This recipe series was first published in the summer of 2006 in The Sunday Times, but read on and you'll see it's perfectly relevant 10 years later... and if you want to make it out of season you'll find it's much easier now to buy frozen blackcurrants. You may not have enjoyed the cold winter and chilly, damp spring, but Britain’s blackcurrant bushes did. Currants need a proper winter to produce a good crop and this year, at last, they got one. The 2006 harvest is looking as

I don't know why more people don't make lemon curd. It's much easier than marmalade or jam and bears no discernible relation to the day-glo gooey bought stuff. Stir it into yoghurt or spread it on toast, waffles or whatever at breakfast, and use it in tarts with sweetened mascarpone or meringue on top and/or ground almonds underneath. If you have a sweet tooth, you can use more sugar (add up to 50g). You can also make the taste richer and softer by adding an extra egg yolk, b

These light, moist almond cakes, also known as financiers, are French in origin, but they’ve been taken up by the Australians and you’re now more likely to find them being drunk with a macchiato in fashionable cafés in Sydney, Melbourne and Perth. I prefer to make small friands in mini muffin tins, but you can make larger ones – and I hardly need tell ice cream and mayonnaise-makers that these are a brilliant way of using up all those leftover egg whites in the freezer. Makes

Continuing on from last week's breakfast and brunch comes another alternative idea, this time an homage to that all-important brunch staple, bacon. You can eat these exactly as they come or buttered, but they’re also a treat with scrambled or poached eggs, sausages, mushrooms, tomatoes and extra bacon, and you can vary the flavourings – adding grated cheddar or semi-dried tomatoes with or instead of the bacon. They’re so easy, you could almost make them in your sleep – not th

Is it just me or have we become oddly unimaginative about breakfast, belying the British reputation for starting the day with the closest thing to a banquet? I wouldn’t dream of eating the same thing day in day out at other meals, so I can’t think why I’ve been so boring about breakfast. Well, not any more. Last weekend it was kedgeree on Saturday and bacon muffins, eggs and mushrooms on Sunday. We’ve had friands with our coffee and there’s a fridge-full of home-made lemon cu