Unpredictable, fussy, unceasingly critical – if you ran a restaurant, at least you could throw customers like these out. But when they are in your home, needing nourishment until adulthood, you can feel like the head chef who got the rubbish job: unpaid double shifts with no staff, no union and often no gratitude. Amid all this, somehow you have to command some respect. Rescue comes with just a few good recipes, the good advice of real mothers, tearing a few pages out of the rule book and having a little sympathy.

Until I had children, I had one formula in my head with regard to feeding others: that good raw materials combined with good cooking equalled empty plates. But six-month-old baby on knee, I found those first few, soft rubber spoons of baby rice and apple purée were not exactly welcome. Put it this way, no one had ever spat something back in my face before.

Feeding children is an art or at least a very inexact science. Children have a remote control of your emotional core and quickly learn that these powers are especially potent at mealtimes. The ever changing preferences, varying between siblings and age group; the fussiness (‘It’s not cooked like you did it last time’), the utter waste of time and money – I have been quite undone by feeding children. They can make cooking a horrible job, removing any chance of adventure or attempt at creativity because they hate mixtures or the sight of a green herb leaf in their supper. You are never hailed, like a chef, and rarely rewarded. After two decades of this, many parents want to give up cooking altogether. The adult children, on the other hand, are often out there in the big wide world banging on to others about how brilliant your food is.

Often I have been driven to distraction by my children’s demands. I cannot have that time again, but what I can do is pass on some experience. This chapter is all about what succeeds in my family kitchen, and it also draws on the wisdom and knowledge of others.

I have learned much, mostly by word-of-mouth, from cooks who are familiar with the daily grind of cooking for the family. The authorities seem overly obsessed with nutrition rather than cookery. Good cooking is about balancing diet. Better to teach parents food psychology: for example, how to understand the foibles of young children and the pressure they feel from their peers. Getting inside the mind of a child is far harder than boiling a pan of pasta. Learning a few management skills would be useful, too, such as handling and budgeting for the mountainous hunger of a 14-year-old boy (and all his friends).

I worked it out the hard way. Begin from the standpoint – which I did not – that you will probably not get it perfectly right. This is real, normal and expected of someone who cares about food yet is busy and not necessarily able simply to throw money at the situation. You will be proud of some weeks, ashamed at those where you gave in. But aim to balance good and bad experiences and look for an overall average in the good zone.

Many of the recipes in this chapter are adaptable, because busy people juggling work and children thrive on flexibility. The days are over when a dedicated housewife could afford a protracted row, sometimes lasting the whole afternoon, over an unfinished lunchtime plate of spinach. Instead I will often put the ‘building blocks’ of a meal onto the table, then offer things to go with it that the less fussy might consider.

A large pan of rice cooked with strips of chicken and flavoured with the hidden earthy scent of coriander seed and allspice could be served alone, but little dishes of herbs, a yoghurt sauce, toasted pine nuts, even hot green chilli is there for those who want it. Building blocks can also be cooked things that serve as a base for more than one recipe. For example, I make large quantities of a smooth tomato, olive oil and basil purée, which can be transformed into seven dishes for children and several more that will please adults, too.

Sympathy is important. Some children, school age in particular, seem genuinely scared of certain foods when confronted for the first time. Textures seem to be the greatest challenge. Often their noses will lift with interest at the aroma of sizzling onions, rosemary, thyme and garlic – but they do not want to find ‘bits’ in their food. Reward is also vital for good behaviour at mealtimes – gooey puddings in return for clean plates. Well, nearly clean anyway.

Ask yourself what you want to achieve, and set the bar a little lower. In the end, your efforts will pay off. It is a big claim, but when there is intermittent peace in the home kitchen, good things on offer and a sense of where it all came from, the adults who emerge from that home have a little more than an education, they have the tools to survive.

Busy

I imagined, with some smugness, that I would be very good at family food. A typical new mother, I privately believed others had it wrong (you only had to meet their children!) and that the realm of nurturing had been waiting for me to come along and show them all how to do it. I wonder now if this rather familiar thought pattern is activated by a hormonal switch when pregnant, in order to fog the actuality of the work ahead.

But why think otherwise? My mother set a great example and even trained me to cook. But the difference between my mother and my life now is that she was a housewife in the classic sense. Managing a healthy kitchen for children takes concentration. My children make toast and rampage through the biscuit supply as soon as they are sure I am in my office, working – and spoil their supper appetite. As a child I was not allowed to pick between meals. Like jewellery shop staff, we were kept pretty much under surveillance. When the meals came, though, they were generous and delicious.

You can set out a blueprint, which I did, then watch as various forces unravel it. As any parent in full-time employment knows, it is very hard to stick to plans, and it is no surprise, yet so sad, that cooking is killed by a reliance on ready-made food.

The children of busy parents soon discover that you are too tired to argue, give in easily and get very tetchy if, having spent precious time preparing food, they do not eat it. This can become a sport. What would I do in retrospect? Ban sugar and TV, probably, or consorting with friends who hold birthday parties in McDonald’s and are allowed to eat Oreos while doing their homework. But of course you can’t do this. Just say why you are different, and occasionally give in to show you are human. My son Jack says don’t try to be a good mother. But I do – the skill is not letting it show.

Seven plates of sweet cooked tomato

Asked to nominate a recipe that makes a difference to how my week goes, something with integrity that is economical and essentially useful, and I look no further than my store of sweet cooked tomato.

This tomato sauce or ‘compote’ imitates the best Italian in that it tastes full of fruit, sunshine and herbs, yet it can easily be made in a British kitchen. I make a large quantity of this sauce routinely and use it in many ways – seven of them regularly for the children, saving a lot of preparation time. It is at once a sauce for pasta, polenta (see page 55) and gnocchi, and needs only a warm through before using. It can be the base of a soup, a curry, a risotto (see page 395) and is also good with mozzarella cheese, toasted between two slices of flatbread or ciabatta. The recipe for the base sauce can be found in Halfway to a Meal (see page 400), with a number of ways to use it, but the ones listed here are ideal family food.

USING SWEET COOKED TOMATO IN CHILDREN’S MEALS

• Pasta and gnocchi – warm the sauce and dress the boiled pasta or gnocchi (3 tablespoons of sauce per person). To make a quick baked pasta dish, cook some tubular pasta (penne/rigatoni) and dress with a mix of ricotta and mascarpone with added grated Parmesan. Pour over tomato sauce, add more grated cheese and bake until bubbling.

• Macaroni – a more traditional macaroni can be made by stirring béchamel (see page 413), grated Parmesan and a little mascarpone into a gratin dish full of cooked macaroni, pouring over some tomato sauce, scattering over a little more grated cheese then baking at a high temperature for 25–30 minutes. See plate 5.

• Polenta – serve the sauce over wet polenta (the freshly cooked, sloppy type) or with sticks of grilled polenta (see page 56).

• Tomato risotto – for 4 people, sauté 1 grated onion in 30g/1oz butter, add 200g/7oz arborio or carnaroli rice and 300ml/½ pint sauce. Bring to boiling point then slowly add chicken stock or water (use extra butter if you use water), a ladleful at a time, until the simmering rice is tender; takes about 25 minutes. Serve with cheese.

• Tomato and spelt or oat groat soup – for 4 people, sauté 1 grated or finely chopped onion in 2 tablespoons olive oil; add the chopped leaves from a sprig of rosemary, 4 heaped tablespoons grains and 300ml/½ pint sauce with 450ml/¾ pint stock (or water combined with 1 more tablespoon olive oil). Simmer for about 15 minutes until the grains are just tender. Season and serve with olive oil. (Spelt and groats are available from wholefood shops.)

• Curry – for 4 servings of a good, not-too-hot curry flavoured with ginger that many children will like, gently sauté 1 teaspoon each of ground cumin seed, ground coriander, garam masala and (if desired) a pinch or more of cayenne pepper in 4 tablespoons oil. Add ½ teaspoon fine sea salt, 2.5cm/1in piece of fresh ginger, grated, and ½ teaspoon cinnamon, followed by 60g/2oz butter, 4 finely chopped garlic cloves and about 450–600g/1lb–1lb 6oz raw chicken thigh meat, diced. Cook for 1 minute then add 350ml/12fl oz tomato sauce and 4 tablespoons water. Cook for about 10 minutes and eat with rice.

• Toasted flatbreads – for very easy emergency meals, place slices of mozzarella cheese and a spoonful or two of the tomato sauce between 2 pieces of focaccia or ciabatta (or any open-textured bread roll – or inside a pitta) and toast in a dry pan, on both sides, until the cheese melts. Use a panini grill if you have one.

GETTING WHAT YOU ARE GIVEN

My mother was a housewife. ‘You are all so lucky,’ she said not long ago, ‘in the way you can do jobs.’ She had six children in total; when the last was born, her eldest was sixteen. For more than twenty-six years she was caring for school-age children. We were not always all together at home but there was a period when the brood was young and looking after us all must have been hard emotionally and physically. The argument against women with young children taking other employment is strong. But for many of us there is no option. I am not a full-time mother, to coin a horrible phrase used by non-working mothers, so I have to concentrate the duties into a shorter time when I am not working.

In contrast, my mother devoted herself to home-making. She was a perfectionist. She decorated her house cleverly and collected pretty, original things; she gardened with extraordinary knowledge, tending a vegetable garden, and out of her kitchen came wonderful food. Due to the sheer number of children around the table, pleas were not heard if we did not like something. We got what we were given. I hear many people say that it is absurd the way today’s children get away with refusing food. ‘If we did not eat it, we had nothing else,’ they recall.

Giving in

If my kitchen was a third world country I would be described as a failing nation. The infrastructure would need rebuilding and new law established. But if you visited, I bet you’d find there was charm in the chaos. My mother’s excellent example of a firm but fair regime is not often repeated in my kitchen. Surveying the supper table, I know all has gone wrong when everyone seems to be eating something different. One child is eating an omelette because shepherd’s pie is the dish they hate more than anything. Another is heading for the toaster complaining that the shepherd’s pie is not like the one we had last time, and my husband has refused the courgettes. (‘You know I hate courgettes.’)

And, yes, I agreed to cook the omelette, because I like to see a teenager eat. I should have stopped the other one making toast. Like many, I avoid rows, and older, literate children have the ability to argue until midnight. After a day’s work and feeling frayed, I am not sure I want to spend the evening with angry young people.

What matters is finding a pot to please children. Food they like, and which you like, too.

Helping themselves

I have found an answer in dishes that can be shared; taken in the amounts each person wants. It makes for a much more peaceful meal and is similar to the Asian style of eating. The various components of a meal are put on the table – for example, meat, bread, salad, sauces – and everyone eats communally. Plating food is the antithesis and bound to raise conflict. The most obvious example of a help-yourself meal is a roast. There are no fights over roasts (except for extra potatoes) because the child with a huge problem with cabbage or bread sauce can avoid it. This may sound like giving in, and if a child refuses to eat a diet with any balance then help is needed, but in my experience children will come round to foods if they are not pressurised. It is a matter of timing.

But what of everyday food – the more economical things we can prepare quickly after school?

• Pasta can be served with either smooth tomato sauce, or just with olive oil and grated cheese, with pesto or with fresh ricotta.

• A simple stew can sit ungarnished in a casserole, while baked potatoes, sour cream, herbs, vegetables, sautéed mushrooms are there too, if anyone wants them.

• Mildly spiced meat curries go on the table, but adults can pep up theirs with hot chillies and sambals. Children can try yoghurt sauces and dal – and I have found they become more adventurous with this unpressured style of serving food.

• I serve sausages with mashed potato, for the comfort-food addicts, but also make a pot of homemade white haricot beans, garlic and tomatoes, which can be stored in the fridge for other meals if it is not eaten.

Braised chicken rice, steamed with allspice

see PLATE 6

There is a recipe I have cooked consistently since the children were tiny. It takes only 20 minutes to make and can be made both with fresh or cooked chicken. You can also vary the other ingredients – there is a list below the recipe. It is a dish of modern compromise that makes peace in a battle of wills. An easy pilaff that would be plain without the addition of the earthy scent of ground allspice and the mellowing flavours of ground coriander seed. Once cooked, put it on the table, surrounded with bowls containing the yoghurt sauce, herbs and nuts.

Boneless free-range chicken thighs are easy to find and cheap to buy, but I have also made this with leftover leg meat from a roast – there always seems to be some over because everyone eats the white breast meat.

SERVES 4

2 tablespoons pinenuts

2 tablespoons dripping or butter

1 onion, finely chopped (see Kitchen note, below)

5 allspice pods, crushed in a pestle and mortar, or 1 teaspoon ground allspice

1 teaspoon ground coriander seed

4 boneless chicken thighs, cut into children’s bite-sized pieces (or equivalent of leftover roast chicken)

200g/7oz basmati rice, rinsed in a sieve under the cold tap water or chicken stock to cover – about 1.2 litres/2 pints

salt and black pepper

To serve (optional): Greek yoghurt, chilli sauce, coriander leaves

Use a large heavy-based frying pan to cook this dish. Cut out a circle of greaseproof paper or baking parchment that is 1cm/½in larger in diameter than the pan. Place the pan over a medium heat and add the pinenuts. Toast for about 3 minutes, shaking the pan from time to time until they are golden. Transfer them to a separate plate.

Put the fat into the pan. When it melts, add the onion and cook over a low heat for about 5 minutes or more, stirring, until it is pale golden. Add the spices and the meat and cook for another 2 minutes, stirring slowly. Add the rice, stir over the heat for 1 minute, then add enough water or stock to cover to a depth of about 1.5cm/¾in. Bring to the boil, turn down so it slowly simmers, then cover with the paper, pressing the paper down on to the surface of the pan’s contents. Leave to cook for about 12–15 minutes, then lift the paper and test a grain of rice to see if it is tender. Give it a few more minutes if not, paper lid on. Add about 100ml/3½ fl oz more water or stock if it seems dry. When the rice is tender, lift off the lid, season with salt and pepper and stir. Put on the table with a bowl of Greek yoghurt to eat it with, plus the pine nuts, chilli sauce and coriander leaves in separate dishes.

OTHER WAYS

• Herbs – fresh mint, parsley, chives, dill leaves.

• Nuts or seeds – unsalted shelled pistachios, toasted flaked almonds, sunflower seeds, nigella seeds.

• Sauce – sour cream, crème fraiche.

• Also – sliced mild red or green chillies for the brave, shallots sautéed in oil until crisp and sweet, sautéed or grilled tomatoes, roast pepper.

Kitchen note

Much of the time, children do not like home cooking because the basics are not right. You have to prepare and cook the fundamentals, such as onions, properly, or they are disgusting to children. Cooking them slowly – about 5–10 minutes in simmering, not smoking, oil – will make onions sweet. It makes all the difference. The texture needs to be right, too. Children do not want to encounter great greasy squares of roughly chopped onions in their food – nor do I, for that matter. The sympathetic Spanish and Greek mothers have a clever technique and often grate them, so they ‘disappear’ into the dish. Gently drawing children into eating difficult food will not spoil them. Once they love the flavours that ingredients like onions give food, they will worry less about the textures. But always give chopped onions a proper amount of time to cook.

Foibles

Sarah Husband knows all about the foibles of children’s appetites. She should do, because as a school cook she prepares food for over 260 of them a day between the ages of 8 and 18, and is in charge of menus. She also has school-age children of her own. She cooks adventurously at the school and at home, and keeps choice to a minimum. Conversations with her have changed everything for me.

‘Where am I going wrong?’ I asked her, during a period when my son refused to eat the smooth tomato sauce in the recipe on page 400, claiming that it was not ‘real Italian like on pizzas’. He was ten years old at the time.

‘You went wrong because you caved in to him,’ she said. ‘Instead of being firm, you let him dictate. You should be saying: “Don’t give me all of that twaddle about tomatoes,” and win the argument. Children are not born with eating problems, they are put upon them by outside influences, often the parents. Only a child with anorexia nervosa will try and starve, and there is a point when a healthy child’s hunger becomes bigger than its will to mess you around.’

I agreed with all this, yet admitted not feeling up to a fight when the six o’clock swill is in full swing.

‘You have to know when to get angry, and show it. When a child who can understand reason is consistently not eating you have to show you are upset. If you keep smiling, they’ll think you are too easy-going.’

At the school she offers the 260 children a one-pot dish with a vegetable for lunch. She makes braises, risottos, curries, pilaffs, pasta and noodle dishes. The obligatory salads offered are substantial. ‘The girls are not going to get away with eating a lump of cucumber,’ she says. Husband’s sons, George, Alfie and Joe, are good eaters. ‘I am tough with them about food but despite this my children hug me and say they love me. Being weak can be so cruel,’ she adds.

Her advice turned the tomato argument in my favour. The next time I served both my children pasta with tomato sauce, the response was predictable. ‘I’m not eating that,’ said Jack. I stuck to my guns (large gulp of white wine), took the food away and ended his meal. The ensuing row was painful but at the end of the awful evening, I detected a whisper of mutual understanding. It was Sarah’s word ‘twaddle’ that inspired me. Children are often not reasonable – they talk twaddle all the time and we fall for it.

SECRETS OF SUCCESSFUL CHILDREN’S MEALS

• In the early stages, do not give up and try another food if a very young child spits something out. Give the same ingredient, prepared another way. If they really don’t like it, however, don’t force it.

• If a child likes something you give them, don’t bombard them with it or they will go off it.

• Once a child is old enough to reason, be brave enough to take a refused dish away and tell them the meal is over.

• Do not give puddings as a matter of course but only once or twice a week. Encourage healthier puddings that include fruit and yoghurt instead.

• A child is not a restaurant critic; never ask him or her if they liked a new recipe. If they have something to say, they will tell you.

• Once the meal is on the table, sit down with the child even if you are not eating. Keep distraction to a minimum – no TV and not too much talking.

• Last – and this is important and will take up all your steely will – if you spend the whole afternoon cooking something and they taste it and say ‘ugh’, turn your back so they cannot see the hurt and disappointment on your face. Try not to let a child know they have the power to do this.

Mince with hidden roots

I have published this recipe of Sarah’s before – but many have said how good it is and it has a place here, too. You can make it with fresh mince (beef or lamb) or minced leftover beef or lamb. The genius of it is that all the goodness and delicious flavour of vegetables are there, but they are invisible. Eat with mash or Yorkshire puddings.

SERVES 6–8

2 tablespoons olive oil

1 large onion, finely chopped or grated

900g/2lb fresh minced beef or lamb (or minced leftover meat)

20 button mushrooms, grated

2 carrots, grated

about 4 heaped tablespoons grated root vegetables – parsnip, turnip, swede, celeriac (mix them, if you wish)

1 heaped teaspoon English mustard powder

1 litre/1¾ pints beef stock

sea salt and black pepper

3 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce (optional)

Heat the oil in a large casserole, add the onion and cook for at least 5 minutes over a low heat until lightly browned. Add the minced meat, the mushrooms and all the vegetables and cook, stirring, over a medium heat for 1 minute. Add the mustard, stir a few times and pour in the stock. Bring to the boil, then reduce the heat to very low and simmer for about 40 minutes to 1 hour, until the beef is tender. Add more stock or water if the braise is becoming dry. Season to taste with salt and pepper, then add the Worcestershire sauce, if using.

The beginning – pheasant curry

‘Mine eats pheasant curry.’ I am showing off to other mothers of three-year-olds who have not got past the baby pasta stars phase. It was true. We used to buy cheap pheasants, then make a mild curry, mix it with rice and yoghurt and watch it go down by the bowlful. Pride is dangerous. On arrival in primary school he soon clicked that this was not normal among his peers and had the famous pheasant curry dropped from the menu. Back to pasta, though it was possible by now to feed penne, not stars. Tastes evolve in unpredictable ways. From being force-fed eclectic dishes as an unquestioning weaner, to the monolithic predilections of pre-teens – pizza, pasta and nothing else – to a sudden liking for searingly hot and sour tom yum soup at fourteen. It is like running a restaurant and keeping an eccentric, long-term regular happy. Nothing surprises me any more. In the meantime, try the weaners’ curry. I used to love finishing up the leftovers in the bowl.

SERVES 4–8, DEPENDING ON APPETITE

2 tablespoons butter

1 small onion, grated

1 garlic clove, finely chopped

1 dessertspoon mild curry powder

2 pheasant breasts, sliced into children’s bite-sized pieces

4 tablespoons smooth tomato sauce (see page 400) or passata

4 tablespoons water

1 tablespoon smooth mild mango chutney (sieve or process the usual type)

To serve: boiled rice, wholemilk yoghurt

Melt the butter in a pan over a low heat and add the onion and garlic. Cook for a nice long time, about 10 minutes, until the onion is transparent but not coloured. Add the curry powder and sizzle for half a minute, then put in the pheasant and stir until the meat turns opaque. Add the tomato with the water and cook until the pheasant is tender. Remove from the heat. For very young children with no molars, give the curry a little whiz in a food processor. Older ones should manage the textures. Stir in the mango chutney. To serve, mix the heated curry with freshly cooked rice and a little wholemilk yoghurt.

Shall I be mother? Whose job is it anyway?

I do not believe that the libbers of the 1960s, who unchained women from household tasks, are happy with the outcome as it is. Women can now – in theory – succeed in the same jobs as men on identical pay, but they are still the ones taking care of most domestic tasks. On top of a 40-hour week, a European woman in full-time employment is doing an additional 30 hours in the home, while an employed man does only eight hours of domestic tasks. In the UK women are doing most of the childcare, shopping and housework but little cooking. Suspicious that cooking is a laborious chore involving no pleasure, many will not even attempt to learn. And it is a skill, about that there is no doubt at all. Not only does the aspirational cook need to learn how to make food taste good for others, so they will eat it and not waste it, he or she must learn how to shop in a savvy way, buying better quality food that is good value for money. It is all frighteningly daunting for beginners and there is an industry of fast food and ready meals there for the millions who are timid in the kitchen.

Diet trends show that in the UK we are eating out more and more. This immediately sounds like good news. At last, Britain has become a brasserie society, unafraid to eat out for the sake of it rather than for occasion. But, sadly, not a bit of it. On average we spend only 25 minutes a day eating – just 175 minutes per week. Calorie intake, including starchy, sugary foods, has increased dramatically in the last ten years. We buy three times more ready meals than we did then, too. This brings to light the depressing image of a Fast Food Nation. Eating lots, quickly, never cooking – just like the portrait of America painted by Eric Schlosser in his 2001 exposé.

The awful truth is that the women have a responsibility. It is an inescapable fact that women remain the main carers of families. They accept this – or there would surely have been a real revolution – and yet they are being totally irresponsible about the food aspect of guardianship. There is no position to take about this except that from on top of a very high horse, because poor nutrition is now a cause of ill health and obesity in too many youngsters. If no one says ‘it’s the mothers, stupid’, the situation will get worse.

Insisting that schools teach children to cook is not the answer unless the parents are also brought in and become involved. Attitude can only change at a pace to suit the one who needs persuasion – which is why I always detest government interference and bans. Other channels of influence are more subtle. Good food experiences are something to share between children and their parents. It is part of a child’s education and preparation for survival in the outside world as an adult, but one that must be based at least to a degree at home.

Climbing down off my immense horse, can I say that it is really not that difficult. Like any art – try not to think of cooking as a chore – the quantum of the performance is flexible. You can do something well that takes a few minutes, or spend all day working at it. Knowing two good, quick-to-make dishes and how to buy the right ingredients will make a dramatic change at home. There is no need to be able to cook everything ever invented.

TV cookery should take the blame for some of the problem. It is obviously not doing something, because while the number of people who aspire to cook rises, and these must include those who watch cookery, few actually do it. The trend is moving in the opposite direction. But if you look at the stars cooking on TV, you can see why. None of the TV chefs can really relate to the home cook’s many dilemmas. Few have to worry about a budget or a work-life balance. Few either have children or are the main carers of those they do have. Even the women are far removed from life’s reality, with many expected to simper and be more tasty than the dishes they cook. Nevertheless, watching TV remains the favourite leisure activity of both women and men in the UK, which suggests that cookery is enjoyed as pure entertainment. It would not matter, if there were not a real need to encourage cooking in the homes where it is most needed.

Juggling

Born to a Somerset farming family in 1928, my mother-in-law, Joyce, might have followed a typical path: marriage after school to a countryman, then a life combining children, housework and possibly farm duties. But Joyce, one of three sisters, was extraordinarily bright and took up midwifery in order to get a degree (one of the few ways in which a girl could finance herself through higher education at the time). She went on, determined to have a profession, eventually becoming an eminent criminal psychologist and an author. She also worked for the Department of Health. She was an early libber, really, and the world is a better place because she followed this path. She wanted to have equality, to put her considerable talent to use and to escape domestic work. She and I have long debates. She is for cheap food and convenience, yet she does cook, and her sons, who tease her about her food, also have good memories of it. Pork chops and apple sauce, easy to buy and quick to cook, are among them.

Pork shoulder chops with apple sauce

I am not a fan of loin chops. The border of fat around the edge never crackles and the lean meat can be dry. Shoulder chops, aside from being cheaper, are much juicier and the little pockets of muscle are tender for small teeth.

SERVES 4

4 small shoulder chops (on or off the bone), 1–2cm/½–¾in thick

2 teaspoons chopped rosemary

2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

1 garlic clove, roughly chopped

juice of quarter of a lemon

black pepper

To make apple sauce: 4 dessert apples and 1 tablespoon butter

Put the pork, rosemary, oil, garlic and lemon juice in a bowl, add some black pepper and turn the meat over and over again with your hands so it gets a proper coating of everything in the bowl. Leave for about 20 minutes.

Peel and core the apples then cook in a pan with the butter until soft. Mash to a smooth purée, then store in a jar until needed. Trim the slices of shoulder meat if necessary, cutting off the fat.

Heat a sauté or grill pan and gently cook the pork over a low heat for about 5–7 minutes each side, turning once. You will see red droplets form on the surface of the meat after it has been turned. When these turn clear the pork is cooked. You can always cut a little off to test it. Remove the pan from the heat, cover with foil and leave for 5 minutes for the pork to rest and become really tender. Serve with the apple sauce, fried or mashed potatoes or buttered tagliatelle noodles, and something green.

Cheese

Lucky are those people whose children love cheese. I have one who does and one who does not (except cheese on pizza) and cannot count the times I lament this. I would love to be able to enter a kitchen at the end of the day and quickly make croque monsieur (toasted cheese sandwiches), or a dish of mashed potato with cheese, or a cheese omelette. At least I’d know they were getting their protein and calcium, and at a lower cost than buying free-range meat. What is more, most cheese recipes are quick to cook.

Good cheese is easy to buy. You do not have to enter a cheese boutique to buy cheese for cooking. The generic Cheddar, Cheshire, mozzarella, Gruyère, ricotta, Parmesan and fresh goat’s cheese are more than adequate. At least, unlike other cheaper staples like bread, it does not contain additives. Even basic organic Cheddars are good value for money. I do not agree with the red health warning on cheese packaging issued by the Food Standards Agency. A little goes a long way and – especially for children who ‘go off’ milk or cannot drink it – it provides essential nutrition. It is worth finding a green vegetable or salad they like to serve with cheese dishes for balance, however, or offer walnuts afterwards, which the French (famous cheese eaters with low rates of heart disease) believe reduce inflammation in the arteries.

Three ways with cheese

I could write a hundred pages on cooking with cheese, and you will find cheese recipes in other areas of this book, but these ideas please children.

• Pan-cooked cheese sandwiches – a slice of Gruyère, and a slice of ham if liked, put between two pieces of bread, then fried gently in olive oil on both sides. The French tie these bundles up with thin string like a postage parcel – a sweet idea to tempt a reluctant child, perhaps.

• Cheese omelette – see the recipe for omelette on page 104, and add cheese halfway through cooking, choosing from various suitable types. I prefer the gentle nut flavour of Gruyère, but Cheddar, Cheshire, fresh goat’s curd and feta are also good. Basil is a flavour children seem to like with eggs; add it with the fresh cheeses.

• Soufflé – with a supply of white sauce (béchamel) in the fridge (see page 413), it is easy to make small soufflés within a few minutes. To make 2 supper-sized soufflés, butter 2 average-sized ramekins or individual ovenproof dishes. Add 2 egg yolks to 200ml/7fl oz béchamel and 100g/3½oz grated Gruyère. Mix well, then, using a table knife, lightly fold in the 2 egg whites, whipped until stiff. Fill the ramekins almost to the top, and bake for 15 minutes at 200°C/400°F/Gas 6.

Fresh cheese gnocchi

Little dumplings, made with fresh ricotta, not potato, to serve with sweet cooked tomato (page 400) or a little melted butter and Grana Padano. Handling the soft dough takes a little practice but they are surprisingly sturdy in the pan. The sage in the butter may not be to all tastes but most children taste it and think it is ‘sausagey’.

SERVES 4

500g/1lb 2oz fresh ricotta, drained on a cloth for about 15 minutes

100g/3½oz Grana Padano (similar to Parmesan, but less mature), grated

pinch of grated nutmeg

1 egg

2 tablespoons flour

about 200g/7oz semolina flour, for dusting (available from Italian food shops)

salt

100g/3½oz unsalted butter

2 sage leaves (optional)

extra grated Grana Padano, to serve

Mix together the ricotta, Grana Padano, nutmeg, egg and flour until you have a thick paste. Scatter semolina flour on the work surface and more on a dish. Take two dessertspoons and scoop up a spoonful of ‘dough’ with one, then transfer to the other spoon, cupping one spoon inside the other. Repeat to make a neat lozenge shape. Drop gently onto the work surface and lightly roll in the semolina. Lift and place on the plate with the semolina. Repeat until you have used all the dough. You can store the gnocchi in the fridge for up to a day before using.

To cook the gnocchi, fill a large pan with water and add a little salt. While it comes to the boil, melt the butter in a second pan and add the sage leaves if using – then keep warm. When the water boils, drop in half the gnocchi, one by one (you are unlikely to be able to fit them all into the pan at once). They are cooked when they float to the surface. Place them on a plate, spoon some melted butter over, scatter with some cheese and serve.

Kitchen note

You can also serve gnocchi with sweet cooked tomato (see page 400) and grated cheese. Alternatively, put the cooked gnocchi into an ovenproof dish, cover with sweet cooked tomato, add a few halved cherry tomatoes and bake until lightly browned.

Eggs

As with cheese, there are dozens of ways in which eggs can be cooked to please children. Providing they like eggs. It is easy, perhaps in retrospect, to see how many children develop a hatred of eggs, however. If not cooked properly, gelatinous stringy raw bits in fried or boiled eggs can do it for life, with some. Be sensitive to squeamishness, which is absent until a child is three, then suddenly hits. Again, like cheese, fortunate are families with children who eat eggs, because quick, cheap, healthy meals are yours.

Egg pots

Go as far as you dare with these, in terms of adding other ingredients. Preheat the oven to 200°C/400°F/Gas 6. Butter a ramekin and place a slice of ham in the bottom. Crack in an egg. If it is for me, and I have some, I add 3 or 4 tarragon leaves. Cover with single cream and bake for 12 minutes until a little prod with a teaspoon indicates the whites are done. Eat with toast.

You can add many things to egg pots, choosing from these or combining: roast pepper, sweet cooked tomato (see page 400), undyed smoked haddock, slices of black pudding or even haggis.

Hot sugared ham

This was a favourite of my childhood, and one my children always ask for. A gammon (raw leg of cured pork, which is a ‘ham’ when cooked) or even a half gammon is a treat, however. On ordinary days I use hock – the cured shin of pork that rarely costs more than £5 and has enough meat on it, on average, for three. My mother studded her hams with cloves, and I do this too, but I remember how I hated to bite on a clove so I always make sure to remove them from this children’s meal, in sympathy, before serving it.

SERVES 2–4, DEPENDING ON APPETITE

1 ham hock

1 star anise

1 bay leaf

4 juniper berries

To glaze: 1 tablespoon English mustard, 6 tablespoons Demerara sugar, 6 cloves

Put the hock in a good-sized casserole, cover with cold water, bring to the boil then drain, discarding the water. (See Kitchen note for an alternative method.) Cover with water once more. Add the spices and bring to the boil. Simmer for 1½ hours until the meat becomes tender but is not yet falling off the bone. Another way to tell if ham is cooked is to insert a skewer and pull it out; if the skewer pulls out smoothly, the meat is cooked. If the meat seems to hold onto the skewer, it is still undercooked. This is always a good way to test larger cuts like half gammons and whole ones.

Lift out of the casserole and throw away the water. Preheat the oven to 220°C/425°F/Gas 7 and place a piece of foil in the base of the casserole. Use a small sharp knife to cut off the rind, leaving behind as much fat as possible. Spread the whole surface of the hock with the mustard. Put the Demerara sugar on a plate and roll the hock in the sugar so it is well coated. Stud with the 6 cloves. Put back into the pan and bake until the surface of the hock is glazed with a layer of bubbling sugar: 15–20 minutes. The foil is there to protect the pan from drips that might burn. Take the hock out of the pan – remove the cloves whatever you do or there will be strong protest. Carve it from the bone and eat hot with mash.

Kitchen note

Instead of this quick method, you can soak the ham/hock overnight. Discard the water after, then boil with the spices and follow the recipe.

The Chinese paradox

Nothing surprises me any longer. The hours spent arguing over likes and dislikes throw up some astonishing contradictions. The child who is shy of ‘mixtures’ like stew, also loves Chinese food. Terrified of finding a button mushroom or a herb leaf in a casserole, they are quite content to put away bowlfuls of food made with fermented beans, black cardamoms, star anise and spring onion. There is a genius to the flavouring in all Chinese dishes that, while weird in concept, is very sensual. Umami, the ‘fifth taste’, is a characteristic of Chinese cooking. Umami foods contain natural glutamates (not to be confused with the chemical MSG), flavours that have a way of invading the whole mouth. It is found in a lot of fermented foods (including cheese, Parma ham and wine) and it is very much present in soy sauce, red bean curd and various other Chinese ingredients, which explains why kids eat Chinese meals unquestioningly.

I cook Chinese food for the children often, seeking out authentic recipes rather than simply imitating the salty, greasy stir-fries sold in our local takeaway. There is a little more work in the preparation and sourcing the ingredients. If I pass a Chinese supermarket I stock up on store-cupboard items, but the fresh ingredients are relatively easy to buy. Making this food at home also means the ability to use naturally reared pork, duck and chicken – not usually at the top of the list of concerns in Chinese restaurants and takeaways.

A meeting with Annie Leong, a cookery writer from Shanghai, opened my eyes to real Chinese home cooking and its suitability for children. Leong is a writer ahead of her time in her own country. She attempted to start an organic pig farm in mainland China but found there is still no receptiveness to welfare-friendly, naturally reared meat, even after some of China’s recent food scares. Her plans for the farm are on hold. ‘They [Chinese cooks] still cannot see the beauty of slow growth and using better breeds for flavour and meat quality,’ she told me, sadly.

Leong is a devoted family cook. I met her through her son, an orthopaedic surgeon working in a London hospital. When I went to collect one of his mother’s books from his home, he was preparing her Red Braised Belly Pork. He gave me a tub of red fermented bean curd, an evil-looking paste oozing a thin red liquid that is essential for this dish. Adding it to the braised meat at the end of cooking changed everything. The children came into the kitchen, sniffing the aromas with fascination. Watching them fall upon the food was almost frightening and they still ask often for Annie’s red pork. Her recipe, which can be found along with many other good ones in her book At Home with Annie, is quite detailed. This is a shorter version.

Red braised pork

The secret to the success of this dish is to buy pork with a good layer of fat and to fry it for a long time until the fat is mostly rendered away and the pork pieces turn crisp. I find the meat crisps better when I use free-range pork from slower-grown pigs.

SERVES 4

1kg/2lb 4oz fat pork belly, cut away from the ribs and strip of lean meat – use this to make spare ribs, for another meal

4 tablespoons sunflower or groundnut oil

4 tablespoons Demerara sugar or palm sugar

500ml/18fl oz water

10 spring onions, sliced

2cm/¾in piece fresh ginger, sliced

4 tablespoons soy sauce

pinch of salt

2 tablespoons Shaoxing wine (or pale dry sherry, such as fino)

1 star anise

1 teaspoon red fermented bean curd

1 black cardamom

Bring a pan of water to the boil, add the pork and simmer for 10 minutes. Drain and pat dry, then cut into bite-sized pieces. Put 2 tablespoons of the oil in the pan and fry the pork over a medium heat, browning it on all sides until golden and crisp – this will take about 10 minutes and the fat should render away. Remove from the pan with a slotted spoon. Discard the fat, or save in a bowl to use for roasting potatoes. Wipe the pan clean with a cloth. Put half the sugar into the pan with 1 further tablespoon of the oil. Place over the heat and allow the oil to bubble with the sugar and caramelise, turning golden brown. Remove from the heat and add the water – be careful, because it will sizzle. Bring to the boil – you should have a thin caramel-flavoured liquid – then pour into a jug or bowl and set aside. Wipe the pan clean again.

Put the final tablespoon of oil into the pan with the onions and ginger and fry gently until fragrant and soft. Add the soy sauce, salt and wine and then the pork. Cover with the sugar stock, add the star anise, fermented bean curd and black cardamom. Braise in an open pan for 1½ hours until the pork is tender. The sauce will reduce and you may need to add a few tablespoons of water. In the last 5 minutes, add the remaining 2 tablespoons sugar and boil faster so the sauce is syrupy. Remove the black cardamom and star anise (I sometimes tie these two spices up in a bundle of muslin, because children hate to find them in their food). Serve with plain boiled rice (see page 405) or clay-pot rice (see below).

Clay-pot rice with rice crackling

Another of Annie Leong’s recipes, delicious on its own with some stir-fried broccoli or pak choi, or with the red pork above. Use a cast-iron casserole with a lid or a lidded ceramic dish that is hob-proof. Annie uses Thai fragrant rice for this recipe but Chinese long grain is also suitable.

SERVES 4

225g/8oz Thai fragrant rice

1 teaspoon sunflower or groundnut oil

1 teaspoon white rice vinegar

½ teaspoon salt

180–250ml/6–9fl oz water

To make rice crackling: 1–2 tablespoons sunflower or groundnut oil

Put the rice in a bowl, cover with cold water and rub it with your fingers to wash the excess starch away. Drain in a fine sieve then put back in the bowl with the oil, vinegar and salt. Stir and leave to stand for 20 minutes.

Put the rice in the casserole and pour in the water. Bring to the boil, cover with a lid and allow to bubble vigorously for 5 minutes. This is important as it helps the exterior of the rice grain form a protective layer around the interior so that the rice remains firm despite the longer cooking time. After 3 minutes, lift the lid and stir the rice with a metal spoon, scraping the bottom of the pot. Cover and simmer for another 5 minutes.

Remove from the heat, lift the lid once more (there should still be a few drops of water bubbling on the surface) and stir the rice for the last time. To make the crackling, carefully pour 1–2 tablespoons oil down the sides of the casserole – a little in each place. It should dribble down to the base of the pan. Cover the pot again and place over a low heat and cook for another 10 minutes. Remove from the heat and rest the rice, keeping the lid on, for 5 minutes.

Special fried rice

The real thing, borrowed from Fuchsia Dunlop, who found this recipe on her travels in Yangzhou, China. In her book, Shark’s Fin and Sichuan Pepper, Dunlop, a British journalist, writes of the conflict between her love of Chinese cooking and concerns about the quality of the ingredients used in China itself. Finding the original special fried rice in its birthplace, Yangzhou, she also found tender shoots of change, with some of her companions talking about eating less but ‘greener’ ingredients – something to cheer Annie Leong (see page 88). Explaining that the hardships of China’s revolutionary twentieth century had bred a greed for plenty (not unlike the bad food habits that came after World War II in Britain), Dunlop finishes her book with a note of optimism and this recipe, which is delightfully clean and delicate. Great mountains of this economical and satisfying dish have been served to my son and his hungry friends, getting rave reviews. It is a great dish for using up leftovers.

SERVES 6–8, DEPENDING ON APPETITE

8 tablespoons groundnut oil

1 raw pork neck fillet, cut into small pieces (or use pork mince)

2 tablespoons defrosted peeled prawns (squeeze out excess water), chopped

2 tablespoons chopped cooked ham

1 cooked chicken breast or leg, chopped

2 tablespoons sliced bamboo shoot (from a can, drained)

2 tablespoons Shaoxing wine (or pale dry sherry, such as fino)

400ml/14fl oz chicken stock

salt (optional)

2 eggs, beaten

1.3kg/3lb cold cooked Thai fragrant rice

2 tablespoons frozen petits pois or podded edamame (soya) beans, defrosted (optional)

6 spring onions, green part only, sliced

Heat half the oil in a large pan or wok and stir-fry the raw pork and prawns briefly, until the meat is pale. Add the ham, chicken and bamboo shoot and fry 1 minute longer. Add the wine and stock and bring to the boil, season with a little salt if necessary. (I don’t, usually, because of the ham.) Set to one side in a bowl and clean the pan.

Heat the remaining oil in the pan and add the eggs. Swirl with a wooden spatula to scramble the eggs a little, then add the rice. Stir-fry over a medium heat until the rice is hot. Try not to brown it, however. Fold in the prepared ingredients, the peas and spring onions and cook, gently stirring, until all is warmed through. Eat immediately.

Adventure

My niece and nephew Luke and Eve Clark have grown up in a restaurant family. They are the exception to the rule that children reject certain foods once they discover that their friends find it strange to be served a grilled razor clam or spiced chickpeas. It is not just because their parents, Sam and Sam, cook brilliantly. Since they were babies they have been among people who work with and socialise around food. They simply know no other life than that where something different is being tried all the time. Ask Sam which recipe from the restaurant, Moro, that Luke and Eve love to eat, and each time she comes up with something completely different – of course.

Lahmacun

It’s best to describe Sam and Sam’s lahmacun as a Turkish ‘pizza’ – healthier than the cheese-and-tomato type, yet full of the sweet flavours children love. I find this easy to make once you have a store of the stewed lamb ready to use. The lamb can be prepared the day before, along with the tomato sauce.

MAKES 4 PIZZAS

FOR THE STEWED LAMB:

300g/10½oz boneless shoulder or neck of lamb, cut into 1cm/½in cubes (or you can use lean minced lamb with the same seasonings, so no stewing)

½ small onion, grated

¼ teaspoon ground allspice

100–150ml/3½–5fl oz water

salt and black pepper

Put the lamb, onion and allspice into a medium saucepan and stir well. Add enough water just to cover – add a pinch of salt and pepper and place a piece of baking parchment on top. Simmer over a low flame for about 1–1½ hours or until tender. Uncover the pot, increase the heat and cook until the juices run thick. Remove from the heat to cool and keep aside.

FOR THE DOUGH:

450g/1lb unbleached strong white bread flour, plus extra for kneading

5g/1 teaspoon fast action yeast

¾ teaspoon fine sea salt

300ml/½ pint warm water

2 tablespoons olive oil

Put the flour, yeast and salt into a large bowl and add the water. Mix to a paste, then add the oil and continue to mix until it has come together. Transfer to a floured surface and knead well for about 5 minutes until smooth and elastic, adding more flour if necessary. Set aside to rise, covered with a cloth, for 1 hour.

Kitchenella: The secrets of women: heroic, simple, nurturing cookery - for everyone

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