Spiced porridge with quince, apple and vanilla compote

Another breakfast recipe. I'm not going to apologise, though, because there are several reasons why this is the absolute best thing you could be making and eating right now (I mean 'right now' figuratively speaking, of course, because you might be reading this at night time, in which case it's probably not a great idea to indulge in a vat of hearty oats before lying down).

Firstly, I've read a few of those awful detox-related articles in various newspapers and magazines this week. Curse those publications, for contributing to JIGS, or 'January-Influenced Guilt Syndrome' (I have just invented this, but I think it should be a nationally-acknowledged phenomenon). They're pretty hard to avoid, and the worst part is I only read magazines and newspapers while eating, so invariably there I am, gorging on some giant bowl of carbs, reading an article telling me not to do exactly that. It's pretty depressing reading about ideal lunches based around salad, green veg and lean protein while you're tucking into their opposite.

However, one of the things these articles all have in common is that they recommend oats. Oats are great for several reasons. I won't bore you with the details, but in a nutshell - they're good for your heart, cholesterol, and they fill you up for ages, meaning you don't get hungry at 11am and reach for an almond croissant.

Another thing mentioned by these articles is that people who eat breakfast are often thinner and happier than those who don't. Combine these two pieces of advice, then, and make porridge for breakfast a new year's resolution. If you need another reason, look outside at the fifty shades of grey that is the English winter morning: this is a time for piping hot, steaming breakfasts. Even the sight of wisps of steam emerging from something is enough to calm the nerves and lift the spirits, whether it be a cup of tea, a plate of pasta, or a bowl of porridge.

To some people, porridge is a simple thing of beauty. Pure, unadulterated, creamy oaty goodness. A quiet simplicity. However, I've yet to experience the moment where I feel satisfied by contemplating a bowl of unadorned oats. If the idea of porridge bores you, or - even worse - repulses you, making you think of Dickensian style gruel, then

I can't stress enough the transformative power of a good compote.

By making a delicious fruit-based compote to top your porridge, you turn something plain and worthy into something plainly worth shouting about. You can smother your oats in sweet, colourful fruit, and pretend you're tucking into rice pudding (if you like that sort of thing - I think I'd rather have porridge). Another advantage of this is that it negates the need for sugar in the porridge, as the fruit is sweet enough to balance the bland starchiness of the oats. Not only are you getting rid of the sugar, which is generally accepted as being bad for us, you're adding one or even two of your five a day to your diet, before you've even woken up properly.

Ever since I became captivated by the unusual quince, by its glorious curvature and exquisite perfumed sweetness, I've been coming up with new recipes that make the most of its soft, aromatic flesh. Sometimes these are savoury - particularly good partners are lamb, chicken, nuts and cheese - others are sweet, such as this quince, apple and almond crumble tart or this quince tarte tatin. I recently decided I didn't want to limit the sweetness of the quince to desserts only, and came up with this compote.

If you've never cooked with quince before, this is a good introduction. Its assertive fragrance is tempered by the addition of apples - since the quince is in both flavour and appearance a cross between an apple and a pear, this makes good culinary sense. The beauty of mingling quince and apple is that the latter loses its shape quickly during cooking, disintegrating into a frothy mush, while the quince retains its form and slightly firmer texture. The result is a thick compote of almost puréed apple, studded with golden cubes of tender quince.

I've made this a few times with different spices. First I tried a cinnamon stick, then star anise. Both versions were lovely, but when I experimented on a whim with adding a vanilla pod, the result was so wonderful that it just had to be shared, even if it is a humble bowl of porridge. Vanilla works incredibly well with quinces, which have their own subtle fragrance that the vanilla serves to highlight. It also works wonderfully with apples. Although cinnamon is often the classic spice for apples, I feel that apple and vanilla are a pairing that should be given more limelight. Vanilla emphasises the apple's natural sweetness rather than its acidity.

Using vanilla in this compote also makes it intensely pretty to look at - a beautiful very pale green appley froth, flecked with those tiny black seeds that contain so much promise of flavour, full of golden quince pieces. It's sweet but still quite tart (you could add more sugar if you like), providing a bracing start to the morning and contrasting wonderfully with the comfort blanket that is the creamy porridge. I've used a lovely vanilla pod, along with some ground cinnamon and ginger in the porridge to add a subtle warm flavour. I also put sultanas in my porridge - they swell up as it cooks, giving a lovely contrast in texture. Toffee-like dried fruits combined with the sweet quince and apple is another delicious flavour contrast.

The best way to eat this is on top of the spiced porridge, as in the recipe below. I prefer to spoon the compote, cold from the fridge, over the steaming hot porridge. You get that wonderful temperature contrast when eating it, like having cold ice cream with a hot crumble or pie. It might sound odd, but a spoonful of scalding porridge mingled with the chilled, sweet fruit is beautiful. The contrast between the warmly-spiced sweet porridge and the tart, vanilla-laced fruit is delectable. However, you could warm the compote up in the microwave if you wanted.

If you're still not convinced by porridge, this compote would also make a fabulous dessert served either warm or cold with ice cream, or even with meringues or alongside a rich almond cake. But humour me, and regard my reasons for an oaty breakfast above. I want to convert you.

Spiced porridge with quince, apple and vanilla compote:

For the compote (makes 4-5 servings):

• 2 large quinces
• 3 cooking apples, or 4 eating apples
• 300ml water
• 4 tbsp brown sugar
• 1 vanilla pod, scored lengthways with a sharp knife

Put the water, sugar and vanilla pod in a large saucepan and bring to the boil. Stir to dissolve the sugar.

Peel, quarter and core the quinces. Cut each quince segment into small chunks, about an inch wide. Add to the water, then cover and cook on a medium high heat for 10 minutes. Meanwhile, peel, core and cut the apples into 1cm slices. When the quince is just tender, add the apples. Cover and cook for 5 minutes or so, stirring occasionally, until most of the apples break down into mush but there are a few solid pieces left. Turn off the heat and leave to cool, then refrigerate.

For the porridge (makes 1 giant serving - I eat a lot of porridge - can be halved as necessary!):

• 100g rolled/porridge oats
• 1/2 tsp
• ground cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp
• ground ginger
• 80g sultanas
• 300ml water
• 200ml semi-skimmed milk

Put the oats, spices and sultanas in a saucepan. Add the water and milk, then bring to the boil. Cook for around 3-5 minutes, stirring, until the porridge thickens. Add more water or milk if you like it less thick, then pour into a bowl and top with the compote.

Apple and quince almond crumble tart

The street is a soothing, nondescript muddle of brickwork and grey cobbles, glistening slightly in the aftermath of the morning rain. The sombre wares of the shop windows merge into a blur; dusty vintage clothing, old leather-bound books, pens of various shapes, sizes and degrees of antiquity. Everything has an air of tiredness to it, of weary age yearning to be invigorated with new life. It's calming, easy to walk down the street in a daze as everything blends into the background.

But there they are. Sitting there in their little wicker basket. Great orbs of primrose-coloured sunshine, their vivid yellow blazing out like a flame amidst their drab surroundings. Their voluptuous curves whisper seductively of hotter, more exotic and carefree climes, yet the soft down that clings to their skin like cobwebs suggests light snowflakes, or a vain attempt to wrap up warm for the winter. They are firm in the hand; heavy, satisfying. They feel sturdy, promising robust, heady flavours; whispering of brightness both to look at and to eat. I pick up two, cradling them gently against my stomach, leaving the rest to their quiet yellow repose.

I am, of course, talking about the first quinces of the year. Always a happy moment, the arrival of quinces in the markets promises delicious culinary joy for the coming months. It's like Mother Nature's way of making up for the cold, dreary weather that starts to grate and sadden at this time of year. You can't refuse to be cheered up by the bright spectacle of a quince, and you definitely can't refuse to be made happier by eating one.

Okay, so maybe all that was a little over-the-top and wannabe-poetic. But I really do love these fruits, which seem so modern and exotic despite dating back thousands of years. We still haven't quite figured them out as a nation - they're pretty tricky to track down, and currently the only place I can find them in York is a lovely little deli called the Hairy Fig, which is where I spied the aforementioned glowing yellow basket. None of my new friends at university have ever heard of, let alone eaten, a quince.

I'm not quite mean enough to try the 'Oh, just bite into it - it's really nice, like an apple!' trick, though. Damn my good nature, getting in the way of hilarious practical jokes.

To celebrate the first quinces of the year, I've made a rather wonderful little tart. While I love using quinces in savoury recipes, sometimes their fragrant perfumed flesh just yearns to be coupled with a liberal amount of butter, either in the form of pastry or crumble. This tart does both, in that half the crumble is pressed down to form a rough pastry, onto which the fruit is spread, while the remaining half is scattered over the top, to bake into a rough, crunchy, buttery mass. This was inspired by a Dan Lepard recipe that uses plums and cobnuts, but I figured it would work with quinces and almonds (and, dare I suggest that it might be even tastier?)

It's very common to pair quinces with apples - sometimes pears - in baking. This is, I think, because their strong flavour can rather overwhelm when left to its own devices. I don't agree, loving the taste of quince pure and unadulterated, but this is the first time I've tempered it with apples and I rather liked the result. I used cooking apples from the tree in my garden, which are rather tart, and take the edge off the cloying sweetness of the quince. The result is a gorgeous marriage; it tastes homely, somehow, like going back to basics - you can't beat the purity of stewed fruit, enhanced only with a little sugar.

There's also something rather texturally appealing about cooking apples with quinces - the quinces don't soften as much, remaining delectable, tender morsels, while the apples dissolve into a froth. The combination is delicious, and the perfect filling for this crumble tart. It's basically apple crumble, but in sliceable form, and improved with the delectable fragrance of quince. I added some flaked almonds to the crumble mixture, which give a lovely nutty crunch, and sprinkled some demerara sugar over the top for the same reason.

One of the reasons behind this dessert, apart from my passionate love for the quince, is that I was recently sent some lovely wines from South West France to sample (I know, it's a hard life being a food blogger). Home to around twenty indigenous grape varieties and the point of origin for grapes like Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot and Malbec, the South West is a wonderful region for wine diversity (there are 16 PDO wine denominations). Even more excitingly, wines from this region have the highest procyanidin content of any in the world - the chemical that means wine can have positive effects on cardiovascular health.

I haven't noticed any immediate benefits yet, so I guess I'll just have to keep drinking it until I am fully conscious of my arteries expanding.

My first taste was of the PDO Gaillac, Domaine Rotier, 2008. This is a beautiful dessert wine. I don't know that much about wine, so I won't be a fraudulent bore and start waxing lyrical about bouquets and body and finish. Instead, I will tell you that this wine is like drinking liquid honey. It warms you from the inside, and is gorgeously sweet and aromatic. It has, according to the bottle, notes of apricot, fig and quince, which makes it the perfect partner for this dessert.

I made the dessert with the inkling that it would go well with the wine. In fact, it was an even better match than I could have hoped.

It's quite hard to pair wine with dessert, because very sweet or tart things tend to make the wine taste overly sour and acidic. The best way is to ensure there is a rich, buttery component to said dessert, to mellow out any assertive fruit flavours. This crumble, then, is the ideal way to go. It provides a rich, buttery base for the sweet, fragrant wine, which perfectly reflects the quince flavours in the fruit filling.

It's a way of putting a proper autumnal pudding on the table without the heaviness of crumble (not that I'd ever turn down crumble, but sometimes you want something a bit lighter and more refined). You can serve it in elegant slices. It looks far more effort than it actually is. It's exotic and will make people say 'Ooh, what's quince?' It's an amalgam of two very traditional British ingredients: quince and crumble. It breathes sweet and tasty life into a much misunderstood fruit.

Then you have the taste, which is just wonderful. Serve it with lots of vanilla ice cream, while it's still a little warm from the oven. There's rich buttery pastry, the crunch of toasted almonds, and the soft, unctuous collapsed autumnal fruit inside; sweet, yet tart, standing up robustly to its crumbly trappings.

Buttery crumble, a sweet fruit filling and a glass of ambrosial dessert wine - the absolute best way to end a meal.

Quince and apple crumble tart (serves 6):

(Adapted from a recipe from Dan Lepard's Short and Sweet)

• 1 medium quince
• 3-4 tbsp brown sugar
• Water
• Squeeze of lemon juice
• 3 medium cooking apples
• 2 tsp cornflour
• 3 tsp water
• 100g plain flour
• 75g wholemeal flour
• 100g cold butter, cubed
• 50g brown sugar
• 50g flaked almonds, toasted, plus 1 tbsp to garnish
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 2 tbsp milk
• 1 tbsp demerara sugar

First, make the fruit filling. Peel and quarter the quince. Remove the core. Cut into 2cm cubes and put in a medium saucepan with the brown sugar, lemon juice and enough water to just cover it. Cover the pan and bring to the boil, then simmer gently for 10 minutes or so until almost tender. Peel, core and chop the apples into similar sized pieces, then add to the quince and simmer for another 10-15 minutes, uncovered, until the fruit has mostly collapsed. Taste and check the sweetness - add a little more sugar if it's too tart (but you want it fairly tart to contrast with the crumble).  Mix the cornflour with the water then stir into the fruit to thicken it. Set aside to cool.

Grease a 20cm tart tin with a removable base. Pre-heat the oven to 190C.

For the pastry, rub the butter into the flours using your fingers or a food processor. Stir in the sugar. Finely chop the toasted almonds (except the ones for the garnish) then stir these in too along with the baking powder. Stir in the milk. Press half of this mixture into the tart tin, along the bottom and up around the sides too, to make a crust. Spoon in the fruit filling, then scatter the rest of the pastry mixture evenly over the top, but don't press down. Sprinkle over the demerara sugar and reserved flaked almonds.

Bake for 45-50 minutes, until the top is golden brown. Check it halfway through to make sure it isn't burning - if so, cover with foil and turn the oven down slightly. Leave to cool in the tin before dusting with icing sugar, removing and slicing to serve (preferably with ice cream).

Quince and marzipan cake

I have a culinary conundrum for you. It's one I've been pondering for a long time now, often while daydreaming in the swimming pool or on my bike. Yes, I know that's a bit dangerous.

Why is it that some flavours taste more of themselves than the actual ingredient they have derived from?

That probably doesn't make any sense. Let's take an example.Marzipan.

Marzipan has that distinctive almond flavour, the kind you find in macaroons and flavoured sweets or chocolate. The kind you find in those mass-produced, impossibly neat, garish bakewell tarts with a cherry on top.

OK, so you've eaten almonds, right?

They taste nothing like almonds. 

Almonds have a strange, mouth-puckering dryness. They're soft, crumbly, and have a very very subtle sweetness and a deep, earthy flavour. But they bear no resemblance in taste to anything that carries their name. Almond croissants. Almond marzipan. Almond macaroons. Almond cakes. These things taste how we expect them to taste; they taste of the flavour we have come to associate with almonds. I've used ground almonds in cakes many a time, and found they impart little or no flavour to the rest of the cake; they certainly don't pack an almond punch on their own, whether whole or crushed up.

How, then, do they derive this flavour from a nut that tastes nothing like that? And why do we accept this unnatural and bizarre notion of almond flavour?

It's the same with coconut. Actual coconut flesh tastes almost nothing like the synthetic 'coconut' flavour we put in baked goods and chocolates, in Bounty bars and coconut ice and other tropical delights. It's remarkably subtle in taste, as is the coconut milk we add to curries and are often disappointed with because it doesn't offer enough of a 'coconut' hit, enough of that artificial flavour we've come to associate with coconut.

I'm sure some molecular gastronomic genius like Harold McGee or Heston Blumenthal would be able to answer me on this, but if anyone else (Heston, I know you're busy - please don't feel like you have to comment on all my blog posts) has an answer to this serious query of mine, there's a comment box at the bottom of the page.

But obviously you don't care about my almond and coconut dilemmas, because what you really want to know is how damn good this cake is.

Doesn't it just look the picture of rustic, English perfection? I can't think of a more traditional tea-time cake than this. It uses quinces, a medieval fruit that has sadly fallen out of favour yet, for me, is one of the most exquisite ingredients in the world. It has a complexity of flavour like no other; I once made a sorbet that contained just quinces, sugar and water, yet from its taste you would have thought it was spiked with a heady cocktail of fragrant spices.

Indeed, when my father tried this cake he was adamant that I'd put cinnamon in it. I hadn't. That's just the complexity of quince for you; it has a perfume redolent of mulled wine and potpourri and the bubbling cauldrons of medieval cooks, brimming with treasures from the spice trail.

Poached quince segments make a great basis for all sorts of desserts. By simply simmering them in the gentlest possible way, in a syrup of sugar and water flavoured with whatever herbs and spices you choose, you end up with kitchen gold - literally. They mellow and soften, becoming golden, sometimes deep sunset red, full of ambrosial fragrant flavour and with a pleasant yielding yet grainy texture not unlike that of a perfectly ripe pear.

Cooked like this, you can use quinces for so many things. I like them pure and simple, spooned onto my morning porridge with a handful of tart blackberries or blueberries. They are also excellent with ice cream, or you can use them to top a dessert, as in this wonderful  quince tarte tatin recipe. Cover them in pastry for a beautiful pie, or top with a coarse crumble for a buttery treat.

Quinces marry particularly well with almonds. Given that they are not dissimilar to pears in both shape and texture when cooked, this shouldn't be surprising. The idea to include them in a cake with marzipan came to me when I was baking mini simnel cakes this Easter. I had some high-quality marzipan to use up, and some quinces sitting in the fridge, and I suddenly thought that stirring cubes of marzipan into a cake batter with cubes of poached quince would create something fabulous.

I wasn't wrong; this is a beautiful cake. The cubes of marzipan melt in the heat of the oven, giving a gorgeous gooey texture and sharp hit of almond flavour (that strong, almost fake variety, as discussed at the beginning of this post). The quince is soft, grainy and fruity, delivering a sweetness and a perfume that matches beautifully with the marzipan. The cake is nutty from the use of spelt flour and the scattering of flaked almonds over the top, resulting in a dense crumb that is beautifully moist from the molten marzipan and the juicy quince.

This isn't a very sweet cake; it's more of a pudding to be eaten after a light meal, or something to be served in slabs with a good cup of afternoon tea. The quince and marzipan combination is more than enough sweetness for the whole cake, so there isn't much extra sugar involved. I'd suggest pairing it with vanilla ice cream, as the cold cleanliness of the ice cream is a good foil for the sugary marzipan and the fragrant quince. If you don't have quinces (they're quite hard to find even when in season), use ripe but firm pears - but don't bother with the poaching step, just cut them up and put them in raw.

This is a hearty, rustic cake, the kind I can imagine a medieval chef unearthing from the bowels of the oven and cutting into thick slices to serve after a banquet of venison and wild fowl. It looks beautiful and makes a satisfying pudding or afternoon treat, the kind of thing that will keep you going in that hideous destitute period between lunch and dinner when all seems bleak.

Pair it with a strong cup of tea - perhaps something rich and smoky like lapsang souchong - or coffee, cut yourself an indecently large slice, and savour the comforting, crumbly warmth of the cake and the surprising burst of gooey marzipan pieces. This is a proper cake, as cakes should be.

Quince and marzipan cake (serves 8-10):

• 600ml water
• 250g caster sugar
• 1 lemon
• All or a mixture of: cloves, star anise, crushed cardamom pods, cinnamon stick, vanilla pod, bay leaf
• 3 medium quinces [Or, if you can't find quinces, just use 4-5 ripe but firm pears - Conference are good - and skip the rest of the above ingredients]
• 310g spelt flour (or plain/wholemeal, depending on your preference)
• 1 tbsp baking powder
• 80g brown sugar
• Grated zest of 1 lemon
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 60g melted butter, cooled slightly
• 2 eggs
• 340ml buttermilk (or yoghurt loosened with a little milk)
• 150g marzipan, cut into 1cm cubes
• 2 tbsp flaked almonds

First, prepare the quinces. Bring the water and caster sugar to the boil in a large saucepan, then bubble away for a couple of minutes so the sugar dissolves. Cut the lemon in half and add to the pot. Add your chosen herbs and spices. Peel the quinces then cut into quarters. Remove the tough core and cut each quarter lengthways so you have eight slices. Add the quince slices to the liquid. Top up with more water, if necessary, so they are just covered.

[If using pears, skip this step and go straight to the cake-making - cut up the pears as below and use them raw]

Cut a circle of greaseproof paper to fit over the quinces in the pot, and cut a 1-inch hole in the centre. Place over the quinces, touching the water, then turn the heat right down. Simmer very gently for an hour or so, until the quinces are tender but still holding their shape - check them occasionally as you don't want them disintegrating. Remove with a slotted spoon and place on a chopping board. Slice three or four of the segments lengthways into three pieces so you end up with long, slender slices. Cut the rest of the segments into 2cm dice, and set them all aside to dry on a piece of kitchen towel.

Pre-heat the oven to 190C (fan oven). Grease a 25cm cake tin or fluted tart tin and line it with baking parchment.

Sift the flour and baking powder into a large bowl. Add the brown sugar, lemon zest and salt.

In another bowl whisk together the melted butter, eggs and buttermilk. Pour this into the dry mixture and fold together gently with a large spoon until just combined - don't over mix.

Fold the cubes of quince and marzipan into the mixture so they are evenly dispersed. Pour the mixture into the prepared tin, then arrange the long quince slices in a pattern over the top of the cake. Scatter over the flaked almonds.

Bake in the oven for 35-40 minutes until the centre is firm and a skewer comes out clean. Leave to cool slightly before dusting with icing sugar.

Serve with vanilla ice cream. It's best eaten warm, but keeps for days wrapped in foil and reheats well in the oven or microwave.

Quince tarte tatin

But what I am of opinion the governor should eat now in order to preserve and fortify his health is a hundred or so of wafer cakes and a few thin slices of conserve of quinces, which will settle his stomach and help his digestion ~ Don Quixote

I'm a firm believer of less being more in the dessert world, that the simplest creations often far outshine the intricate, fiddly ones. I'd far rather tuck into a piece of treacle tart, a crumble or a sticky toffee pudding than any kind of fancy French patisserie, smothered in ganache and spun sugar and delicately piped cream. Where many cooks and bloggers see macarons as the ultimate in culinary challenges, the Everest that simply must be scaled, I see them as encapsulating everything I hate about that type of baking: fussy, fiddly, cutesy, overdecorated. I admit that I've never tasted a macaron, but I have no need to - I know that it would never match up to even an average sticky toffee pudding.

The simple marriage of butter, flour, sugar and perhaps a few other choice flavourings - spices, fruit, nuts - is one that will last me a lifetime of enjoyment. No need for anything fancier.

Note, however, that I am not condemning French desserts with the above. In fact, I am about to sing the praises of one: the humble tarte tatin.

I can't actually say 'tarte tatin' any more, after watching Masterchef. Every time I open my mouth to say the words, all I hear is Gregg Wallace's interesting interpretation of its pronunciation: "TATTATTAN" (spoken at top booming volume and preferably with a mouth full of pudding). I then lose all faith in my own ability to pronounce French, and come out with something along the lines of "taahhtattan".

No matter, though, because even if you can't pronounce it, you can still enjoy what has to be one of the greatest culinary inventions known to man.

The best tarte tatin I have ever eaten was at a little bistro in Nice. It was deservedly popular, packed with French people spilling out onto its streetside tables in the balmy August evening. It was everything that the ghastly Cafe Rouge restaurant chain pretends to be: local, authentic, quaint, unmistakably French. I remember eating sardine escabeche, crunching my way accidentally through the heads of the sardines, as they were hidden by the thick red sweet-sour sauce.

But it is the tart that really stands out in my memory. It was served piping hot from the oven, a very thin layer of pastry absolutely saturated with gorgeous sharp-sweet caramel. It was the apples, though, that struck me - huge great billowing pieces of apple, not like the thinly sliced, neatly arranged pieces you get on a classic French apple tart. These were giant segments, stained a deep burnished gold by the sugar and butter in which they had been bathed. They were juicy, fluffy, sweet and simply wonderful. I would go all the way back to that bistro for another taste of that tarte tatin.

Fortunately, however, last night I came up with something almost as good.

I've had a bowl of glossy, curvaceous quinces in my kitchen for weeks now - I stocked up on them before Christmas, as they last for months and I knew I'd want to cook with them long after they've disappeared from the market. They've been sitting there begging me to use them, and I've been mulling over various quince creations in my mind as possibilities. I still intend to bring those ideas to fruition (pardon the pun), but suddenly I had an overwhelming urge to make a quince tarte tatin.

This was mainly because all my other ideas involved cakes, and I've made a lot of cakes recently. In fact, most dessert recipes that appear on this blog are either cakes, cheesecakes or cobblers, and I thought I should branch out a bit. Plus I've been having a craving for tarte tatin ever since I watched a friend of mine presented with one in a French restaurant when we were skiing in the Alps in December. I sat there eating my ice cream, which paled in comparison to his gorgeous plate of steaming hot apples, pastry and caramel. There's something about this alchemy of ingredients that is just irresistible.

The way the caramel soaks into the pastry, leaving it sodden and sweet on the top and still crunchy and flaky underneath. The contrast between the yielding juicy flesh of the cooked apples and the crunch of the buttery pastry. It really is up there with crumble and sticky toffee pudding in my all-time favourite desserts, and I can't think why I haven't made it more often.

This version is made with quinces, adapted from a recipe by the excellent David Lebovitz. I thought about using half quince and half apple, worried that the perfumed flavour of the quince would be too powerful, but I needn't have worried (in fact my mum, who normally hates quince, loved this).

This is an absolutely incredible dessert, all the better for the sweet, mysterious aroma of quinces. The quince segments are poached to rosy perfection in a syrup of sugar, water, clove, lemon and cinnamon. There's a simple pastry dough that is so easy to make, yet tastes as complex and wonderful as puff pastry, but without the faff. It is buttery, crumbly, crunchy and flaky all at the same time - amazing for something made in under 5 minutes in the food processor.

Instead of making a caramel for the quinces, their poaching syrup is reduced in the tarte tatin pan (you can buy special ones for this purpose, but I just used a frying pan with a removable handle) until it has the consistency of honey. I added a couple of spoonfuls of homemade quince paste to thicken it a little and add an extra intense quince flavour. I was amazed at how buttery and caramelly this tasted when it had soaked into the pastry in the finished tart.

In short: this was fabulous. The sweet, juicy segments of quince with their syrupy coating; the buttery, flaky pastry base...I think this could give that Nicoise tarte tatin a run for its money. Please make it if you find yourself with quinces to use up.

Quince tarte tatin (serves 6):

Adapted from David Lebovitz's recipe, here.

• 3 large quinces (you might end up with a bit left over - eat them for breakfast on porridge/muesli!)
• Half a lemon
• 1 cinnamon stick
• 3 cloves
• 900ml water
• 100g sugar
• 140g flour
• 2 tsp brown sugar
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 85g cold butter, cubed
• 3-4 tbsp very cold water
• 2 tsp quince paste (membrillo) or jelly (optional)
• You will also need a suitable pan - an ovenproof frying pan around 18-22cm in diameter is ideal

First, poach the quinces. Put the water, sugar, lemon, cinnamon stick and cloves in a large saucepan and bring slowly to the boil, stirring to dissolve the sugar. Peel, core and quarter the quinces, then halve each quarter to get eight segments per quince. Drop them into the poaching liquid. Lower the heat to barely a simmer, and place a circle of greaseproof paper with a 1-inch hole in the middle over the water. Cook on a very low heat for an hour or so, until the liquid has turned pink and the quinces are tender. Turn off the heat and leave the quinces in the syrup until you need them.

Next, make the pastry. Put the flour, sugar, salt and butter in a food processor and pulse until you have fine crumbs (or rub the butter in with your fingers, trying to touch it for as little a time as possible). Add the water a tablespoon at a time, until the dough just comes together and looks like little pebbles. You will have to squash it together with your hands. Form a ball and wrap it in cling film. Chill in the fridge for at least 30 minutes.

When ready to assemble the tart, put about 250ml of the quince poaching liquid along with the quince jelly or paste, if using, in your chosen pan and simmer until it has reduced to a thick syrup (you want a layer about 5mm deep on the base of the pan). Pre-heat the oven to 190C.

Lay the quince segments, drained, over the bottom of the pan, curved side down in a circle. Try and squish them together as much as possible so there are no gaps. You may not need all the quince segments. Roll out the pastry on a floured surface to a circle slightly bigger than the pan, and lay it over the quinces, tucking it in all around the edges (this will be the best bit of the whole dessert, where the pastry edges are saturated in caramel!)

Bake in the oven for about 45 minutes, until the pastry is crisp and golden and the caramel is bubbling around the sides. Remove and allow to cool for about 15-20 minutes before putting a plate over the top of the pan and turning it upside down to release the finished tart (you might have to shake it a bit to loosen it).

Serve warm with ice cream, creme fraiche or cream.

Homemade quince jelly

Things in jars give me a deep and profound sense of satisfaction.

Well, OK, not entirely. I should probably qualify that statement. Things I have made that I am able to put in jars give me a deep and profound sense of satisfaction. Such things include jam, jelly, chutney, preserved lemons, and bottled fruits.

What is it about the simple act of putting something homemade in a jar that is so enjoyable? I think it's perhaps that we tend to associate jars with things we've bought in a shop, rather than made at home. When we make something ourselves, put it in a jar and label it, it's almost as if we feel we're packaging up a product that's good enough to be on a shop shelf (though, of course, the irony is that homemade produce is often far better than anything you'd find on a shop shelf).

That's just a theory, but I do think there's something in it. When we make a nice plate of food, we can admire it all we like, but we're not packaging it up in a way that's presentable, that's transferrable. When we pour homemade jam or chutney into jars, seal and label them, it's as if we're proudly declaring to the world, "This is good enough to be given as a present, or to be displayed on the larder shelf".

Perhaps it's also the sense of anticipation: generally, homemade jams, jellies, chutneys and the like last quite a long time. Chutney, especially, seeing as it usually needs to mature for several months before it is edible. When we put the lids on jars of homemade preserves and give them their final twist, we think of and eagerly await all the delightful pieces of toast or cold meat sandwiches to come.

Perhaps it's the sense of giving, the fact that we've lovingly stirred away at a tasty creation that's now ours to share, because it's easily portable. It's almost a cliché to say that homemade preserves make wonderful gifts, but of course it's true. A jar of homemade chutney or jam from a friend will always be prized and savoured because it's unique; you can't just nip to the supermarket and find an identical jar when you run out.

And, of course, homemade jarred goods are usually rather aesthetically pleasing, too. You only have to look at the pictures of my bottled apricots from this year to see that. The preserved lemons I made years ago were once beautiful as well. Now they look rather like a jar full of dead things preserved in a swamp, with the odd clove and bay leaf floating around, but the glow of preserving pride is still there every time I take one out, chop it and add its zesty, salty aroma to my cooking.

Small pleasures, perhaps, but I enjoy them nonetheless.

I did not, however, enjoy the last time I attempted to preserve one of my favourite fruits, the quince. I decided to make membrillo, that beautiful golden, sweet, perfumed quince paste so beloved of the Spanish. I followed a recipe instructing me to place a couple of kilos of whole quince in a dish and bake them in the oven for several hours. I was then supposed to push the cooked quince through a sieve.

What a ridiculous notion. Sure, the quince was quite soft, after I'd caused my house's electricity bill to skyrocket by leaving the oven on all afternoon, but did its skin and tough fibres want to go through the sieve? No, they emphatically did not. You may as well have tried to push a whole apple through a sieve using a ladle. Half an hour of intense frustration and aching biceps later, I had extracted a poxy amount of quince purée which I then dutifully boiled with a lot of sugar, as instructed.

Yes, the result was tasty membrillo, but a very small amount considering the money I'd expended on all those quince whose pulp ended up in the bin. To add insult to injury, most of it went mouldy (despite being in the fridge) before I'd even had much of a chance to enjoy it. Usually I'm all for making things yourself; it's generally much cheaper than buying them. But in this case, I should have just bought myself a jar of membrillo and not bothered. Although the homemade stuff was amazing on toast with goat's cheese. To this day, I cannot understand the thinking behind that recipe. It was, I think, in Waitrose Food Illustrated, but I honestly do not believe it was ever tested. Every recipe I've come across since has instructed me to boil the quince, chopped, in a little water so it turns mushy, and THEN push it through a sieve. Much more realistic. No matter how long you bake them for, you won't get that mushyness from putting a quince in the oven as opposed to a pan of water, especially if you leave the skin on, as the recipe directed.

RECIPE RAGE.

This year, then, I did not go down that route. However, when a big bag of quinces arrived, courtesy of a friend whose parents had a glut of them, I couldn't resist revisiting the idea of quince preserves again. Mainly because these quince surprised me with their diminutive size; there was such a high ratio of core and pips to actual quince flesh that it didn't seem worthwhile to bake or poach them as I would normally do for sweet or savoury dishes. I've never seen such tiny quince, but a quick Google informed me that these were in fact ornamental/Japonica quinces, a very different variety to the huge specimens you find in the markets at this time of year, usually imported from France, Spain or Turkey.

In the interests of an easy life, then, it seemed easier to just chop them all up - peel, pips and all - and make some sort of preserve with them, rather than attempt to painstakingly peel, core and chop them all for a dessert. The beauty of quince jelly is that you can boil the quinces with all the pips and peel remaining - you literally just chop them up roughly and put them in some water.

Quince jelly, then. Not membrillo - this time I decided to do something different. For quince jelly, you just want the juice you get when you boil the quince in water until soft. The way to do this is to strain the resulting quince mixture through a muslin bag to extract the juice, which you then boil with sugar until you reach a set. It really is as easy as that. However, you can then make membrillo with the remaining quince pulp in the muslin, which I might get round to doing next week, so as not to waste a single morsel of this excellent fruit (apart from the pips, of course).

I dutifully hung my bag of quincey goodness over a bowl overnight, and ended up with a lot of liquid that looked like that gorgeous Copella cloudy apple juice. This I then weighed, measured out an almost equal amount of sugar, and boiled it all together.

And gosh, it was a LOT of sugar. 

I really did wince as I poured an entire kilo of the white stuff into the pan of quince juice. My mind turned to fillings, tooth decay, ADHD...but then I realised that of course I wouldn't be eating the entire panful in one go, and that it was no more sugary than jam I'd buy in the shops (though of course when you buy it, you have the luxury of being able to ignore just how much sugar goes into it). In went the sugar, and the resulting mixture bubbled away for about an hour.

In the process, it turned from pale yellow to the most incredible crimson. I have never understood why quinces turn from gold to deep amber with long cooking, and I"d never really experienced it first hand before, but this pan of bubbling, spitting, sugary goodness was a truly beautiful sight. It took forever to reach a setting point, I think because the quince juice was quite dilute in the first place so took a while to boil down, but finally I was able to pour it into jars and seal them.

And how beautiful are these jars? They completely encapsulate everything I said above.

I really cannot stop admiring them. How would you describe this amazing colour? It's somewhere between red and pink, but darker and more vibrant; it almost seems to glow of its own accord. It's also completely clear; the jelly reminds me of dark amber, just waiting for the point of a buttery knife to slice down within and create a jagged fault line through its scarlet depths.

I put the jars in the sun and admired their jewel-like beauty for a good few minutes, musing on the miraculous transformation of a bowl of speckled, wrinkled fruit into something so gorgeous.

And that, really, is what preserving is all about.

Quince jelly

This is a really rough guideline for a recipe, as I didn't measure out my quinces beforehand. Basically, roughly chop all your quinces, put in a large pan, and barely cover with water. Simmer until they're very tender and almost falling apart. Then put all the mixture in a muslin bag, tie it up and suspend it over a bowl overnight to catch the juice (or just pour the pulp into a colander lined with muslin).

Measure out your quince juice and pour into a sturdy pan (a jam pan is ideal, if you have one). For every 550ml of quince juice, add 450g caster sugar. Also add the juice of a lemon (this helps the jelly set, and also helps offset some of the sweetness). Slowly heat the mixture, stirring to dissolve the sugar, then bring to the boil and simmer until a setting point is reached.

To test for a set, put a saucer in the freezer until very cold. Drop a spoonful of jelly onto it, and leave it for a minute or so. If you can run your finger through the jelly leaving a wrinkly mark, it's set. If not, continue to boil. This can take anything from ten minutes to over an hour, so be patient.

While you're waiting, sterilise some jam jars and lids (I sterilise jars by washing them then putting them, upturned, in the oven at 130C for 20 minutes; I sterilise the lids by pouring boiling water over them). When the jelly has set, pour into the jars, cover with wax discs, and screw on the lids.

Five things I love this week #3

There's a definite autumnal feel to my 'five things' this week; that much is evident from the muted beige tones of these photos. After a wonderfully warm October, I think I'm finally ready to embrace the onset of autumn, and all the delicious produce it brings with it. 

1. Wild mushroom and truffle risotto. I've been craving risotto ever since I had a beautiful starter at the Yorke Arms last week: truffled partridge boudin with ceps and carnaroli rice. The rice was a gorgeous risotto-like concoction, heady with the musky fragrance of truffle, the rice still with a little bite to it, creamy and savoury and incredibly delicious. I couldn't ignore my truffle/risotto cravings any longer, and succumbed with this lovely recipe. 

It's a standard risotto to which I added chopped chestnut mushrooms when frying the onion and garlic; I also used soaked porcini mushrooms and added their soaking water to the chicken stock used to plump up the rice. The risotto is finished off with some pan-fried girolle and shiitake mushrooms (shockingly expensive, but a nice little luxury, and so much more interesting to eat and look at than standard mushrooms), a drizzle of truffle oil, lots of lemon thyme leaves and a hefty grating of parmesan. Savoury, umami-rich wonderfulness. 

2. Pumpkins and winter squash. It's easy to just pick up the knee-jerk butternut when planning winter squash recipes, but the other day I discovered these beauties at the farmers market. I think the pale blue one is a Crown Prince squash; the others I'm not too sure about. 

I cut them all into chunks (risking life and limb and a hernia in the process; who needs a gym when you can spend an evening hacking your way through an unyielding orb of orange?) and roasted them with olive oil, salt, pepper and lots of chopped fresh rosemary. They softened into intensely flavoursome, sweet, fudgy deliciousness. Their flesh was much more dense and full-flavoured than your standard butternut squash, while the skin went beautifully dark and caramelly. 

I served them alongside roast partridge (recipe to come) and also mixed them with some couscous, feta and cherry tomatoes for a salad. Winter squash are great with anything salty, like bacon, feta or goats cheese. The possibilities are pretty much endless. I'm definitely going to seek out different kinds of squash in future (and perhaps an axe to chop them with). 

3. Fig and orange cobbler. Figs and oranges are a surprisingly successful combination (my aim this autumn is to discover all possible partners for the wonderful fig - raspberries and oranges are two of my new finds). Mix sliced figs and segmented oranges (about eight figs and two oranges) with a little dark sugar and a splash of rum, orange juice or grand marnier in a pie dish. Dollop on this cobbler topping, then bake for half an hour or so until the fruit releases its beautiful garnet juices and the topping is crisp and crunchy. This also works wonderfully as a crumble, especially if you mix some oats and almonds or hazelnuts into the crumble mixture. The figs soften and the oranges become really sweet and flavoursome, and the combination together is juicy, fragrant and delicious. Add some good vanilla ice cream and devour: autumn in a bowl.

4. Porridge with apple and quince compote. A delicious, unusual and thoroughly seasonal way to start an autumn day. Simply simmer peeled, chopped quince in a little water and lemon juice until almost tender. Don't throw away the cores and peel - simmer those covered in water in a separate pan while you cook the quince. Add a few sliced cooking/Cox apples to the chopped quince (peel if you like - I only bother if they're quite big, otherwise it's too fiddly) and the water from the quince cores and peel, and cook until the apples start to disintegrate. You should have a lovely, pale gold bowl of fragrant goodness. You can add sugar, but I don't think it needs it - quince is sweet enough on its own. This is lovely on hot porridge scattered with a few blackberries.

5. The Great British Food Revival. A brilliant programme all about championing British produce that is in danger of being sidelined by foreign imports, putting us back in touch with our food heritage and urging us to save those traditional ingredients from extinction (think peas, pears, crab, pork, potatoes...). I loved the first series, and the second is just as good, judging from what I've seen so far: Gregg Wallace extolling the virtues of Yorkshire rhubarb, an ingredient very close to my heart and one that I hoard like a mad person during its short season. There's still some in my freezer. He comes up with some unusual and delicious recipes that I can't wait to try.

While on the subject, I love Gregg Wallace. I think he has an honest and immensely refreshing attitude to food. None of this poncing around with silly descriptions about umami, mouthfeel and acidity. He simply says "it's like a hug from the pudding angel". If that isn't a concise and accurate description of a dessert, I don't know what is. He is entirely unpretentious and seems like a genuinely nice, fun person. And I'm not just saying this because he likes rhubarb, though that does win anyone brownie points in my eyes.

I'm also looking forward to seeing Valentine Warner's contribution to the show, mainly because I had lunch with him a couple of months ago and am childish enough to get excited about having met people who appear on TV.

Spiced duck and quince salad

I'm starting to get a little bit cross with Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall. He seems to have a knack for publishing pieces in the Guardian on topics that I have been on the cusp of writing about myself, or have already written. First it was the pig's cheeks. Obviously I was pleased that Hugh had helped to bring a highly underrated ingredient to the masses. But, dear readers, you saw it here first, on my blog, and here, in my article for lovefood. Then it was Hugh's charming little article on homemade cheese. Again, been there, done that (although I do concede that my efforts ended with ricotta and labneh, and I have not yet attempted homemade mozzarella). 

While I understand that it must be difficult for Hugh, a mere nobody who has yet to make it in the world of cookery and food writing, to come up with original ideas week after week, I would really appreciate it if he would at least credit me in his weekly Guardian articles for the effervescing fountain of inspiration that I constantly provide.

I was similarly dismayed by his most recent articles. No sooner had I drafted a post about the beauty of figs than a similar piece pops up in the Guardian. Hugh's love for figs even seems, like mine, to border on the erotic, judging by the highly fetishised voyeuristic language he used to describe them ("provocatively, fleshily, immodestly sexy"). Like myself, he bemoaned the availability of decent ripe figs in England, owing to their stubborn resistance to transportation without turning to mulch. As in my last post about figs, he harked back to romantic holidays in the Med, where he would pluck ripe, ready and abundant figs off trees laden with fruit and gobble them greedily.

I was vexed, I admit, but I let it slide, as I have a rather ravishing fig, raspberry and hazelnut cake recipe up my sleeve to share with you all at a later date, which I'm sure would knock socks off Hugh's fig and almond tart. Besides, there were always the quinces.

Oh wait. What did I see the following week in that most austere of journalistic publications?

Oh well. They do say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, I suppose.

What I found most interesting about Hugh's article on quinces last week was not the article itself, but the comments underneath (this seems to be the case with a lot of Guardian articles for me, especially the foodie ones - the middle-class outrage evinced by some of the commenters is utterly priceless and can make for very entertaining reading; I imagine they could devote a whole section on the 'First World Problems' website to them). Most of the comments underneath had one thing in common: they were lamenting the elusive nature of the humble quince.

I found this rather hard to comprehend. I seem to be overwhelmed by quinces at the moment. Every fruit stall in Cambridge market is selling them. They're mostly Turkish imports, but I picked up three home-grown specimens the other day. I try and buy a couple every time I go to the market, ensuring I always have a permanent stash should the mood for quinces arise. (Admittedly, quinces aren't something one cooks on impulse, as they can take hours to cook into sublime, perfumed softness).

However, I think I am just lucky that Cambridge has a decent fruit market. Quinces are, by and large, quite difficult to track down. Supermarkets don't tend to sell them, which I always find odd, because they keep incredibly well. I kept one in my fridge for nearly six months and it was still perfectly edible when I finally got round to stewing it for porridge. They also transport well, prone to none of the bruising of fruits like peaches and figs, which supermarkets still manage to sell in abundance.

A mystery, I think. Generally your best bet for quinces are greengrocers or Middle Eastern stores (though the latter in Cambridge has never, to my knowledge, stocked them). Maybe a nice greengrocer would be able to order some for you. Support your local greengrocer, readers; they're few and far between these days.

Judging by how many Guardian readers are unable to locate this excellent fruit in their vicinities, I think it'll be a while before quince becomes a mainstream ingredient. I know it's rather selfish of me, but I'm quite glad of this. I like that the quince still maintains a rather mysterious, elusive aura. It makes cooking with it so much more interesting, because few people are used to its delightful perfumed flavour and sweet, slightly grainy texture. It means that there are relatively few recipes around using quince, giving me the scope to be creative and invent my own, both sweet and savoury.

A couple of weeks ago I baked two whole quinces for a couple of hours. When they had turned crimson and soft, I sliced them in half and scooped out the core. I stuffed them with a mixture of lamb mince, onion, pine nuts and allspice, then baked them for half an hour or so until the stuffing was golden and oozing delicious lamb juices over the fruit. Perched atop a bed of saffron and coriander rice and drizzled with a tahini yoghurt sauce, they were utterly delicious, their intense sweetness balanced by the earthy lamb, nuts and saffron.

Hooked by the combination of meat and quinces, I wanted to try them with duck. This salad is something I came up with out of the blue (literally, actually - all my best recipes come to me while I'm swimming). It's a really simple combination of pan-fried duck breast, thinly sliced, with poached quince segments, on a bed of lentils and spinach and scattered with walnuts. It looks labour-intensive on the page (lots of ingredients) but it's actually really simple, just a matter of cooking and co-ordinating the various components. Most of the ingredients are herbs and spices.

I rubbed the duck with a mixture of ground cumin, coriander seed, paprika and olive oil before searing it on both sides in a very hot pan and cooking it briefly in the oven for medium rare meat. I wanted some nice pungent spices in there to counteract the sweetness of the quince, which they did perfectly. Cumin and coriander seemed just right, given the Middle Eastern origins of the quince, and they work really well with the sweet meat of duck. I absolutely love duck breast, but I don't eat it that often. There are few things more satisfying than using a really sharp knife to slice into a medium-rare duck breast, still pink and tender in the middle, whispering promises of juicy, flavoursome meat and a crisp, spice-rubbed skin. It's during moments like these that I feel most content and satisfied as a cook.

The quince I poached in a sugar syrup infused with star anise, cinnamon, lemon peel, lemon juice, bay leaf and black peppercorns. It renders the quince delightfully soft and fragrant, the flavour of the anise and the lemon juice preventing it from cloying, which quince has a tendency to do more than any other fruit. Any leftover quince is great eaten on porridge the next day, as I found out this morning. That's the beauty of this fruit - it can provide a supporting or even a starring role in sweet and savoury dishes alike.

This is a really delicious salad, full of interesting flavours. There are a lot of what I would call 'earthy' flavours in there - lentils, cumin, coriander, walnuts, spinach - to counteract the natural sweetness of the duck meat and the intense sweetness of the quince. The end result is flavoursome and satisfying but still quite light (did you know that duck breast, when you take the skin off, is actually leaner than chicken?). To make it lighter still, you could just serve the meat and quince on a bed of salad leaves or wilted spinach, but you might want to use more duck in that case (I allowed half a duck breast per person, but the duck breasts I bought from the butcher must have belonged to some kind of Godzilla duck because they were absolutely gigantic).

I fully expect Hugh to have an article on duck in the Guardian this weekend.

Spiced duck and quince salad (serves 4):

• 2 large or 4 small duck breasts, skin scored at 1 inch intervals
• 1 tsp cumin seeds
• 1 tsp coriander seeds
• 1 tsp paprika
• 3 tbsp olive oil
• 2 small or 1 large quince, peeled, cored, and cut lengthways into eight
• 100g sugar
• Water
• 3 star anise
• 4 bay leaves
• Juice of half a lemon
• Four strips of lemon peel
• 10 black peppercorns
• Half a cinnamon stick
• 250g green or Puy lentils
• 1 chicken stock cube
• A few sprigs of lemon thyme (or normal thyme)
• 4 bay leaves
• A bag of baby spinach
• 1 tsp balsamic vinegar
• A large handful of shelled walnuts (or pecans/hazelnuts)

Toast the cumin and coriander seeds in a dry frying pan until fragrant. Crush in a pestle and mortar with the paprika, then add 2 tbsp olive oil and a good grinding of salt and pepper to make a paste. Rub this over the duck breasts and set aside.

Place the sugar in a large saucepan with around 300ml water. Bring to the boil, stirring to dissolve the sugar. Add the star anise, bay leaves, lemon juice, lemon peel, peppercorns and cinnamon stick, then add the quince slices. You may need to add a little more water to cover them. Bring to the boil, then cover and reduce the heat. Simmer for around 20-30 minutes until the quince is tender. Keep checking it every 10 minutes or so, as it can collapse into mush very quickly. When cooked, turn off the heat and set aside.

Meanwhile, bring around 500ml water to the boil and add the chicken stock cube, a few thyme sprigs, and the bay leaves. Add the lentils and boil for about 25 minutes until tender but still with a little bit of bite. Drain and keep warm.

Pre-heat the oven to 180C. Heat 1 tbsp olive oil in a large frying pan until very hot, then add the duck, skin side down. Cook for a couple of minutes or until the fat starts to crisp up, then turn over and sear for a minute or so on the other side. Transfer the duck breasts to an ovenproof dish and cook for 4-6 minutes (for medium rare meat). When cooked, place on a chopping board and leave to rest, covered with foil, for 10 minutes.

Meanwhile, add the spinach to the hot duck pan (drain away most of the fat). Cook until wilted, then add to the lentils. Add the balsamic vinegar and some seasoning, then stir together to mix well. Taste - you might want a little more vinegar or seasoning (the quince is very sweet, so it needs the tang of vinegar to balance it out).

When ready to serve, cut the quince segments into thin slices. Slice the duck breasts thinly. Arrange the lentils and spinach on four plates, then top with the quince and duck slices. Scatter with walnuts and a few thyme leaves, then serve.

Quince sorbet

I know it is bad, but I do occasionally succumb to the allure of the impulse buy. The odd top or pair of trousers here and there. A new eyeliner. A very nice tweed-patterned scarf from Zara on Regent Street. An ice cream machine. Perhaps this last one isn't something you generally associate with impulse-buying, but then again, most people aren't as greedy and as gastronomically obsessed as I am. When the Arts and Humanities Research Council decided to fund my MA, I'm sure they intended the money to cover such necessities (thank you, AHRC). 

Recently I've been longing more and more for the capability to make my own ice cream. I partly blame Masterchef for this, proffering the likes of star anise ice cream (to go with pear tart), but also my own desire for something slightly more exciting to accompany a dessert. Apple crumble and ginger ice cream, anyone? Orange cake with date and caramel ice cream? Lemon torte with earl grey tea ice cream? All these are now at my fingertips. (Not literally, unfortunately).

They're not far off, though. I love this little machine. It's a Kenwood. We have a big Kenwood mixer at home, with a separate ice cream attachment, and this self-contained machine seems tiny in comparison. However, it's a great size to fit in the freezer and actually makes a surprising amount of ice cream - one litre, which is the average size of a supermarket tub anyway. A bargain, I think, for £23.

So, tonight I decided to give it a test run, by making some quince sorbet. As my mum said, "Well, I didn't think you'd start with vanilla." She is quite right - not when I have four quinces in the fridge (I keep a permanent supply on standby at the moment, such is my love for them). It's unconventional, and it features one of my favourite fruits: a clear choice. A good one, too - the end result is delicious. It looks and tastes creamy, even though there is no cream involved. In fact, it contains just three ingredients: 300g sugar, dissolved in 500ml water to make a syrup, into which go about a kilo of quinces, peeled, cored and chopped. Simmer until very tender then puree with a stick blender and pass through a sieve. Leave to cool before churning. 

I think it would be nice to serve alongside something richer - perhaps pistachio ice cream, or some form of pastry. Quinces have such a sweet, perfumed flavour that I think you need something richer and more earthy to balance it. It does make a great palate cleanser though and is lovely after a substantial dinner. 

I feel like the world of ice cream is my oyster.

Lamb and quince tagine, and twice-cooked pears

If I ever find myself getting married, I hope it is a marriage like that of lamb and quinces: sweet, warm, rich, satisfying, perfectly balanced, slightly exotic, complementary to both parties, and never boring. (Just right with a bit of coriander; requiring a sharp knife; inedible when raw; only achievable during certain seasons - I think the marriage analogy falls down a bit here. Although I can tell you now that I refuse to marry anyone who doesn't like coriander). 

I've cooked lamb and quince tagine before, but this is a different recipe, from Nigel Slater's new book. It's basically the same as the one I usually use (Claudia Roden), except involves fresh ginger rather than ground. I think I actually prefer the fresh; it's more flavoursome. This is probably because I put in a piece about the size of my face. It mellows in the cooking process though (fortunately). The end result is fabulous: a fragrant, rather sweet sauce, lamb so tender you could swallow it without chewing, and soft, perfumed quinces. Just the thing to make the kitchen smell wonderful and inviting in the rather wintry weather we've been having lately. 

Tagines are generally very easy to make. Brown some diced lamb shoulder in a pan, remove and set aside. Add sliced onion and soften. Return the lamb to the pan, add a cinnamon stick, a generous amount of salt, a big pinch of saffron and a thumb-sized piece of ginger, peeled and finely chopped. Pour in a couple of tablespoons of honey and cover the lamb with water. Partially cover with a lid and leave for at least an hour and a half - I left mine for two and a half. 20 minutes before you want to eat, peel, core and slice two large or three small quinces and add them to the pan until they are soft (don't stir too much or they'll disintegrate). Add more water/reduce the sauce to get it to the right consistency (I usually find that although it looks like a lot you can never have enough sauce, so more is better), stir in lots of chopped coriander, and serve with couscous. 

For dessert, pears. Conference and Comice. Peeled, cored and poached in a sugar syrup until approaching softness, then placed in the oven with a trickle of maple syrup and some vanilla extract until golden. Just right with some vanilla ice cream - you don't want to eat anything too filling after a tagine. Oddly, they tasted exactly like tinned pears, just a bit more maple-y. Maybe I shouldn't bother with the effort of peeling and coring nine pears next time, and instead just use the tinned variety...

Autumn fruits and their perfect partners

I was going to start this post by declaring that I am a happier person when both figs and quinces can be found in the market. However, I realise that is not strictly true. I am, in fact, a more anxious person - anxious that their short season will be over before I can exploit them to their full potential. I've already devoted at least two whole posts to the magnificence of such fruits - they seem exotic and otherworldly, somehow, yet both grow quite happily on our own English soil - so will spare you the raptures. Instead, I will write about a meal that did actually make me a happier person, comprising as it did both figs and quinces and ticking another of the "things I want to try with figs and quinces" list. 

I set out for the market intending to purchase a nice fat chicken with which to make a fig and walnut tagine. Unfortunately, lack of said chicken meant I had to compromise. I would go as far as to say that this was in fact infinitely better than compromise - it was improvement. I ended up with a shoulder of lamb on the bone, a cut I don't normally use, preferring to use diced shoulder in a tagine or casserole. However, I figured I could still incorporate elements of the originally intended tagine: I rubbed the lamb with saffron, cinnamon and ginger mixed with olive oil. It went in a hot (240C) oven for 15 minutes and then I turned it down to 160C and let it cook away for a couple of hours. How long exactly I am not sure - as long as it took for me to read a few pages of Gifford's Dialogue Concerning Witches and decide that it was too late in the day to be reading annoying early modern script where all the S's look like Fs.

Next, some couscous stirred up with the seeds of half a pomegranate. The pomegranates I found at the market today are truly fine specimens, infinitely better than the watery, pale pink and slightly bitter versions I've been putting up with so far this autumn. The seeds of these have a real sweet sourness to them and are a beautiful vibrant colour. I also put some crumbled walnuts into the couscous. For the last five minutes of cooking, I put some halved figs into the roasting tray with the lamb and drizzled over some honey. The shredded lamb meat went in with the couscous with the figs on the side. They had turned molten and scarlet, almost the colour of the pomegranate seeds, and went beautifully with the lamb. I'd forgotten how much I love lamb shoulder cooked on the bone; the meat is sublime and so versatile. 

For dessert. something from the new Nigel Slater book, Tender II. This book is enough to bring me to the verge of tears because I don't have Mr Slater's metabolism. There are enough recipes for pies, crumbles and tarts in there to guarantee I'd never see my hipbones again. How he manages it, I really don't know, especially because he recommends serving everything with "cream: thick, yellow, unpasteurised". The photo for the recipe of "soft quinces under a crisp crust" simply looked too good to resist.

Said crisp crust is a mixture of brown sugar, flour, butter, brown breadcrumbs and ground almonds. It is a bit like the pear betty topping I made a few weeks ago; much crunchier and more buttery than a traditional crumble topping, I think it will be my new blanket with which to wrap up warm fruits. The quinces are sauteed into soft, golden tenderness with butter, sugar and lemon juice and then baked under the crumble for half an hour or so. I put a pear in with the quinces just for a difference in flavour and texture. They go rather well together, which makes sense, seeing as they are quite similar in shape. 

I must say, however, that the task of peeling, halving, quartering, coring and slicing four large quinces is enough to mean I probably don't need to do any arm-based weightlifting at the gym tomorrow. Especially with a blunt knife. I can almost see why so many people overlook these fine fruits: preparation is a faff and a half. 

But so, so worth it, however, when you bite into that mouthful of perfumed, buttery, juicy fruit and its crunchy topping, with hints of treacle from the dark brown sugar used and little nuggets of toasted breadcrumb. I might have to make this one again; it is beautiful. As are its colours, which I think look like autumn in a bowl.

So there we have it. Two of my favourite things, and some excellent other things with which to partner them to maximise their full potential. Delicious.

An ode to the humble quince

"They call for dates and quinces in the pastry" 

~ Romeo and Juliet

Whenever I am cooking with quinces, it is inevitable that one of my housemates will ask what they are, and then remark that they've never tried one. I was on the Waitrose forum (OK, I am slightly ashamed to admit that...let's just move on) last autumn, and someone was asking whether Waitrose would be stocking quinces this year (autumn is British quince season). Their head of customer whatever replied that no, they would not, as there's not enough demand for them.

I find it hard to see why. They are the most luscious of fruits. Well, no, the Alphonso mango is probably the most luscious of fruits. But the quince comes a close second. It is absolutely divine. I would quite like to convert the entire world to eating quinces like they do cooking apples. Or just hoard them all for myself.

They are probably best described as a sort of cross between an apple and a pear - some are quite pear-shaped, others more squat, and their flavour has the perfume of pears and the sweetness of apples. You can't eat them raw, as they are rock solid and sour, but when you bake them, something magic happens - their flesh goes soft like a Bramley apple and they taste of honeyed loveliness. Not a very technical description I know, but you'd have to taste one to find out - I recommend you do. They have a lovely grainy texture which goes really well with soft meat in a tagine, or smooth vanilla ice cream as a dessert. If you cook them for long enough, they turn bright red - I remember Nigella has a lovely recipe for red quinces with pomegranate seeds on top. A scarlet feast of fruity delight.

There's all sorts of fun mythology surrounding the quince. It has been suggested that cultivation of the fruit preceded cultivation of the apple, so references to apples in early literature (the garden of Eden...the golden apple that Paris gave to Aphrodite) may actually refer to quinces. In medieval times, to give a quince to a lady was a declaration of love, and Plutarch reports that Greek brides used to nibble them before entering the bridal chamber to ensure their kiss was not "unpleasant". In Slavonia, Croatia, when a baby is born, a quince tree is planted as a symbol of fertility. 

The word 'marmalade' comes from marmelo, the Portuguese for quince, and so marmalade was originally a quince jam. That's just one of the things you can do with quinces - make membrillo, as the Spanish call it - quince paste. It's delicious with cheese or roasted meat such as lamb or pheasant, and I also quite like it on toast. I made it a few terms ago, and probably won't do so again - it was incredibly labour intensive, involving pushing quinces through a sieve to get a tiny amount of puree which was then mixed with equal amounts of sugar, boiled until gelatinous, then set like jam. Admittedly it was superb, especially with a chunk of crusty bread and some strong goats cheese, but in future I reckon I'll just buy it ready-made...especially as I never even got to finish the amount I made before it developed a "little furry jacket" (my mum's way of referring to mould) in the fridge. Rubbish.

The quince tree is native to Iran, Armenia, Georgia and Pakistan, but has been introduced to all sorts of places, especially the Med and the middle East. They're used a lot in middle Eastern cooking, either as a dessert or with meat such as lamb. I can think of endless uses for this goddess of fruits, but a few of my favourites are: served as a dessert, sliced and poached in a lemon and vanilla infused syrup; baked and served with ice cream; sliced and added to a lamb tagine (absolutely sublime); my stuffed pheasant recipe from a couple of weeks ago; in a compote with rosemary, served with roasted venison steaks; baked and stuffed with minced lamb, onions, pine nuts and cinnamon. It's also good in an apple or pear crumble, adding a fragrant note. Next time I can get my hands on some more quinces (at the moment they're hard to find, though there are some Turkish ones around, if you're prepared to pay £2 a fruit, or so...which I am) I want to try a quince crumble. Every time I spot some at the grocer's, my heart flutters a little. Shakespeare and I were clearly on the same page (no pun intended) - I would definitely call for dates and quinces in my pastry. In fact, I might try some date and quince turnovers. With filo pastry. Yum.

So I found a couple of joyous fruits in Cambridge while I was home for easter, and decided to make the aforementioned stuffed quinces. Sliced in half, baked until soft, then the inside scooped out and added to a mixture of lamb mince, chopped onion, pine nuts, cinnamon and allspice, which is then put back in the fruit and baked for another half hour or so. I served it with spinach and couscous, though a rice pilaff might also have been nice, or some chickpeas.

To paraphrase Edward Lear:

"We dined on mince, and slices of quince, which we ate with a runcible spoon"

No idea what a runcible spoon is. I suspect Lear didn't either. But the quince tasted nice.