More from life

I love sausages!

14 June 2025 9:00 am

‘Sausages,’ my son says to me, leaning forward from the back of the car, with the authority and confidence only…

No, I’m not a British spy

7 June 2025 9:00 am

Dante’s Beach, Ravenna The youngest of our six children, Giuseppe, nine, received the Eucharist for the first time on Sunday.…

It’s time to reclaim tapioca pudding

31 May 2025 9:00 am

‘Nothing will surely ever taste so hateful as nursery tapioca,’ wrote Elizabeth David. She’s not alone in her hatred of…

Pope Francis, my love rival

17 May 2025 9:00 am

To be honest, I felt relief when Pope Francis died. This had nothing much to do with his regular assertion,…

Devilled kidneys: a heavenly breakfast

17 May 2025 9:00 am

Iam standing in my kitchen preparing kidneys for devilling. Snipping their white cores away piece by piece until they come…

The gobsmacking brilliance of baked Alaska

3 May 2025 9:00 am

I have never seen a baked Alaska in the wild. Have you? I knew what they looked like, of course,…

The day the King came to Ravenna

26 April 2025 9:00 am

Dante’s Beach, Ravenna ‘Fortune’s a right whore: If she give aught, she deals it in small parcels,/ That she may…

The simple elegance of fondant potatoes

19 April 2025 9:00 am

In 1999, a relatively unknown American chef wrote an essay in the New Yorker uncovering the secrets of restaurants. ‘Don’t…

Is there sex after 70?

19 April 2025 9:00 am

When I turned 70 in September, I had a panic attack. I was certain that my romantic life was over.…

Golden syrup dumplings: the perfect comfort food

5 April 2025 9:00 am

The Italians have a phrase: ‘brutti ma buoni’. It means ‘ugly but beautiful’, and it’s the name they give to…

Why I won’t accept the Laurels of Dante

22 March 2025 9:00 am

Dante’s Beach, Ravenna I have just refused to accept the local equivalent of an Oscar, which was to have been…

Sole meunière: simple one-pan sophistication

22 March 2025 9:00 am

Picture the scene. The year is 2004. The setting, a British field or maybe a beach. There is a small…

In defence of red velvet cake

8 March 2025 9:00 am

I will admit to having been dismissive of red velvet cake in the past, considering it to be bland in…

The secrets of the perfect potato rösti

22 February 2025 9:00 am

You may be forgiven, if you are a regular reader of this column, for thinking that my primary motivation in…

Drinking with The Chemist – and God

15 February 2025 9:00 am

Dante’s Beach, Ravenna The closest I get to a social life these days is when I sneak off into town…

The time-poor woman’s perfect chocolate cake

8 February 2025 9:00 am

Isn’t it awful that the older you get, the more you know yourself? It’s supposed to be a good thing,…

Hunter’s chicken: the ultimate cheer-me-up-quickly recipe

25 January 2025 9:00 am

Pub food in Britain has had a mixed reputation over the years. For a long time, the most a pub…

My night with Mussolini’s ghost

18 January 2025 9:00 am

Dante’s Beach, Ravenna I came to Italy to write a biography of Benito Mussolini in the summer of 1998 and…

My YouTube rabbit hole

11 January 2025 9:00 am

How do you live with yourself when 179 air passengers are burned alive on a South Korean runway, and you’ve…

January deserves lemon pudding

11 January 2025 9:00 am

January kitchens are my favourite. This isn’t anything against Christmas – I love the spice, the frenzy, the ritual of…

The Spectator’s 2024 Christmas quiz

14 December 2024 9:00 am

  Events, dear boy In 2024: 1. Twenty-two tons of what were stolen from Neal’s Yard in London? 2. Down…

How to make chocolate salami

14 December 2024 9:00 am

For as long as we’ve been serving food, we’ve been unable to resist a bit of culinary deception. Making one…

The glamour of the scallop

30 November 2024 9:00 am

There is a gentle irony to the dish coquilles St Jacques: a decadent, rich preparation of one of our most…

Mince, glorious mince

16 November 2024 9:00 am

Sometimes, when it comes to culinary history, Britain is its own worst enemy. For a long time, British food has…

The slippery business of catching a snake

9 November 2024 9:00 am

Dante’s Beach, Ravenna It is strange how events elide and create a pattern whose significance remains elusive. I had just…