Fast

Many of the recipes in this chapter involve vegetables, fruit and fish, and are the types of dishes I would rustle up quickly for lunch after coming home a little late from the market, or in the evenings when my children’s homework has dragged on. These are a mixture of open-a-tin, quick assembly and cooked-from-scratch recipes, where the speed of the cooking methods is certainly convenient on a busy day.

Equipment-wise, your greatest allies for fast, healthy cooking are a saucepan with a steamer, a heavy cast-iron pan and a good oven. The recipes in this chapter keep the number of saucepans and hob rings needed to a minimum. They are dishes that cook in the time it takes to prepare them or that can be left alone after the preparation for the oven or hob to do the work for you. I hope they will help you consider ‘fast’ food not just as opening a pre-cooked pack from your freezer. In French kitchens, you won’t: find much in the way of convenience food. There is always a better way! It comes down to shopping sensibly, introducing one or two basic items to your weekly shopping list, like beautiful cherry tomatoes, crunchy apples or a good French cheese - fresh things that will stay in your fridge for a while and can be considered a snack as well as an addition to an unavoidably starch-inclusive main meal.