Food to Share James Martin: Home Comforts

The heart of my home is the kitchen.

And it's here that I love to cook delicious meals

for my nearest and dearest.

There's no better way to celebrate everything good in life

than sharing some great food...

..with the people you love.

These are the dishes that I cook

when I want to bring people together.

These are my Home Comforts.

Although dinner for one can be a guilty pleasure,

sharing a meal takes it to another level.

I think it makes great grub taste even better.

For me, the best food isn't about white tablecloths and fine dining -

it's much more about dining with your family and friends,

a dish that you can rip up and share.

In my mind, there's no greater compliment

than seeing a dish I've prepared

being devoured by a hungry crowd.

'So today I'm cooking a boozy barbecue chicken on a can of beer...'

Check that out!

'..enjoying a knockout meal with Olympic Gold medallist Nicola Adams...'

You can't even see that right hand coming!

'..and making a pie that's so good it could cause a punch-up.'

This type of food is all about sharing -

nobody is getting any of this.

Take one generous bowl of delicious food,

place in the middle of the dining table and watch everybody dive in.

Well, how could they resist this?

My shellfish stew with chunky croutons is simple, aromatic

and packed with all the flavours of the South of France!

Now, this is one of my favourite dishes to actually cook

and share at the table. It's based on a classic bouillabaisse,

that famous dish from Marseille.

The way that I was taught when I was trained over there,

by this mad chef, was using a five foot live conger eel,

a ton of other fish and about six hours' worth of cooking.

I haven't got that. I've got a nice bit of mackerel,

I've got a nice bit of pollock here,

we've got some lovely prawns, mussels, a little lobster

for a bit of luxury and some dark crab meat, but you can easily

create a wonderful little sauce just using a few basic ingredients.

Now, of course you can do this at home in your normal oven,

but it's my version cos I'm going to use

my favourite toy - my wood-fired oven.

This wood fired-oven gives a very unique flavour,

not only to things like pizza, but also to casseroles like this.

To start the sauce, chop an onion, six cloves of garlic

and add a glug of olive oil.

And some white wine.

Now to the dish's main flavour.

A really underused veg, I think, fennel. It's great braised,

it's great raw in salads but it's fantastic in this dish and this

is one of the main flavours,

so if you don't like fennel or aniseedy flavours,

this is a dish that's not for you, clearly,

but it does taste fantastic, cos everything is just cooked and served

in this one pan.

Touch of fennel seed and then some star anise.

Now, the key to this is you don't want one of these in your mouth

when you come to eat it, so count them in,

then you can count them out. Four will do.

At home, preheat your oven as high as it will go

and cook the sauce for roughly five minutes. Now prepare the seafood.

This is where you can have an entirely different selection of seafood -

whatever you want, really - whatever's to hand.

The lobster itself, just cut all this lot into decent-sized chunks

so take the legs off, just crack the claws...

When you are training as a chef, you think bouillabaisse is

made from the shells of lobster and crab and anything like that.

It's not at all - it is basically just the flavour of the fish

and other ingredients and a whole manner of different sorts of stuff,

some I've never seen before.

Some I think would probably confuse Mr Attenborough, to be honest.

And with the mackerel, you want to chop this into chunks

and I can already hear the sauce sizzling away in our oven.

It does take about five or six minutes to soften up...

..but when it is soft like that,

the smell of this is just superb.

Mmm-mmm-mmm!

Now mix in the tinned tomatoes and add some pureed brown crab meat

and return the dish to the oven for another five minutes.

Now classically, in bouillabaisse, or certainly

the bouillabaisse that I've had, it's always got potatoes in it,

but instead of potatoes, I am going to use some of this sourdough

because I like to add a little bit of texture to this,

rather than it just being all shellfish and seafood.

The sourdough gives a really nice texture to it but also it soaks up

some of that lovely juice and you end up with

the best croutons you have ever tasted.

Decent sized chunks as well - don't be

too poncey with this. That's a crouton - not too small!

Drizzle it with some olive oil and then our sauce is just about ready.

One goes in, the other one comes out.

That looks pretty good to me.

Now we can take our croutons and pop these in.

Now for this pot.

This is why I love this dish -

you just take the lobster, the pollock

and you want it sort of chunks,

that's why I've cut the mackerel

into sort of decent-sized chunks like this.

The prawns - don't do anything with them.

They go in. There's nothing too fancy about this.

It's all about great flavour, great colour.

I mean, already just look at a that as a dish.

It just looks fantastic.

There's a lot of juice

that is going to come out of these mussels as well.

It's like a proper pot of seafood!

Good amount of black pepper and some salt.

I've got to keep my eye on this cos this gets really hot.

Very hot.

That is another slightly over-caramelised one

but it's all right!

Now put the stew back into the oven for ten minutes.

So, if you are doing this at home, set your oven really high.

Don't cover it over. You want to sort of char if not colour the lobster and bits

and pieces over the top,

so just stick it in the oven and just leave it.

As it cooks, the flavours of the dish will fill your kitchen

and immediately transport you to the South of France.

Now I have kind of fond memories of France

and some nightmare memories of France.

On the same trip that I learned how the bouillabaisse was made properly,

I nearly got arrested, to be honest with you, because

the producer said that you've to cook on the beach.

Well, I didn't realise

that you're not allowed to cook on certain French beaches.

And you certainly aren't allowed to cook on French beaches

with bundles of vine prunings that I set fire to

and flames were coming up about the size of that tree.

The police were called as I was just sealing off my steak

and properly arrested me.

Look!

Now just check this out for a pot of food!

How good does that look?!

Loads of flavour in there as well

and all we're going to do is nothing fancy, just pop these chunks

of croutons in there, which kind of soak up some of this lovely juice.

It's the perfect one pot food, really.

Little bit of basil over the top,

for a little bit of flavour, just a touch,

and of course a nice drizzle of olive oil.

Now, good food doesn't look much better than that

and what you do is you get these croutons and just dunk them in.

It just tastes superb.

It's the perfect sharing plate of food, really.

You kind of stick it in the middle of the table

and everyone just helps themselves.

It's not got a five foot conger eel in there

and it doesn't matter, cos that tastes delicious.

If they had served this succulent

and aromatic seafood stew in a French jail,

then I might have been happy to spend a night in the cells.

Bon appetit.

Top-quality food goes a long way

when it comes to keeping a hungry crowd happy.

Thankfully, here in the UK,

we have a whole host of dedicated food producers

who work hard to provide us with the best ingredients in the world.

Slow-food farmers Jonty and Mel Brunyee

take a very patient approach to rearing

rare Cotswold sheep on their National Trust tenant farm

and with views like this, I'd be happy to hang around too.

So, we are stood on the roof of Lodge Park,

a 17th-century hunting grandstand.

Lord Sherborne used to course deer out of the woods

down the one-mile straight and gamble on the deer hound.

Now the National Trust property is spanned around us

and our farm is in the distance, Conygree Farm.

Jonty and Mel come from environmental

and farming backgrounds, so when the National Trust offered them

the tenancy here, they jumped at the chance.

We took on the farm ten years ago and the purpose for us

really is to conserve the landscape and the grassland,

the wild flower meadows and to protect the wonderful,

wonderful habitat we have around us.

Currently one of our fields,

one of our meadows, is a wild flower meadow.

It's a thin chalky, stony field, it's not great

for growing crops, but it is great

for growing grass and wild flowers and herbs.

And those meadows are also wonderful

for rearing their flock of traditional Cotswold sheep,

a breed that was on the verge of extinction.

The farm next door to here was the last farm to have a flock in the '70s

and when I moved to the farm in the parish of Aldsworth,

I couldn't not have Cotswold sheep.

The Cotswolds' long golden fleece fell out of favour

when machine weaving took off

but being a slow-growing breed,

they have other uses

and Jonty raised them for an unusual meat

that not many people have heard of -

hogget.

A lot of people think hogs, or hogget, is pigs,

older pigs or Mr Hoggett from Babe.

Hogget is lamb into its second year, so if it was born in April or May,

the following spring it's grazing again on the wild flower grasslands,

and it's got that second spring,

second early summer at grass so it's bigger in size, bigger in taste.

So, here we have beautiful wonderful Cotswold hogget,

a pedigree Cotswold with a beautiful golden fleece,

the long wool that's the famous Cotswold fleece

and of course this was the valued bit of the sheep,

which is why it was kept to be an older sheep.

To maybe its second birthday, third birthday, this was the valued fleece,

and that's why we ate more hogget and mutton than we did lamb.

Lamb is of course succulent and very juicy,

but maybe doesn't taste of very much. Hogget is still succulent

and juicy and tender, but it's full of flavour, full of taste

and it's got a more robust flavour.

Going up to mutton, you've got something,

a more dense product, maybe you want to cook it slowly full of flavour.

But hogget sits right in the middle,

a really nice mix, halfway between lamb and mutton.

These wild flower meadows are ideal for sheep rearing

but Mel is also passionate about their other benefits.

We have got ox-eye daisy appearing, we have some vetches appearing,

there's clovers and stuff in the mix but there's

also lovely little plant here called birdsfoot trefoil

which has lots of other names -

some people know it as bacon and eggs.

A lot of these flowers, this one in particular, are really, really

important nectar sources - they attract lots of different species

of butterflies and are really important for bumblebees as well.

Why not have fields full of wild flowers

and still produce good quality meats? We can do that here and

part of that is because we have the right breeds to do that.

We have traditional native breeds, that were bred to survive

on this particular habitat.

But creating these meadows for the sheep to graze doesn't mean

you can just let things grow wild.

On a grass-fed system like ours, the sheep

and the cattle working together are crucial.

The cattle come in first, nibbling the grass right down,

ripping the grass, leaving tussocks and the flowers.

And then come the sheep and the lambs, followed by the hoggets,

and the hoggets will come in very shortly, eating all the herbs

and the wild flowers and that will all go into the taste of the meat.

Well, the proof, they say, is in the pudding,

or in this case, the main course!

Jonty has organised a barbecue for family and friends

and there is only one thing on the menu.

We have got some sausages, some hogget burgers,

some leg steaks, some chops,

got a rack of hogget on there and some minty ribs.

Hogget-tastic.

So how will the fuller-flavoured hogget

go down with his flock of diners?

I love the extra flavour, that extra season -

there's a little bit of marbling in the fat

and it just makes it taste outstanding.

Leg steaks? Chops?

Burgers for kids - come and grab some.

It is delicious - it tastes much nicer than lamb,

it's a bit richer without being too fatty or over-strong.

It is nice, yeah.

Even the youngest diner is a hogget fan.

Zack finished almost an entire burger.

He really enjoyed it.

So if you want to try some of the best British meat that is out there,

be adventurous - and don't follow the crowd.

You might not want to follow the crowd,

but what if you want to feed one?

Well, this next recipe will have them queuing up a second time.

I cook it slowly, so the juicy, tender meat simply falls apart

then I top it with golden buttery potatoes.

It's my rich braised hogget pie.

So the first thing we've got on here

is a shoulder of the hogget that has been deboned

and I am actually going to braise it first of all

then create a pie afterwards.

Now, I particularly like this cut more than any other.

I was always taught the part of the animal that has the most flavour

does the most amount of work,

so you think the shoulder of the lamb

that then turns into hogget is moving round like that -

you get so much flavour into this.

Now, what I am going to do is quickly season it,

salt and pepper,

and then sear it in a hot pan.

So often, to make a pie, you would actually chop this up into chunks.

We are actually going to cook it in a whole piece

and almost shred it, like the best pulled pork you have ever tasted.

Brown the hogget shoulder on all sides

in an oil-free hot casserole pan.

Then chop up some carrots, celery, shallots,

and of course, some garlic.

Garlic and, of course, lamb work fantastically well together

so hogget and garlic is going to work exactly the same.

When the hogget is nicely browned all over,

lift it out and set aside.

Now keep the fat that's in the pan.

This is really the key to this dish -

everything is cooked in one pot and served in this dish as well,

which makes it the perfect dish for sharing at a dinner table

and let everybody just dive in.

And then we add the onions, first of all, then the garlic.

And then at this stage, we can throw in some tomato puree.

Now this, you've got to be kind of careful with, really.

It must go in at the start of cooking

cos you need to cook out the tomato puree.

If you don't cook it out, it'll become really, really bitter,

it can overpower everything.

In goes the rest of veg.

Don't cut the veg too small,

otherwise they just go into a lump of mush,

but you don't want them too big.

After sweating the veg for a couple of minutes,

place the whole hogget back into the pan.

Add a small bunch of thyme followed by just a little red wine.

Now, at my house, I'm a massive fan of rioja

and if it's good enough to drink, it's good enough for the pot.

One thing you don't want to be doing

is putting poor-quality wine into good-quality dishes,

otherwise it'll just affect the taste.

Having said that, I am a Yorkshireman

and this ain't 30 quid a bottle.

Season with salt and black pepper, add some lamb stock,

although you can use chicken or beef.

Bring everything gently to the boil before putting the lid on

and it will need two hours in the oven.

You don't need to baste it or anything -

just put it in the oven and leave it.

A slow braise is a wonderful, stress-free way of cooking

for a large crowd, because the oven does all the hard work.

While it does its thing, I can do mine,

although the wonderful aromas mean you can't ignore this dish for long.

Now, what you end up with is this -

a beautiful braised shoulder of hogget.

All the flavour is kept in the pan.

To be honest, I'd just eat this as it is.

Look at it - it just drops apart.

That is exactly what we want it to do

and then what we can do is grab a fork

and basically just rip it up

and because you braised it

in all that lovely, inexpensive wine,

it just softens all the meat up

so instead of actually stewing it in chunks -

which is fine, which most pies, let's face it, are made out of -

this takes it to a different level.

Mmmmm!

Sounded like bull then, but this is just delicious.

Return the shredded meat to the pan.

Mix with the juices and the veg.

Add some seasoning

and then thinly slice some uncooked, peeled waxy potatoes.

I am using a mandolin but a kitchen knife is also fine.

Now all we do now is basically top this with the potatoes,

just randomly, first of all.

It stops the potatoes sinking, really.

With the larger potatoes, then, you start to go round.

Now you could, if you wanted to, top this with mashed potato,

turn it into the ultimate shepherd's pie, I suppose.

Alternatively, you can put puff pastry over the top,

or even shortcrust pastry, but for me,

just some peeled, sliced potatoes.

Touch of salt over the top,

a little bit of freshly ground black pepper.

But it wouldn't be my pie without a little bit of butter,

so just a few knobs of butter over the top.

This colours the potatoes while they are in the oven.

You just pop it in the oven and wait.

The pie will need to cook for another 30 minutes

until the buttered potatoes are nice and golden,

and the garlic and rich rioja gravy is bubbling around the edges.

You see, I love this bit.

When food looks that good,

you just know that this is going to taste great

and making a pie like this is very different,

but by using the shoulder, it makes it taste fantastic.

Mmm!

That tastes so good.

But what I love about this,

although it's braised as a whole piece,

you still end up with chunks of meat it in as well.

This type of food is all about sharing.

Nobody is getting any of this!

Off you go!

I might be hogging this hogget,

but who can blame me?

Serve this upmarket slow-braised pie to your friends and family

and they'll flock to your table.

Of course, a big get-together over a tasty meal is nothing new.

Food historian Ivan Day is at Townend Farm in Cumbria,

rustling up a recipe that our 18th ancestors turned to

when they were having a bit of a do.

For the family who lived

in this absolutely wonderful farmhouse in the Lake District,

their lives were punctuated by major events -

births, marriages and deaths -

and for all those occasions,

they had incredible celebrations, great parties,

with buckets of drink and lots of food.

For my inspiration, I'm going to use this extraordinary book

that was written by Elizabeth Brown

who lived in this house from 1702 to 1728.

Elizabeth moved here

when she married the owner of the house -

the farmer, Benjamin Brown.

We don't know too much about their wedding,

but it would have been a fairly big affair

and it's quite likely that she would have had

a rustic bride cake

and that's what I am going to make right now.

Ivan gets going on a simple bride cake

by rolling shortcrust pastry

and chopping preserve peel for the filling.

This is citron, which is very lemony,

got a wonderful green colour.

So just chop that up roughly to begin with...

And some preserved lemon.

This isn't the same as candied peel

because it's sitting in its syrup.

When he has chopped the peel,

Ivan adds it to the pan of melted butter

along with a mixture of sugar, allspice and nutmeg

and a handful of currants.

And finally, just a little zest of lemon.

The mixture is placed over an open fire

for about 20 minutes.

While it's cooling, Ivan cuts out two discs of the pastry.

I am now ready to finish off Elizabeth's bride cake

by putting in this amazingly rich and spicy filling.

Another layer of pastry was placed over the fruit

and a crisscross pattern was made on the top.

This made it easier to share the cake

during the wedding celebrations,

but not before some peculiar traditions were observed.

The cake was actually broken up and put over the bride's head -

it was scattered by the groom onto a napkin,

which two attendants held over her hair.

These customs are still with us -

we still throw stuff over the bride's head

and she still wears a veil.

But before it can be broken over the bride's head,

the cake needed to be baked.

This was done over an open fire

on a brilliant contraption called a swinging girdle.

In order to bake the cake,

I've also got to have heat from above

so I am going to put a few hot embers on to here.

I am going to leave that for about 20 minutes.

We will have a peek later on, but I can't wait to taste it.

A wedding cake cooked on Elizabeth Brown's fire

in her kitchen, using a recipe

from her remarkable, handwritten 18th century recipe book

but how will it taste almost 300 years on?

It's not too sweet - cakes like this

are still eaten round here with cheese on them.

Very good.

Really spicy.

So, here's to you, Elizabeth Brown!

Our ancestors went to a lot of trouble to feed a crowd,

but these days, we can be a little bit less formal.

A barbecue is the ideal excuse for a get-together

and chicken is the perfect meat for the grill.

But this one is done in a slightly unusual way.

My spicy marinated piri piri chicken

has a can of beer where the sun doesn't shine

to keep it super-moist.

Served up with a home-made garlic butter and jacket potatoes,

it's the ideal barbecue banquet to share.

What I am going to do first of all is create our marinade to this.

Now, I like spicy marinades

so this is like a piri piri marinade, really.

I am going to use some sweet paprika and a spicy paprika.

This one is the sweet one -

it will actually say on the side of the tin -

and then some of the hot and spicy one.

Now, it's entirely up to you, the combination of the two,

but I like to put half sweet, half spicy.

Little bit of dried chilli - you can use fresh, of course -

and then some mustard.

A little bit of Dijon mustard, about two tablespoons of mustard,

and vinegar, as the whole thing about this

is that little piquant that you get

and I am going to get the flavour from the vinegar,

but also from a combination of lime and lemon.

Take one of each fruit, then add their juice to the marinade.

Throw in a pinch of salt and pepper and stir into a paste.

Then what I am going to do is take a bag.

This is basically just to marinade the chicken.

You take the marinade and you pour that into the bag.

Then you can put about four tablespoons of olive oil in there

This is where you can mix and match this recipe.

You can put fresh herbs in there, a little bit of garlic -

entirely up to you.

Then we've got our lovely chicken -

really good-quality chicken, remember,

and take the entire lot and stuff it in the bag.

It saves you getting the marinade all over your hands,

which makes you look like you've been painting for a week.

Seal it up and the roll the bag around your chicken.

If you're just tuning in, this is not boil-in-the-bag chicken -

it's marinated chicken.

Looking at this,

I think when I did Strictly, I was this colour.

Now you can't have chicken,

particularly barbecued chicken like this, without potatoes

and I'm doing jacket potatoes.

Quite simply, in tinfoil - nothing fancy.

Cut the tinfoil up.

And you can grab the spuds.

Prick it a little bit with a fork, touch of oil.

Just a little drizzle.

Some salt and then just wrap the potatoes in the tinfoil.

I am using sort of medium-sized potatoes.

I try not to use the larger potatoes for this

cos I am going to cook the whole lot in the barbecue

and we want them to cook at the same time as the chicken,

which will take about 45 minutes.

And then, before we cook our chicken,

we need a can of beer.

But I only want half a can.

The things I have to do for the viewing public(!)

For the chicken, I'm just going to cut up a little bit of garlic

and then we put the garlic inside the chicken

and put the chicken over the top of the can

or the can inside the chicken.

Check that out!

Carefully stand the beer can with the chicken on top

in the centre of the barbecue,

then place a ring of foil around the base

to stop the legs of the chicken burning.

Now what is going to happen is the can bubbles over, creates a steam,

which keeps inside of the chicken nice and moist

and cooks the chicken.

While all that is happening,

I've got time to make the garlic butter for the baked potatoes.

Simply wrap a whole garlic bulb in foil, add some olive oil

and then roast alongside the chicken.

After 15 minutes, the garlic will be soft and gooey.

You can do this in a conventional oven as well.

If you roast off the whole garlic bulb like that,

when you cut it, you cut at the top like that.

Now, this is the best bit - you squeeze it.

Oh! Look at that!

Chop up some chives, then put them in a bowl

along with some of your roasted garlic

before adding a whole pack of softened butter.

And by cooking the garlic, you get this amazing flavour,

but it softens up in the bowl.

It's like the best garlic butter ever.

To go with the spicy chicken and buttery baked potatoes,

I'm making a simple salad

with some lemon and lime wedges to garish.

The chicken has had an hour on the booze - I mean, barbecue -

so it should be perfectly cooked.

How good does that look?

So often, people would never cook a whole chicken like this

on a barbecue, but the beer inside it

keeps that chicken nice and moist - it almost steams the inside.

And I actually like to serve it just like that, in the can.

You can take chunks off.

So a few lemons and limes around, big chunks of lemon and lime.

It goes really well with that piri piri mixture.

Jacket potatoes and then, of course, the home-made garlic butter.

A nice dollop inside each spud.

Now, this is a proper plate of sharing food.

It's one of those ones that you just leave in the middle of the table

and let everybody else just dive in.

And who wouldn't want to get their fill of juicy chicken

with a chilli marinade kick,

served with crispy skin potatoes that ooze garlic butter?

Sharing has never tasted so good.

And that is not the beer talking.

Another very British food-sharing tradition

is afternoon tea and cakes,

and in Bristol, Nancy and her wife Lucy

are giving one of our most popular pastries

an award-winning and glamorous makeover.

I think that both me and Nancy really enjoy food

so it's an important aspect for our own lives.

When we sat down with some friends once at a barbecue,

someone brought some doughnuts from a really big company.

We just all ate them and me and Nancy were like,

"Yeah, we think we can do better than that," basically!

So we thought we'd get stuck in.

First, Nancy and Lucy had to find the perfect doughnut recipe

and bring it back home to Bristol.

We searched around for loads of different types of doughnuts.

We wanted to find something that was really light

so that we could put loads of really indulgent fillings in.

The doughnut that we settled on in the end is a Polish recipe

and they call it a paczki.

What makes them different

is that they're very light compared to an English doughnut

and we're mixing up the different flavours that we're using

and trying to be a bit experimental.

Often people will be really surprised -

they'll think that the creamy ones are custard

or they're just vanilla but then they find out

that there's coconut and lime and we're using mango

and we're putting, you know, lots of different flavours in

that people maybe don't expect.

These surprising flavour combinations went down so well,

the business had its first sweet taste of success

within three months.

We entered the Taste Of The West competition

with two of our doughnuts.

We did a chai-flavoured doughnut which was a lovely cream filling

with a nice Indian spice.

We also did entered a blood orange marmalade doughnut

and they both won a Gold award

so we were really pleased with that.

Today, Nancy is trying out a new flavour

inspired by what is growing on her doorstep.

So we try to use as much local produce as we can.

We use seasonal fruits

and that helps us to keep everything really fresh

and keep the flavours really exciting.

We just move with the seasons.

The one we're really excited about at the moment

is the English rose and raspberry

and you can't get any more local than our back garden.

We are going to select some of the best raspberries we've got here and use those.

Inside, Lucy is preparing a fresh batch of doughnuts

ready for their brand-new topping.

The mark of a good doughnut

is that it has a white ring around the middle,

because when the doughnut hits the hot fat,

it activates the yeast more,

so it makes the doughnut expand quickly cos of the temperature.

You're left with a bit in the middle

which never comes in contact with the oil properly.

Now that they're finished,

I'm just going to get them out and let them cool

and then we can ice them and they're going to look fantastic.

I've got some all-important icing sugar here.

I've got some water, some raspberries from the garden,

some rose petals, a bit of pink food colouring and the rose water.

I can smell the rose water - it's such a fragrant ingredient.

I'm just going to give it a good stir.

You can start to see the colour then.

Now, I'm going to take some raspberries

and just smash them into it.

Don't need too many, but just enough

so we can see those lovely red jewels of the raspberries.

With their brand-new flavour ready to be tried and tested,

Lucy and Nancy are off to the market to share their passion for doughnuts

with a crowd of hungry Bristolians.

One coconut and lime and one lemon.

The stall is the lifeblood of our business, really -

you just get an instant reaction from your customers

so if they love something, they'll let you know,

you can tell from their faces and their expressions when they go past

so it's really good fun for us.

Coconut and lime here, double chocolate

and on the end is pink vanilla.

Can I get one of those, one of those and one of those?

Sometimes they go off and share it with their mates in the office

so they might get a bag of them, all different flavours.

It's a really great market.

-Can I get a pink vanilla?

-Pink vanilla?

Let me just grab one of those for you.

Yeah, nice. Nice, great.

Really good. Yeah, it's got amazing citrus flavours.

It is kind of like key lime pie

and lemon meringue pie in a doughnut - fantastic!

Lovely. Enjoy!

It has been a hectic but successful few hours.

Their new raspberry and rose flavours proved such a hit,

they've sold every last one.

Yeah, it's been really busy today, really busy.

Everyone descends at about midday

and then by about two, it's all over.

so it's a very quick one, this one, the lunchtime markets are great.

You arrive, you set up and then it's finished.

Do you concur?

I concur! Yeah, it's been excellent.

Those doughnuts are obviously a knockout, and so is my mate,

who has popped round to teach me a few ringside moves -

the first woman in the world

to win an Olympic gold medal for boxing, Nicola Adams.

-Hello, stranger.

-All right? How are you?

-This is a swanky car, isn't it?

-It is not bad, not bad.

How are you doing? Ready for something to eat?

In return, I am making her one of my favourite Latin American dishes,

perfect for sharing with friends.

It is my deep-fried fritters called churros,

served with a creamy home-made custard

and an indulgent peach and basil compote.

Right then, Nicola,

I thought I'd cook you something that I know you love.

-You like doughnuts, don't you?

-Yep.

-I am surprised you're allowed them. Look at this six-pack here!

-Ah, I know!

-Yeah, I know, tell me about it(!)

-But doughnuts - and I know you like your Mexican food, don't you?

-Yeah.

So we'll do churros. They're trendy at the moment.

We'll do two sauces to go with it.

You're making one and I'll do the other one,

if that's all right!

You're brave, you're brave!

You're pretty handy in the kitchen.

Right, home-made custard. Now, I need you to separate the eggs

and we need five for this one.

In a bowl, whisk the egg yolks with some caster sugar.

Then in a pan, bring some milk, double cream,

sugar and a vanilla pod gently to the boil.

Can I ask, you were in a boxing ring at 12?

Yeah, but I got into boxing by mistake, really.

My mum used to do aerobics.

She couldn't get a baby-sitter for me and for my brother one night

and took us down to an after-school boxing class they had there,

and I absolutely loved it - been boxing ever since.

But as a girl in the boxing ring, that must have been quite tough, though, wasn't it?

-You were in working men's clubs, boxing.

-Yeah, boxing away.

What was that like, though?

It was very different back then - you were allowed to smoke as well,

so there would be, like, above the ring

there would be, like, a big, massive cloud of smoke as you were boxing,

but, erm, it was...

I just loved it. I loved the atmosphere.

I think I just liked to entertain the crowd.

When the milk is boiling, pour it on to the egg yolk mixture

whisking all the time so that they don't scramble.

-Am I doing a good job?

-You're doing all right.

What do you like cooking at home? Are you any good?

Erm...I'm OK. I can cook chicken fajitas!

-You can cook chicken fajitas? Is that it?

-Yeah!

Now return the whole mixture to the pan

and cook over a gentle heat,

whisking occasionally until it thickens.

If you boil, it separates.

It is basically like a knockout -

once you do that, you've had it, it is game over.

Now, dare I say, there's quite a few people over the years

that have won medals at the Olympics,

but you are the first women's gold medal boxer, ever.

Yeah, I know, I know -

it still sounds exciting every time I hear that!

And we've got the Olympics just around the corner again, really,

so are you training now?

Are you allowed to eat this, actually?

Oh, yeah! I am allowed to eat that now.

We've got a year to go, plenty of time to burn that off.

How long does it take to get ready for a fight?

Well, to be honest, we're kind of always ready all the time, because we're competing.

So, you could leap into action right now?

Yeah, yeah, literally right now!

THEY LAUGH

Set the thickened custard aside

and move on to preparing the peach and basil compote.

Start by chopping four ripe peaches,

removing the stones first, of course.

Is there a special way to do this? Because...

-Well, it's just that.

-See, you made that look really easy.

I didn't, it's quite easy!

See, you've ruined it! All the way round.

Look, take your knife all the way round and then twist.

-All right, here we go, here we go.

-You're too strong, you see?

You have munched up my peaches, look...

-Aw, look at that!

-You see? You're on it, now.

-Master chef!

-Don't get too good.

Put the chopped peaches into a pan

with some sugar, butter, water and some basil leaves,

then cover and gently simmer for five to ten minutes

until tender and softened.

Now for the churros.

-Now have you ever made eclairs before?

-No.

-Profiteroles? Choux pastry?

-No.

-Doughnuts?

-No.

-Never?

I just eat them!

This is my problem, you see - I cook them and eat them.

This is why I haven't got the six-pack.

But this is a combination of all three.

So we need 250ml of water.

Now I want you to put two level tablespoons of sugar in there

and we are going to pop in about 75g of butter.

Bring the water, sugar and butter to the boil

in a saucepan set over a medium heat.

When it is boiled, add 200g of plain flour

and a quarter of a teaspoon of baking powder.

Right, now, put it back on the heat, mix this together

and you'll see what happens.

It goes into this thick paste.

-Look at that.

-That's actually quite cool.

So this is what choux pastry would look like.

Now, what we can do... You're much stronger than me.

Throw in an egg and then you're going to beat it up.

Off you go.

-See, you're struggling now, aren't you?

-Yeah!

THEY LAUGH

Nicola Adams, Olympic champion, defeated over an egg.

-We can delete this bit.

-No, we'll keep this bit in!

Once the egg is combined,

spoon half the mixture into a piping bag

fitted with a star nozzle.

Pipe the mixture in lines directly into the fat fryer.

Dip a pair of metal scissors into the hot oil

so that the batter doesn't stick and then begin snipping it.

They'll take about five to six minutes to cook.

I reckon when me and you retire,

we could get ourselves a little Citron van,

go around to all these festivals and be the Churros Twins.

-Yeah, definitely.

-Something like that?

-James and the apprentice.

-Well, I don't know.

You need to be piping a bit quicker

if we go to somewhere like Glastonbury.

So hurry up! SHE LAUGHS

Once the churros are golden and crispy,

remove from the oil, drain on kitchen paper

and toss with caster sugar.

With the custard and compote on the side,

you can dunk to your heart's content.

-How good is that?

-That is really good.

There are all right, aren't they?

I can feel the calories already!

I think that has been my problem for the last 40 years but...

Everybody deserves a treat every now and again.

It is just that I have these for breakfast, lunch and dinner.

Can I call myself a chef now?

Well, who am I to argue with you? Course you can!

I've seen a set of boxing gloves over there, so yeah.

You've gone through the ranks very quickly.

These bite-sized Mexican churros are perfect to grab and dip

into the rich custard and the succulent compote.

Share these with your friends and family and let the fiesta begin.

I've taught you something.

Now I want you to teach me something.

-Can you teach me how to box?

-Are you ready?

Not particularly, no. Can I have one of these first?

Well, if there's one way to shed a few of these churros calories,

it is going a few rounds with an Olympic champion.

Just remember, Nicola, I bruise like a peach.

-I am going to regret this, aren't I?

-You're going to need that headguard.

-THEY LAUGH

-I'll try not to miss.

-Yeah, cheers(!)

You've got a pretty big target, really, haven't you?

-Are you ready?

-Not really, no!

I'll start with the jab - just on this hand, yeah?

Even that hurts!

-Right, go on, then.

-A combination.

See? It's not so bad.

-Right, give it some beans, then.

-Yeah?

Gee!

You hit hard!

You can't even see that right hand coming!

That's the whole point, I'm quick!

THEY LAUGH Look, the dog is watching.

THEY LAUGH

You'll have to be careful, now, I'll have to get you back for that!

These are the days that I value the most -

at home, hanging out with good friends

and cooking the food I know they will love.

These are meals too delicious not to share.

You can find all the recipes from the series on...

Every now and again, you have to...

-Oof!

-..go for a body shot!

HE COUGHS

Can I take this ridiculous stuff off now?!