Australian supermarket cucumber pickles taste test: ‘I didn’t think any would be this powerful’

Baby cucumbers, dill gherkins and snacky cornichons are put to a blind taste test by Nicholas Jordan and friends, who find there’s a big leap from sour and salty to ‘unnervingly unnatural’I love pickles. I almost always order pickles and/or ferments on restaurant menus, my fridge is regularly stocked with a zoological range of pickle colours and smells, and I find the idea of eating more than 20 different pickles in a single hour thrilling.But this wasn’t a taste test of pickles: it was a taste test of supermarket aisle cucumber pickles, the Wes Anderson films of the stinky food world. Sure, they’ve got some character, but step into that theatre and everyone knows exactly what they’re about to get, and it isn’t depth.The blind taste test consisted of me and 11 friends eating 21 cucumber pickles

Layer up: spring fillings for filo pies

Filo pies are my go-to for entertaining, but what are the best spring fillings? The wonderful thing about filo pies and tarts is that they look fancy even when they’re knocked up from just a handful of ingredients, they require little more than a green salad to please and, much like the rest of us, they really do benefit from some downtime. “They’re even better at room temperature because the flavour evolves,” says Rosie Kellett, author of In for Dinner, which also makes them perfect for dodging any last-minute entertaining scrambles.Kellett likes to wrap as many spring greens as possible in filo, along with cheese and hot honey butter. “The key to getting a really delicious filo tart or pie is a flavoured butter,” she says, so, rather than simply painting melted butter between every filo sheet so it goes nice and crisp in the oven, she also adds honey and harissa. (In a similar vein, if your pie or tart involves mushrooms, take your lead from Feast columnist Georgina Hayden, who uses butter flavoured with thyme and Marmite

Rukmini Iyer’s quick and easy recipe for gildas in carriages | Quick and easy

Gildas are such a lovely pre-dinner snack: really good olives and anchovies on a stick, with any number of variations, such as artichokes, sun-dried tomatoes, bits of cheese … The one I had most recently, at Brett in Glasgow, was beyond wonderful, and featured chicken fat-topped croutons and homemade green chilli sauce with plump Perelló olives and anchovies. Inspired by this, I made a lemon-spiked green chilli and artichoke tapenade for hot focaccia, topped with the same excellent olives and the best anchovies.I don’t usually specify brands in my recipes, but when there are so few ingredients, it really is worth getting the ones recommended below as a treat. They’re very rich, too, so a few go a long way.Prep 15 min Cook 20 min Serves 6 as a starter or pre-drink snack250g focaccia 125g jarred artichokes in olive oil (drained weight), plus 25ml oil from the jar1 tsp sea salt flakes Juice of ½ lemon1-2 large green chillies, depending on your tolerance to heat150g tinned green olives (drained weight; from a 350g tin) – I like Perelló1-2 47½g tins anchovies in oil (27g drained weight) – I like OrtizHeat the oven to 200C (180C fan)/390F/gas 6

‘For indulgence, brioche is king’ – the sweet, buttery bread stealing sourdough’s crown

Once an indicator of wealth, but for years stuck in burger-bun purgatory, the enriched dough is being embraced by a new generation of chefs and bakers for its versatility and delicious complexity‘You shouldn’t have to fight your sandwich,” says Sacha Yonan, his voice rising to compete with the noise of London’s Soho on a Tuesday morning. Within half an hour, queues for the sandwiches at Crunch, the sandwich shop he co-founded earlier this year, will be snaking out of its doors. Its secret? Fresh brioche, which comes toasted and filled with ingredients that give the place its name, including southern-fried chicken, baby pickles and lettuce. “We love a sourdough,” says Joni Francisco, Crunch’s head of food. “But if you’re talking about sandwiches, then you need something with an easier mouthfeel

Richard Goodman obituary

My brother Richard Goodman, who has died aged 87, played a leading role in introducing New Zealand wine to Britain, beginning in the early 1980s.At that time, New Zealand wine was practically unobtainable in the UK and was certainly not to be found on supermarket shelves. Today, it is top of the league table in Britain in terms of sales of white wines by value.Richard moved to London in 1980, and took up a position with Cooks New Zealand Wine, the first NZ producer to venture into this tough, nascent market. In 1986 he transferred to Montana, a bigger producer now known as Brancott Estate

How to make the perfect pasta al limone – recipe | Felicity Cloake's How to make the perfect …

Al limone (no translation needed) is perhaps the perfect primo for this time of year, when we’re still waiting for the produce to catch up with the temperatures. The zesty citrus sings of the south, of heavy yellow fruit against a blue Mediterranean sky, while the butter gives just enough richness to make up for any chilly spring breezes. As Nigella observes, this is a dish that can “equally offer summer sprightliness or winter comfort”.Although I happen to agree with Daniel Gritzer when he writes on Serious Eats that “a satiny butter sauce like this pairs better with fresh noodles”, I wouldn’t turn down Catherine Phipps and Nigella Lawson’s dried linguine, nor Rachel Roddy’s dried (or fresh!) tagliatelle in her second book, Two Kitchens, nor even the River Cafe Classic Italian Cookbook’s dried pici. (Pici, Rose Gray and Ruth Rogers explain, “is a handmade pasta, made with plain flour and water, which is only found in Tuscany” – though bucatini, they allow, may be substituted)