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The Dutch have always been smart when it comes to saving energy and cooking is no different. The Dutch oven is a practice of preparing your food in an energy-efficient manner. You basically bring your food to boil for about 15 to 30 seconds with the lid on the pot. Then you turn off your stove and you keep the pot hot, lid on, with some sort of thermal insualtion around or at least underneath it. The insulation is especially useful for outdoor cooking, during trips, for food that doesn’t need a lot of boiling. It’s also very useful during regular cooking if you want to save energy, avoid frying the food on the bottom of the pot and prevent the contents of the pot from boiling over. I have tried it at home with pasta, no insulation whatsoever, and it works great. Next time I shall try to reproduce the experiment with rice.

Thank you Roger Caffin for the tip.

Yesterday, upon recovering from a terrible hangover I cooked an interesting pasta salad that turned out to be very tasty. You need:

• Pasta (250 g). I recommend farfalle or fusilli – even better in three colours.
• A can of tuna (130 g)
• A can of Mexico salad: sweet corn, peas and paprika (250 g)
• Sour cream (150 ml)
• One table spoon of butter
• Basil and oregano
• Parmesan cheese

The quantities are for a double meal (two people). Boil the pasta, drain it when it’s done, put it back in the pot you used for boiling it and add the butter. Stir. Open the cans, drain the tuna and the Mexico salad, then put them in a bowl and add the sour cream. Add basil and oregano to taste. Stir. Put the pasta in the dishes and place the tuna and salad sauce over it. Add Parmesan cheese around the sauce, over the pasta. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Serve.

I wrote this recipe for Fabien & Valentina and I thought of sharing it with you. In order to make rice cake, you need:

• a glass* of rice
• 3 eggs
• 50-150 grams of coconut
• 1/2-1/3 glass of wheat, barley or rye flakes (improvise)
• 100-150 grams of cottage or riccota cheese
• 100 grams of sweet cream
• 100 grams of raisins or other chopped dried fruit (improvise)
• 50 grams of nuts or seeds (improvise)
• some amount of sugar or honey to taste
• some amount of milk
• some flavourings if you like

*1 glass = a 200 ml glass

Boil the rice, drain it. Put the rice in a bowl, add the eggs; stir. Add the cocnut; stir. Add the cottage/riccota cheese and the sweet cream; stir. Add the raisins, nuts and flakes and then stir and add milk if necessary. The mixture should have the consistency of cottage cheese. You can add the sugar or honey and the flavourings at the end. You shouldn’t put too much sugar or honey if you plan to serve it with jam on top. Get a deep baking tray and some cooking paper (I have the waxed, brown kind). Put the paper in the tray and pour the mixture inside. Bake for at least 40 minutes. Let it rest for another 30 minutes in the oven after you turned off the heat in order to become solid. Cut the desired amount into pieces and serve with some fruit jam on top. My personal favourites are blackcurrant or blueberry jam with whole fruits. Rice cake is particulary good with tea so it’s great to serve it at tea parties.

Feel free to improvise as much as you like.