Açorda Alentejana

Açorda Alentejana

This is the Alentejo's classic morning-after breakfast and lunchtime supper: a thin garlic-and-coriander broth ladled over chunks of stale country bread with a poached egg slipped in at the end. You start by pounding fresh coriander, garlic, salt and olive oil into a paste in a wide bowl, then pour boiling water (or light stock) over it to make a fragrant broth. Stale bread goes in to soak up the liquid, eggs poach in the same broth for the last minute, and the whole bowl comes to the table warm enough to steam but cool enough to eat with a spoon. Stir the yolk through your portion as you eat. It is the cleanest, most aromatic 15-minute bowl of bread soup you will ever make.

Portuguese 30 minutes Serves4
Big Mike’s Mac ’n’ Cheese

Big Mike’s Mac ’n’ Cheese

The Cajun take on mac and cheese, with the Southern heat dial turned up to where you'd expect at a Louisiana cookout. You build a creamy béchamel base, fold in sharp white cheddar with a generous splash of hot sauce and a hit of Cajun seasoning, then toss the lot through hot pasta until every shape is coated. The whole thing goes into a baking dish, gets a topping of more grated cheese, and slides under a hot grill until the top is bubbling and freckled deep gold. Eaten as a side at a barbecue or as the centre of a weeknight plate with a green salad and a beer. Comfort food with backbone.

Cajun 30 minutes Serves6-8
Blackened Chicken

Blackened Chicken

The Cajun classic invented by Paul Prudhomme in his New Orleans kitchen in the 1980s, the dish that put smoky char on the American restaurant menu for a decade. You build a bold spice mixture (paprika, garlic, onion, thyme, cayenne, salt and black pepper), dip butterflied chicken breasts in melted butter and press them firmly into the spice rub on both sides. Then they hit a screaming-hot cast-iron skillet for about three minutes per side, where the butter and spices char into a deep mahogany crust that locks the juices in and gives the chicken its defining smoky finish. The technique works equally well on fish (Prudhomme's original was redfish), pork or beef. Eaten sliced over a salad, layered in a sandwich with remoulade, or alongside dirty rice as a proper Cajun plate.

Cajun 21 minutes Serves4
Buttermilk Pancakes

Buttermilk Pancakes

Tall, soft, caramel-coloured pancakes that pour into the kind of weekend breakfast you don't rush. You whisk the dry ingredients in one bowl, the wet (buttermilk, eggs, melted butter, a thread of vanilla) in another, then combine briefly and stop while lumps are still visible. Smooth batter develops gluten and gives you chewy, dense rounds rather than the cloud-soft stack you're after. Ten minutes' rest lets the baking powder and bicarb start working with the buttermilk's acid, which is where the lift comes from. You cook them on a medium-low pan with a small knob of butter, and you flip when bubbles dot the surface and the edges look set. Stack three high, drown in butter and maple syrup, scatter berries if there are any in the fridge. Sunday breakfast, slow morning, second pot of coffee.

American 30 minutes Serves12
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