Diets
Vegan recipes
No animal products at all.
Vegan cooking has to replace three separate things that animal ingredients provide — fat, savoury depth and structure — and the recipes here are the ones that do it without a substitute pretending to be something it is not. Fat comes from oil, nuts and coconut; depth from mushrooms, miso, soy, tomato and proper browning; structure is the hard one, and where a dish needs it we use aquafaba, starch or pulses rather than an imitation. Everything tagged here is checked rather than assumed, including the wine, the sugar and the bread.
31 recipes
Wet Brine for Chicken and Pork
A five per cent salt brine for lean chicken and pork, chilled hard before the meat goes in, with the timings that stop it going spongy.
Vinegret
Beetroot, potato, carrot and sauerkraut dressed with oil rather than mayonnaise, with the beetroot oiled first to hold the colour.
Vegetable Stock
A light stock of leek, carrot, celery and onion simmered for only forty minutes, because long cooking turns vegetable stock bitter.
Spaghetti Aglio e Olio
Garlic sliced thin and taken slowly to pale gold in olive oil, emulsified with pasta water into a sauce that is nothing but those two things.
Smashed Cucumber Salad
Cucumbers smashed rather than sliced so the torn faces grip a soy, vinegar and sesame dressing instead of shedding it.
Sauerkraut
Cabbage and carrot salted, packed down and left to ferment under its own brine until it turns sour and keeps.
Salted Tomato Salad
Ripe tomatoes salted twenty minutes ahead, then dressed with the juice that draws out of them rather than plain oil.
Salsa Verde
Tomatillos and green chilli blitzed with coriander and lime — sharp, loose, and made in the time it takes to boil a kettle.
Roasted Cauliflower with Tahini
Cauliflower roasted hot in wedges so the cut faces brown, served under a tahini sauce loosened to a pouring cream with water.
Raspberry Sorbet
Sieved raspberry puree frozen with a measured sugar syrup and beaten every forty-five minutes, which is what keeps it scoopable.
Quick Salted Cucumbers
Small cucumbers held a day or two in a dill and garlic brine, salted right through but still raw and crunchy.
Quick Pickled Red Onions
Thin red onion slices covered in warm sweet-sharp brine, bright magenta and ready to eat in half an hour.
Lemony Chickpea and Herb Salad
Chickpeas dressed while they are still warm so they drink the lemon and oil, then turned through parsley, mint and dill by the handful.
Kvass
A lightly fermented drink made from dried dark rye bread, sugar and yeast, sour and faintly sweet.
Kissel
Fruit cooked with sugar and thickened with potato starch, served thin enough to drink or thick enough to eat with a spoon.
Herbed Farro Salad
Farro boiled loose in salted water like pasta, dressed while it is still hot, then packed with three soft herbs.
Gazpacho
A chilled Andalusian soup of raw tomatoes, cucumber and pepper blended with bread and olive oil, which is what turns it creamy rather than watery.
Garam Masala
Whole spices toasted one kind at a time, cooled and ground, which is what separates a fresh blend from the grey dust in a jar.
Chickpea and Spinach Stew
Dried chickpeas cooked from scratch and thickened with fried bread pounded to a paste, which is how Seville gets body without cream.
Braised White Beans with Sage
Dried beans soaked in salted water and held at a bare simmer, so the skins stay whole and the liquor turns silky.
Rice and Peas
Rice cooked in coconut milk with kidney beans, thyme and a whole scotch bonnet left in the pot and never broken.
Grilled Pineapple with Rum Syrup
Pineapple wedges charred over high heat and spooned with a dark rum, lime and brown sugar syrup reduced until it just coats.
Fried Plantain
Very ripe plantain sliced on the diagonal and fried until the sugars caramelise at the edges and the middle goes to custard.
Sourdough Boule
A lean loaf raised on starter alone, folded rather than kneaded, retarded overnight and baked covered so it steams itself.
Seeded Rye Loaf
A dense oval of dark rye and seeds, mixed rather than kneaded because rye forms almost no gluten to work with.
Pisto
Courgette, pepper, onion and tomato cooked separately, then together, until everything collapses into something sweet and jammy.
No-Knead Sourdough Focaccia
A slow sourdough focaccia fermented overnight in the fridge, dimpled deep so the pockets fill with olive oil and flaky salt.
Hand-Rolled Bagels
A stiff low-hydration dough rolled by hand, retarded overnight and boiled before baking, which is what sets the chewy glossy crust.
Garlicky Greens
Greens wilted in garlic oil in a single wide pan, on the table in under ten minutes and the default side for almost anything.
Chana Masala
Chickpeas simmered in a dark, sour tomato and onion masala, finished with amchur so the sourness sits behind the spice rather than on top of it.
Borodinsky Rye Bread
Dark sourdough rye scalded with red rye malt, sweetened with molasses and finished with a crust of coriander seed.