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Classic dishes with a modern twist from ‘Bill’s Basics’ for every aspiring cook

Not quite lentil salad, not quite fattoush, this colourful ensemble is every bit as delicious as both
Not quite lentil salad, not quite fattoush, this colourful ensemble is every bit as delicious as both

Lentil, beetroot and celery fattoush with labna

Here I’ve played around with a traditional lentil salad, making it more like a fattoush with crunchy torn flatbread, and adding one of my favourite curd cheeses, labna. Labna is made from yoghurt so it has a wonderfully tart quality. Worthy substitutes would be tangy goat’s curd or fromage frais. In Australia, beetroot is a favourite in everything from burgers to salad sandwiches, and it’s particularly good with these flavours. Earthy, herby and wholesome, this salad works perfectly well as a main course or to accompany, say, barbecued chicken rubbed with garlic and cumin.

Serves 4-6

2 flatbreads
200g puy lentils
1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
1 small red onion, finely sliced
1 tbsp red wine vinegar
Large handful of flat-leaf parsley
Large handful of mint leaves
3 celery stalks, cut into batons

To serve

4 roasted and peeled beetroots*, cut into wedges
200g labna or other soft white cheese
Sumac
Extra virgin olive oil

Roast your beetroots first, as they take a little longer to cook. Use the warm oven to heat the flatbreads for 10-12 minutes until crisp. Leave to cool, then roughly break the bread into pieces. Put the lentils in a large saucepan with 375ml water and bring to the boil, then reduce the heat and simmer for 15 minutes. Strain the lentils and put in a large bowl. Add the olive oil, onion and vinegar and season with sea salt and ground black pepper. Stir in the mint, parsley and celery.

To serve, spoon the lentil salad into bowls and top with some beetroot, pieces of toasted flatbread and chunks of labna. Sprinkle with a little sumac and drizzle with olive oil.

* Roasted beetroot

Serves 4-6

4 medium-sized beetroots
1 tablespoon olive oil

Preheat the oven to 220C. Put the beetroots in a small baking dish, drizzle with the olive oil and season with sea salt and ground black pepper. Cover with foil and roast in the oven for 40-45 minutes, or until the beetroots are tender when pierced with a knife. Remove from the oven and leave to cool.

Peel the beetroots by rubbing the skin gently with your hands until it comes away. Slice each beetroot into wedges.

Fish soup with chorizo

Serves 4

1 onion, finely sliced
1 fennel bulb, trimmed and finely sliced
1 chorizo sausage, sliced
4 garlic cloves, crushed
1 tsp finely grated fresh ginger
1 red chilli, finely chopped (deseeded first, if you like)
Large pinch of saffron threads
½ tsp paprika
125ml white wine
400g tin chopped tomatoes
375ml fish or vegetable stock
1 tsp caster sugar
1 bay leaf
350-400g white fish fillets, cut into small pieces
8 mussels, scrubbed and beards removed
8 large raw king prawns, peeled and deveined with tails left on
1 tbsp chopped flat-leaf parsley
Lemon juice, to taste

I’m tempted to give this the alternative name “Bill’s bastard child of bouillabaisse and paella”. I adore French bouillabaisse, but the addition of spicy chorizo gives this dish a real Spanish flamboyance.

Heat the olive oil in a large heavy-based pan over medium heat. Add the onion, fennel and a good pinch of sea salt and cook, stirring occasionally, for about 5 minutes until softened. Add the chorizo and cook for 2 minutes. Add the garlic, ginger, chilli, saffron and paprika and cook for 2 minutes until fragrant.

Pour in the wine and scrape the bottom of the pan with your wooden spoon to deglaze it. Add the tomatoes, stock, sugar, bay leaf and 250ml water. Season with sea salt and ground black pepper and leave to simmer for 20-25 minutes.

Gently lower the fish, mussels and prawns into the soup, cover the pan and cook for 2-3 minutes until the fish and prawns are just opaque and the mussels have opened (discard any that remain tightly closed after cooking). Check the seasoning, scatter with parsley and add lemon juice to taste.

Make this a meal with a loaf of garlic bread: mix some softened butter with extra virgin olive oil, sea salt, black pepper, chopped flat-leaf parsley and a few crushed cloves of garlic. Spread over a sliced (but not all the way through) baguette, wrap in foil and bake at 180C/gas mark 4 for 20 minutes.

Chicken and dried apricot pilaf

When I was growing up, dinner would sometimes be one of those rehydrated packets of “flavoured rice”. So, it was a quite extraordinary experience when I first made a beautiful simple pilaf – rich with spices, dried fruit, nuts and the flavours of honey, ginger and orange zest – and suddenly realised what was supposed to have been in those packets.

Serves 4

2 tbsp olive oil
8 chicken thighs
1 onion, chopped
2 garlic cloves, crushed
4cm piece of fresh ginger, peeled and grated
3 tsp ras el hanout spice mix
400g basmati rice
750ml chicken stock
1 tsp honey
Zest of 1 orange
1 tbsp sherry vinegar
100g chopped pistachios
200g chopped dried apricots
2 handfuls of fresh coriander

To serve

Date relish **
Broad bean and pomegranate salad ***
Yoghurt

Heat the oil in a large pan (I use a deep, cast-iron frying pan), sear the chicken for 1-2 minutes on each side and remove from the pan. Add a bit more oil if needed and cook the onion, stirring occasionally, with a pinch of sea salt until soft and translucent. Add the garlic and ginger and cook for 1-2 minutes.

Add the ras el hanout and cook until fragrant. Stir in the rice, return the chicken to the pan and pour in the stock. Stir in the honey, orange zest and sherry vinegar. Bring to the boil, cover the pan, turn down to a simmer and cook for about 40 minutes until the stock has been absorbed and the rice is cooked. Stir in the pistachios, dried apricots and coriander.

Serve with date relish, broad bean and pomegranate salad and yoghurt on the side.

** Date relish

Serves 4

Chop and remove pits from 200g dried medjool dates. Mix with the juice of 1 lemon, 2 tablespoons chopped flat-leaf parsley and 2-3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil. Season with sea salt and ground black pepper.

*** Broad bean and pomegranate salad

Serves 4

Blanch 200g shelled broad beans and refresh in cold water. Gently stir the broad beans with the seeds of ½ pomegranate, the juice of ½ orange, 1 teaspoon sherry vinegar and 2-3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil. Season with sea salt and ground black pepper and scatter with coriander leaves.

‘Bill’s Basics’ by Bill Granger (Quadrille, £16.99) Photography by Mikkel Vang