As we get deep into the Autumn the variety of mushrooms you can find in markets multiply and as well the first Jerusalem artichokes start appearing on restaurant menus.

When trying to cook with a bit more flavour it is inevitable in lots of different dishes the need to resource to a home-made rich and flavoursome stock. In some dishes it is fundamental to use them as water just doesn’t quite cut it. At times we all resort to the quick and ready stock cube, but if you want to eat a more natural diet or have restaurant tasting dishes that are incredibly satisfying when you serve them at the table then there is no way around it as to make your own. The difference will make you proud and your chicken paellas will taste better than ever.

We don’t only tin tuna in Spain, we have an array of recipes for it. This is one of the recipes my mother cooks at home all the time. She makes a very tasty sauce but, with all respect to my mum, she overcooks the fish to death in a very old fashioned way. I don’t blame her, that is just as how she learnt to cook it! This is my fresher and lighter version of this home classic, which I will cook for her soon; let’s see what she thinks.

These pot-roasted lamb shank with artichokes take a while to cook but are in fact very easy to prepare. This is one to make when you feel you deserve a treat – it definitely does the job. Prepare yourself for mellow, fall-off-the-bone lamb. If lamb is not your thing, you can always use shin of beef.

There is flavours that quite simply belong together, and these three are a great example of one of those matches. The beauty of paellas compared with other internationally famous rice dishes such as biryani, risotto… is that it accepts every ingredient you can think of. In Valencia they say there is a paella for each day of the year, I think that sums it all up quite nicely.

Salmorejo is traditional from Cordoba, and it is not a soup as many believe, it’s a dip. You will not believe how this humble, common ingredients, can go that far!

This dish was commonly found in northern Spain and was always cooked in the spring with the new lamb season. It’s one of those ugly brown but very tasty slow-cooked stews Spain is famous for.

We also use other meats for this dish, such as goat or chicken.

Today you hardly ever find it in restaurants and only makes it as a family meal cooked mainly by grandmas.

This is a recipe that has been enjoyed by thousands of customers in my restaurants – incredibly tasty, so refreshing and full of goodness. In a nutshell, it is a blended salad. You can keep it in a bottle in your fridge for up to 3 days.