The Recipes

Given our predilection for spicy foods, I am surprised how few dishes exist in which pepper is brought into play as a key ingredient. We mainly use it out of habit as in ‘season to taste with salt and pepper’. Pepper is more than a mere partner to salt, though, as Roman and medieval cooks well knew and today’s cooks are beginning to appreciate. It is a valid ingredient in its own right with a full spectrum of flavours equal in nuance to those found in good olive oil, chocolate or fine wine.

The recipes that follow are a broadly based collection that shows off these qualities. They are recipes in which pepper makes a real difference, where its absence would be noticeable however small the amount used. Many of them are my own creation, the result of long hours spent tasting and testing; others are from chefs and food writers whose passion for pepper matches my own.