Nonna would lovingly prepare, cook and clean all day long and provide breakfast, lunch and dinner every day without fail. Sunday was the highlight of the week. The house the family lived in was quite large as far as Italian homes go, and in the centre of the home was the spacious kitchen with its high vaulted ceiling. Much of their house, from the front door to the back, contained marble in one form or another, even the 12-seater kitchen table had a marble top. That magnificent table was very handy at the weekend as Sunday was family day.

Nonna would get up at the crack of dawn to go and collect the freshly laid eggs, pick fresh basil and tomatoes and set to work on her most exquisite and lovingly prepared lasagne. Once the fresh pasta was made and carefully rolled by hand into wafer thin sheets, it was then layered together with the silky rich tomato and basil sauce and popped into the oven to bake. Then the torta di riso was prepared.

Nonna used a special red-coloured liquor to flavour the cake and to be honest I can’t remember exactly what it was, so I have adapted the recipe to suit what I have in stock. Nonna baked the torta di riso in a large roasting tin, then cut the cake into squares and served it with gelato that the young ones had brought with them that day.

I have borrowed the recipe and turned it into my version of this special Italian rice cake. It brings back so many wonderful and heart-warming memories for me, demonstrating the true essence of family life. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do.

We serve this dish at the British Larder as a pretty lunchtime starter, but you could serve it as a hearty lunch for two by making the rice balls slightly bigger, if you like.

This particular macaroni bake has nothing ordinary or simple about it, but it has that luxurious comfort food feel to it, just the kind of food that Mr. P and I love to eat.

When I cook this dish, I enjoy every moment as it takes me right back to the years when I used to cook lobsters every day to make the exquisite lobster raviolis for the restaurant where I used to work. It was a daily task performed early in the morning and it was my job to cook the lobsters, pull them apart and prepare the meat for the raviolis. I have a mild allergy when I touch cooked lobsters – my fingers swell up and they itch fiercely. I remember how the boys used to call me a ‘pansy’ for wearing the yellow marigolds, as they thought I could not stand the pain when the sharp bits of shell pierced my fingers, but it was in fact due to my mild allergy.

Lobster is still classed as a delicacy and it commands incredibly high prices. Lobster should not be taken for granted and for that reason I use the whole lobster to make this wonderful lavish dish.

I’m fond of good chorizo that is chewy and spicy and it’s brilliant to cook with, so when I discovered that there are a few producers here in Britain making British chorizo with British Freedom Food-approved pork, I was one happy foodie. The word chorizo refers to the recipe and style of sausage used and the rest, well, it’s British.

In this recipe, the chorizo adds a smoky, rich flavour to my soup, but you can substitute it for a more traditional sausage if you do not have chorizo to hand. I have used pasta ‘rice’ known as orzo pasta, but you could use short macaroni or long grain white rice instead or simply break spaghetti into small pieces.

In this recipe, I serve one large raviolo per person – it looks like a plump pillow sitting on your plate and makes the dish pretty and refined. It’s the perfect show-off starter. This dish does require a bit of work, but the satisfaction and sense of achievement when you’ve finished it, make it well worth all the effort.

The pasta that I use in this recipe is little pieces of pasta called orzo pasta. It’s now regularly available from most supermarkets, but a few years ago that was not the case. When on holiday in other countries, Mr. P and I like to visit their supermarkets to look for unusual ingredients that we might not get here. We brought a packet of orzo pasta back from the Greek island of Santorini a few years ago and learned the lesson that you can find culinary inspiration wherever you go.

This recipe is perfect for a picnic (or lunch boxes) and al fresco dining, so simply pack it all in jars, take some spoons and enjoy it with your friends!

On my cookery journey I have fallen in love with the functions and capabilities of the Thermomix. It’s a brilliant piece of finely crafted German perfection however it took a lot of persuasion to convince me that I could successfully make a risotto in it. I experimented and I was completely stunned!

The first time when I made the risotto in the thermomix I took a tray and spread the cooked risotto rice as thinly as possible. The reason for this act of madness was to inspect each grain of rice in search of a broken grain. I thought if I could find one broken grain then I would have been satisfied and could then happily say it does not work. I have to confess and hold my hands up and say ‘Yes, it works! ‘

I’m secretly very pleased as it means that I can make this recipe for canape parties, it saves me time as the machine does all the stirring, less for me to do.

For this recipe, I’m cooking the rice in a slightly unusual way and you may think that I have finally lost the plot, but trust me, it’s deliberate and the results are delicious! First, I toast half of the basmati rice in toasted sesame oil in a saucepan until the rice is dark brown and looks nearly burnt, then the remaining rice and water are added to the pan and cooked until tender.

This dish is lovely eaten hot or cold. It’s one of those dishes that tastes even better the following day, so it’s a good idea to make a little extra and keep it chilled in the fridge.

We stayed in a contemporary hotel in Bilbao. We expected breakfast to be quite dull, so we thought we had better stock up on caffeine before we started sightseeing. Oh us of little faith, as we were about to enjoy the best breakfast that we have ever experienced. A table floating from the wall dressed with the most desirable morsels of Spanish breakfast cuisine. Passion, pride and perfectionism oozed from that table.

Amongst this entire eye catching fare was this very unusual but most memorable dish, breakfast rice pudding. As I was so pleased and surprised by this dish, I did some research that lead me to this flawless recipe, of course I had to put my own spin and twist on it. The method might perhaps look unorthodox for some of you, but  I guarantee that it will become a gem in your recipe collection. I serve this  breakfast rice pudding with cinnamon baked plums, delicious!

The most important benefit from this recipe is that it saves the lives of my saucepans. When I used to cook rice pudding with milk, it would stick to the pan before the rice was cooked and that meant that I would have to scrub until I was blue in the face. Fear no longer dear saucepans, this recipe is a sheer delight!