5 July - squash risotto

The chicken and spinach pie was just as good second time around for lunch today. The beans are just starting to appear on the French beans on the terrace, but as with lots of veg, the first couple appear and then get quite large before there's enough to pick for a proper serving. So I picked my first three beans, blanched them very briefly and mixed them in with some tomatoes to make a bit of salad to go with the pie. As with the other home-grown veg, it's the wonderful silky texture that stands them apart from the stuff you get in the supermarket, or even the vegbox.

Although I love all the summery green veg, I fancy a change, so dinner tonight is butternut squash risotto - a bit out of season, I know. It's adapted from a recipe in Jamie Oliver's Cook with Jamie. I don't follow his rather long-winded way of making risotto, but the method of cooking the squash works really well.

• Crush a few shards of cinnamon (from the bottom of the jar) together with some salt and dried chilli flakes in a pestle and mortar. Cut a small butternut squash into quarters and remove the seeds. Coast the squash in olive oil, then rub in the salt and spice mix. Roast in a hot oven for 30-40 mins.
• Fry a chopped shallot gently in butter. Add a couple of large handfuls of risotto rice and stir to coat. Pour in a good glug of white wine and let it bubble for a minute or so.
• Add chicken stock a slurp at a time to the rice, letting it gently bubble and be absorbed. I'm not sure how much stock I use, I just keep going and testing the rice occasionally until it feels nearly cooked.
• Scoop out the flesh of the cooked squash into the rice, stir it in and finish off cooking. Taste and season - home-made stock is less salty than stock cubes.
• Stir in a small knob of butter and a handful of parmesan at the end.
• Serve with crispy fried sage leaves and a couple of slices of pancetta. The sage is so good, I must remember to do more next time!
  

3 July - roast chicken with lemon, sage and garlic

I didn't consciously plan to cook a Sunday roast, but roast chicken is a a regular favourite and it makes sense to cook it when you've got a bit of time to potter around. It was a fabulously sunny afternoon, spent mostly out on the terrace doing some gardening and DIY, so it was nice to have a meal that I could pop in the oven then just wander in occasionally to check. I usually do variations on the same theme with roast chicken; sometimes I use butter, sometimes olive oil and the herbs vary too thyme and sage both work well though.

• I mix some chopped sage with some slightly softened butter and a bit of finely grated lemon zest. I smear it all over the chicken and pop it in a roasting tray. I slice a lemon in half, put half inside the chicken, then squeeze the other half over the top and throw the shell in the tin.
• I roast it for an hour and a bit (depending on the size), in a hot oven (c.200C) basting occasionally and adding a few whole, unpeeled cloves of garlic about half an hour before the end. If you put them in from the start, they just go brown and shrivelled.
• When it's cooked, I take the chicken out and leave to stand covered in foil, while I make the sauce. I put the pan on the hob and add a glass of white wine, stirring up the sticky bits from the bottom, and squeezing the lemon shell and garlic.

The moist white chicken with the sharp, rich sauce is great as usual. Today we have it with more home-grown mangetout and some carrots, plus some new potatoes to mash into the juices - yum!