Baby gem, radish and goat’s cheese salad

Serves 4

Farmer's markets, plenty of them out there, and while I'm not so sure if the love of them is waning a little, but if you want to keep in touch with your seasons, there are few better places to hang out. Presently I'm totally spoilt in that if I'm prepared to do a bit of legwork, I now have 4 days out of 7 where I can shop this way at different markets, ensuring the whole sustainable thing is being kept in check, while keeping it as fresh and local as I possibly can. Yestrday morning I wandered down to Dupont Circle market here in DC and in amongst the late apples and early rhubarb, an abundance of spring leaves and vegetables have come up for air. This is what took my fancy and made the perfect Sunday night supper with little fuss and even less effort.

1 large baby gem lettuce
40g watercress (picked weight)
20g pea shoots

6 fat radishes, sliced

5 spring onions, thinly sliced
Half a small bunch of dill
80g goat’s cheese, cut into small cubes

For the vinaigrette
50ml good quality white wine vinegar
1 tsp Dijon mustard
250ml groundnut oil
Salt and pepper

Pick and wash all the salad leaves and set aside.

To make the vinaigrette, mix the vinegar with the mustard, and then slowly add the oil while whisking vigorously or blending with a hand blender.

Season to taste with salt and pepper.

Dress the salad leaves with about 2 tblsp of the vinaigrette, toss together with all the other ingredients and serve pronto.

Ice cream

Washington, DC, day 5 and I've just seen the light of day - quite literally, and the VERY BEST ice cream I think I can EVER remember having... from Dolcezza Gelato in Georgetown, about a 20 minute walk from my new home, and well worth every step of the way.

I went for three big flavours with a Thai coconut, an amazing Valrhona chocolate and an organic pistachio. The three together just rocked, and I know there are going to be so many return visits now this discovery has proven to be so amazing.

The weather since I arrived has been so so perfect, by all accounts, Spring has come a month earlier than usual, so this afternoons impromptu ice cream trip was made all the better for the sun being high up in a glorious blue sky.

There's a tiny little patch of seating in Book Hill Park, on the way back from Dolcezza, the perfect spot to enjoy my treat while watching the traffic trundle up and down Wisconsin Avenue, I've arrived DC, and you know what, I think I'm going to get to like you.

Quick cassoulet

Serves 4

I think I've mentioned cassoulet before, if so there's an admission of a love affair I'm not shy about. This one is dead easy though, opening, a bit of frying and assembling kind of stuff. Just as long as you buy decent quality sausages you'll get a pretty good end result. At the end of the day this is peasant food, so let's not get all professional and try too hard - decent ingredients layered up with a bit of thoughtful timing and a bit of patience will pay dividends. Should you opt for the slower cooking of the last sector, run yourself a big bubble bath, pour the biggest glass of red you can, and sink into at least an hour's worth of anticipation...

4 plump spicy sausages

1 duck breast or thigh, cut into thick slices

1 tblsp olive oil

225g smoked bacon with plenty of fat, cut into large dice

1 large onion, roughly chopped

4 garlic cloves, peeled and thinly sliced

1 tsp tomato purée

55ml red wine

400g chopped tomatoes

2 x 425g cans haricot or butter beans, drained

1 bay leaf

2 tblsp grain mustard

50g coarse breadcrumbs

In a heavy, flameproof casserole, cook the sausages and duck in the olive oil until their fat runs and the sausages and duck are golden on all sides. Scoop out the meat and set aside. Add the bacon pieces to the pan and cook in the remaining fat until golden, then add the onion and garlic.

Cook for 5 or 6 minutes until they have softened slightly then stir in the tomato purée. Cook for another minute or so then pour in the red wine.

Simmer for a minute then stir in the tomatoes, the cooked sausages and the duck. Bring to the boil, stir in the beans, bay leaf, mustard and a seasoning of salt and pepper and then cook over a medium heat at a good simmer for about 15 minutes, or pop into a medium oven for easily an hour if you have the time to kill.

Remove the pan from the heat. Scatter over the breadcrumbs and place under a hot grill, a good few inches from the heat, until golden. Serve very hot.

Dill pickled salmon with mustard mayonnaise

Serves 8

This recipe serves tangy marinated salmon with a rich, homemade mustard mayonnaise, a reliable yet winning combination. Although it seems a lot of ingredients, the assembly is actually very straight forward.

Pickled salmon

900g salmon fillet, skinned and boned

Pinch of salt

Pinch of sugar

Juice of half a lemon

Lemon wedges, to serve

Rye bread, to serve

Marinade

1 bunch of fresh dill, finely chopped

2-3 strips of lemon peel

5g flat leaf parsley leaves only

2 onions, thinly sliced

2 carrots thinly sliced

2 bay leaves

25g mixed peppercorns

1 tsp sugar

1 tsp salt

Freshly ground black pepper

400ml clear malt vinegar

400ml dry white wine

Mustard mayonnaise

2 egg yolks

1 tblsp Dijon mustard

1 tsp sugar

5 tbsp vegetable oil

1 tsp white wine vinegar

8 tblsp dill leaves, finely chopped

Slice the salmon fillet into 4 cm thick slices. Sprinkle with the salt, sugar and lemon juice.

Mix all the marinade ingredients, apart from the malt vinegar and white wine together in a mixing bowl and stand for 10 minutes. Add the vinegar and wine, mixing well.

Pour the marinade into a large sealable container. Add the sliced salmon, seal and refrigerate overnight. To make the mayonnaise, whisk together the yolks, mustard and sugar in a bowl. Add the oil in a steady trickle, whisking until blended thoroughly. Once the oil has been added, mix in the vinegar and the dill.

Serve the pickled salmon with lemon wedges, mustard mayonnaise and sliced rye bread.

Roast chicken with wild garlic

Serves 4

Wild garlic, sometimes found as ramsons, is starting to show up around now. It has all the silkiness of spinach leaves and a soft scent of young garlic. The leaves appear in the wild in early spring but can increasingly be found in farmers markets too. Any garlic stall will have them for the next few weeks. I think at this early stage they can be wonderfully floral without showing too much pungency as full blown garlic often can.

A good-sized chicken for roasting (about 1.5kg)
50g butter
olive oil
1 lemon
a couple of bay leaves
a glass of white wine
A good handful of wild garlic leaves per person

Set the oven at 200C/gas mark 6. Mash the butter with a little olive oil and a generous seasoning of salt and pepper. Massage it into the skin of the chicken. Cut the lemon in half and tuck them inside the bird with a bay leaf or two.

Roast the chicken for about an hour till the skin is golden and the juices run clear. (Pierce the chicken at its thickest point, if the juices have blood in them, continue cooking. If they run clear it is ready.)

Remove the chicken to a warm place and let it rest, covered loosely with foil. Put the roasting tin over a low gas; when the roasting juices start to bubble pour in the wine and scrape at any pan-stickings so they dissolve into the juices.

Throw in the garlic leaves, stirring into the hot juices so that they start to wilt and soften. Check the seasoning then serve the juices and softened garlic with slices of the roast chicken.

Lobster salad with matcha green tea and soya

Serves 2-4

This may not look award winning on the plate, but trust me on this, the flavour combinations are just outstanding, and is simply a lovely summery way to treat lobster. Alternatively use big prawns or even chunks of steamed white fish, but the key here really is in the balancing of the key flavours.

1 freshly cooked lobster, weighing 1lb/500g, with the meat removed and chopped

1 bunch of baby leeks, trimmed

A small bunch of spinach leaves

A small knob of fresh horseradish

For the dressing

Best quality olive oil
Fine powdered matcha green tea
Soy sauce

Warm the lobster gently in a saucepan with a little of the olive oil, throw the leeks in too to warm them through also. Scatter on a plate making sure to use all the pan juices as the base of the dressing, throw over a few spinach leaves at this stage. Sprinkle over a little soy sauce, dust with the matcha green tea powder and finish with a generous but very fine grating of fresh horseradish. At this point a touch of salt and pepper may be added.

Orange and white chocolate biscuits

Makes about 24 biscuits

Middle of the week, and a few baking sessions will be required to get through it. These little ones are moreish, and dead easy to make. You can prepare the mixture in advance: roll it into sausage shapes, wrap in greaseproof paper and store in the freezer. Just remove, slice into discs and bake until golden.

300g plain flour

1 tsp baking powder

½ tsp salt

250g unsalted butter, softened

125g caster sugar

125g light brown soft sugar

1 large egg

Zest of 1 orange

250g white chocolate chips or white chocolate, roughly chopped

Preheat the oven to 180c/gas mark 4. In a large bowl, combine the flour, baking powder and salt. In another bowl, use an electric whisk to cream together the butter and both types of sugar until pale and fluffy.

Add the egg and beat until well combined. Stir in thoroughly the flour mix, orange zest and white chocolate.

Place a sheet of greaseproof paper on a baking sheet and spoon on equal quantities of the biscuit dough, leaving at least 3cm between each one. Place in the centre of the oven and bake for 8-10 minutes or until golden.

Remove from the oven, leave for 2-3 minutes, then place on a wire rack to cool completely.