I cooked supper for myself this evening. The rest of the family voted against anything more exotic than fish and chips. So I did that for them and for myself bought a hake steak from Wards.

I can’t remember where the recipe comes from and if I had it first in The Good Thing’s Cafe but it is one that always goes well. It works best with an old battered terracotta dish – ideally from Spain.

Peel and boil a couple of medium sized potatoes. While they are cooking quarter three good tomatoes, slice a red onion, squash a couple of cloves of garlic and slice up some chilli. Put all this in a bowl together with a quartered lemon. When the potatoes are just cooked drain and quarter them and put them with everything else. Pour over a good few glugs of olive oil, season with salt and pepper and some ground cumin and coriander. Stir well together.

The oven now needs to be hot. Put in the dish to warm up. When it is hot take out to pour in the potato and tomato mix. Put in the oven to cook for about 8 minutes. Season your hake steak and put this on top of the dish and put it back in the oven. It should done in about ten minutes. Sprinkle over some finely chopped parsley and eat.