. Knead on a floured surface for about 5 minutes to make a nice elastic dough. Place in a bowl, cover with a tea towel or clingfilm and leave to rise until doubled in size. This will take 1–1. hours depending on room temperature. Knock the dough back, then divide into 4 portions. Pinch and shape each into a ball and leave under the cover of a towel to prove for 30 minutes.

To make the sauce, prepare the clams. First check that all the shells are undamaged and tightly shut (or close when tapped). Rinse under cold running water to remove any grit or sand, then put the clams in a pan with the wine, bay and chilli. Cover and steam the clams until they open, about 2 minutes. When cooled, remove the clams from their shells, keeping the meat and the liquid; discard the shells and any clams that didn’t open as well as the bay leaf and chilli.

Melt the butter in a smaller pan and stir in the flour. Cook for a couple of minutes to make a roux. Mix the clam cooking liquid and the milk together and pour gradually into the roux, stirring or whisking to make a smooth white sauce. Add the garlic and parsley and simmer for 3–4 minutes. The sauce should be creamy and quite thick. Add the clam meat and stir through. Set aside.

Shape each ball of dough into a disc to fit the pan you are going to use. Push up a raised rim all around.

Preheat the grill. Heat your ovenproof frying pan over a high heat and, when hot, place one of the pizza dough discs in it. Spread a quarter of the clam sauce over the pizza, up to the raised rim. Sprinkle with a little Parmesan and dot some mozzarella liberally all over the pizza. Cook for 4–5 minutes or until the bottom of the pizza is crisp and the edges are starting to rise.

Place the pan under the hot grill to finish cooking – the edges will rise and blister and the cheese will melt and brown. Once the pizza looks full of appeal, take it out and serve, then repeat with the remaining pizza dough discs and topping.

What to drink: I definitely fancy an Italian white wine with this - most likely vermentino but other Italian whites like verdicchio would work too.

From The Rockfish Cookbook by Mitch Tonks available from therockfish.co.uk or the restaurants and Amazon. Photograph © Chris Terry