Squish and stretch the top ends with your fingers, so they become a little thinner, then pinch together. Followers of her social media account have been kept up to date with recent events in Ukraine and the challenges facing her family and friends.

Home Food by Olia Hercules | Waterstones Home Food by Olia Hercules | Waterstones

My brother, however, who also loves cooking, really missed vegetables, so he started making this salad, which is hearty, because of the cooked aubergines and cheese, and fresh, because of the tomatoes. Home Food (Bloomsbury) was written during lockdown and the subtitle ‘recipes to comfort and connect’ was apt then and continues to be the purpose of home cooking.As soon as you see some of the garlic turning golden, reduce the heat or switch it off entirely, and keep swirling until most of the garlic has turned pale gold. When I serve the big jelly for a bunch of close friends or family, I normally give everyone a small plate and a spoon, then we all just, well, jiggle the jelly for fun before diving into it tipsily. It’s the simplest thing with a short ingredients list, but it’s full of flavour and hits all your vegetable needs.

food to raise How Russian and Ukrainian friends are using food to raise

Summer Kitchens contains recipes such as Borsch with duck and smoked pears, Burnt aubergine butter and tomato toast, Pot roast chicken with herb crème fraîche, Nettle, sorrel and wild garlic soup and Poppyseed babka. It was only when I left my family and ended up a student in the UK that I was suddenly drawn to cooking. Olia Hercules owes some of her earliest and fondest memories to the ‘summer kitchens’ of her parents, grandparents, neighbours and friends in Ukraine.I forgot about the leftovers which lurked in the fridge for a few days and when I finally discovered and ate them, I was rewarded with a lovely pickle which had turned bright pink from the pomegranate juice. Get six long, metal skewers and have ready a bowl of warm water to wet your hands, so the meat doesn’t stick to them. She trained at the renowned Leiths School of Food and Wine and then worked as a chef de partie in restaurants, including Ottolenghi, and as a recipe developer before landing a book deal for Mamushka, a cookbook that celebrates her family recipes, from Ukraine and Moldova to Azerbaijan and Uzbekistan. Add the potatoes whole and cook for 10 minutes, or until they are soft, then add the sorrel, nettles and wild garlic and take off the heat.

Recipes – Olia Hercules

I very much doubt you’ll have leftovers, but, if you do, slice and toast the kolach on the second day and slather with butter and marmalade; it also makes a kick-ass bread-and-butter pudding. Another salad which also made for great leftovers – the dressing is seriously good – is made with green beans, apple, fennel and nuts. Ladle over the broth, then sprinkle with the wild garlic flowers (if using), spring onions and herbs.Struggling to find good-quality cottage cheese the day before, I panicked and bought ricotta, and adapted my mum’s original recipe to suit that cheese’s moister texture. Like the best home cooking, it is barely a recipe, ready to bend to whatever ingredients are around, forgiving if measurements are eyeballed, and happy to hang out in the fridge for days. Add the garlic and cook, still stirring, for about two minutes, until fragrant and starting to colour. Alissa Timoshkina and Olia Hercules: ‘Food is an important tool for education,’ Timoshkina says, ‘a basic thing that everyone can relate to. This is half useless, very basic recipes (think pasta with garlic oil), half desserts (like custard and buckwheat cakes).

Home Food by Olia Hercules | Cookbook Corner | Nigella Lawson Home Food by Olia Hercules | Cookbook Corner | Nigella Lawson

Mash the meat around the top of one skewer and work it carefully down its length, so you have an even layer all along the skewer.These days, plain white flour is normally used, but buckwheat flour was popular in the past and it’s healthier, and much more flavoursome. If using a barbecue, wait until the embers have calmed down; they should be glowing red, but there shouldn’t be any flames. We ate this very dish when I was growing up – the sauce both sweet and slightly tart, the green beans cooked rather than steamed as I would prepare them nowadays. Put the butter and oil in the largest, deepest frying pan you have (mine’s a 26cm deep stainless-steel one) on a medium-high heat, until sizzling. If you are using six 200ml glasses, fill them each halfway up; if you are using a one-litre jelly mould, oil it lightly with a brush, especially in all the grooves, but not so much that it pools in the bottom.